Lowest speed pentium 4 for games?

[Morfik]

What is the lowest speed Intel processor I can buy that will give me solid gaming performance if used with an Asus P4P800 deluxe, 512 Mb DDR 400 and a Radeon 9700 pro? Would 2.4C Ghz do or can I go lower?

 

[Morfik]

Which is the better way to go?

Get a gig of high quality ram and a slower CPU (2.4c Ghz P4) or get 512 Mb of Ram with an Athlon 64 3000+???

 

[DaveSimmons]

An A64 3000+ is as fast or faster than a P4 3.2C for gaming, and you can add RAM sticks one at a time since it's single-channel. And only a few games benefit from 1 GB right now. So the A64 is a much better choice.

...and from what I've read the Asus K8V is a good motherboard for A64.

 

[Markfw]

Originally posted by: DaveSimmons
An A64 3000+ is as fast or faster than a P4 3.2C for gaming, and you can add RAM sticks one at a time since it's single-channel. And only a few games benefit from 1 GB right now. So the A64 is a much better choice.

...and from what I've read the Asus K8V is a good motherboard for A64.

Yup, ditto. I should know......

 

[Acanthus]

It would depend on the games you play, Simcity 4, Dark age of camelot, Everquest, Battlefield 1942, and a few others do require more than 512MB of memory to run at max settings. Youre running a good graphics card so a 2.6C (the best intel value atm) is what i would reccomend.

 

[robcy]

Originally posted by: DaveSimmons
An A64 3000+ is as fast or faster than a P4 3.2C for gaming, and you can add RAM sticks one at a time since it's single-channel. And only a few games benefit from 1 GB right now. So the A64 is a much better choice.

...and from what I've read the Asus K8V is a good motherboard for A64.

My choice

 

[Morfik]

those of you who have read my previous posts from the past couple of days know that I am torn between Athlon 64 3000+ and some average Intel like 2.4C or 2.6C. Now obviously the Athlon is the better CPU for performance, but then again I'll be able to upgrade any pentium 4 I buy to a better one or a "Prescott" later on (with an Asus P4P800 deluxe etc), something I won't be able to do with the AMD processor.

I don't know whether I should just go for the AMD CPU right now and have to spend a lot of cash for a MB and CPU later or just buy an average P4 and have an option to upgrade by just replacing the CPU later on....

any thoughts???

 

[robcy]

The AMD64 3000+ uses a 754 socket that was just introduced. The AMD XP with the socket A is the one that is being replaced. The 3000+ is only the second (3200+ was first) CPU in the new line of AMD64 processors. This is just the begining of what is to come for the socket 754. And with the memory controller on the chip the boards are not expensive at all. ESC 755A, and neither are the chips AMD 64 3000+

 

[DaveSimmons]

Your Prescott upgrade won't be much faster than the A64 3000+ though, and will be expensive at first ($400+ for something faster than the A64). It could be 9-12 months before you can buy a noticeably faster gaming P4 for the same price as the A64 you buy today.

By then A64 3400+ - 3600+ will be cheap too 🙂

Can you budget stretch to A64, K8V, and 768 MB? Then BF1942 will run at max speed too.

 

[cockeyed]

I have a P4P800 with a 2.6c and 9800np. Before the 2.6c, it had a 1.6a installed. I only play Tiger Woods 2004 which needs a lot of power; I saw some change, but nothing earth shattering. Benchmarks are higher, but I don't run/play benchmarks. The nice thing is that the 9800 scales well with the CPU and I don't think it has yet topped out. I saw a chart somewhere that showed the 9800 performance still rising with a P4-3ghz. I would think the 9700 Pro is aprox the same as the 9800np. I would get a 2.4c or 2.6c to use with your DDR400 ram. You always have the option of using the auto OC feature in the P4P800's BIOS to get another 5-30% more. I don't oc, but from what I read, many people get 3+ghz out of these without much effort.