New Build Aroung the E8400 CPU

[Fern]

I?m planning on building a rig around the Intel E8400 CPU. This rig will NOT be OC?d, it?s for office/work use and will use Win XP as the OS.

Now, it?s been a while since I?ve last been into building and Oc'ing, and that was with AMD Barton chips. I want to make sure I?ve got the ?math? and other things down pat before I proceed.

CPU
The E8400 specs says FSB speed of 1333 MHz, which I understand to actually be only 333 MHz. (BTW: that seems slow to me after running at better 400 MHz with the old AMD stuff?)

Ram Questions
Ram? I see DDR2 800 being recommended. If my math is correct, that?s really a FSB speed of 400? Is this faster ram recommended for OC headroom?

CPU & Ram in synch or not? With the older AMD systems better performance was obtained by keeping the CPU & ram synch. But IIRC, because of the P4?s long pipelines, they worked better with faster ram ? I.e. asynch.

Do these new Intel chips work better in synch or asynch (ram faster than CPU)?

Dual channel? What?s the story here with these new Intel chips? Didn?t really help with the older AMD architecture, but I understood the P4?s benefited from it back then.

Since I?ll be running XP, I?m thinking ram @ 2 sticks of 1 gig.

How important is the ram?s timing? Possibly a budget concern, as I assume the faster costs more.

What about DDR3?


Mobo
Mobo chipset. I?m hearing the P35 is best. Any disagreement?

I?m looking for integrated graphics since I don?t have any PCIe gfx cards handy and seems a waste to purchase one for general office use. But this looks to have fallen out of favor; I?ve found only one mobo with an IGP. The mobo is a Gigabyte GA-G33M-DS2R. However, when I checked the specs at the Egg, the Northbridge wasn?t listed as P35, it showed G33. But I see on reviews for the mobo:

?The P35 chipset featuring onboard graphics is called the G33. G33 features the same specs as the P35 in addition to DirectX 10 complaint integrated graphics core.?

Anybody familiar with this? (I ask because the specs are NOT always right. I?m in the middle of returning a mobo because the seller?s data was wrong about the CPU socket. PITA)

Anybody familiar with this Gigabyte mobo?

PSU
I?m thinking this will be a pretty light system, I?ve got a nice Enermax 420 watt PSU lying around I think will do the job nicely. Anybody disagree? BTW: Which rail are these new Intel chips drawing from? In the old days they mostly used the 5v rail, while the AMD?s I worked with pulled mostly from the 12v rail. How many watts should be looking for the 5 & 12 volt rails with these new Intel CPUs?

Dang, just realized I better check the connectors, 20 pin or 24 pin or whatever the mobo's are using now

T.I.A.

Fern

 

[DarkRogue]

E8400 is indeed 1333MHz or 333 FSB. I'm pretty sure the old AMD ones were 400 quad pumped or 100FSB, as they usually had really high multipliers to even it out.

DDR2-800 is recommended because it's the easiest way to overclock the E8400 to 3.6GHz. Up FSB to 400 to match DDR2-800 and you're done (vcore increases aside.)
If you're never going to OC, DDR2-667 is good enough, but get whatever is cheaper, I believe the DDR2-800 can run slower.
I firmly believe 1:1/synch is the best way to run anything.

Dual channel memory has been around for a while (even 5 years ago when I built my Athlon XP 2600+ system.) Just use 2 sticks of similar dual-channel capable ram in the proper slots on the mobo and you get a performance boost. 2x2GB for 4GB is relatively cheap nowadays if you want to go for it.

RAM timing really matters in benchmarks, not real-world productivity or gaming.

DDR3 is overpriced atm.

P35 is a good all-around chipset and is relatively affordable, which is why it's recommended.

If you don't like the integrated graphics offerings, you could pick up a cheapish PCI/AGP card, or find someone selling an old PCI-e video card on the for sale forums for cheap.

380w is enough to power the overclocked rig in my sig, 430 is more than enough for a very light office work PC.

Hope this helps.

 

[Denithor]

FSB 333 means you need minimum DDR2-667 to run 1:1. DDR2-800 will scale downward and costs about the same, plus it will give a little room at the top if you decide to OC.

Concerning dual channel, just buy a 2x1GB or 2x2GB kit and you're done. Even with the memory limitation in XP I would suggest 2x2GB because it's just so cheap (and the extra 1-1.5GB of usable memory will actually help in many applications). Ram timing has very little effect except in memory-intensive applications (F@H, other crunchers see a small improvement but no difference in general use).

Do Not bother with DDR3, it's overpriced and just not necessary at this time (for sure if you aren't overclocking).

If you don't want a separate video card (you're right, this is overkill for a general use system) go with either a G33 or G35 chipset motherboard. Gigabyte, Asus, and Intel all make good models that are available on Newegg.

For powersupply, you're better off with a new one that has higher amps on the 12V line (3.3V and 5V are almost unused these days). Pick up one with at least 350W from a good maker (Seasonic, Corsair, OCZ, Antec).



Or, for a general use, non-overclocked system, just buy a Dell/HP/etc and call it a day. This is often cheaper and you can get one with a deal on a nice large LCD monitor and OS already installed.

 

[myocardia]

Originally posted by: DarkRogue
I'm pretty sure the old AMD ones were 400 quad pumped or 100FSB, as they usually had really high multipliers to even it out.

AMD has never tried the "quad-pumped" lie. Their Athlon XP's ranged from as low as a 133 Mhz FSB to a 200 Mhz FSB, assuming we don't include those 500 first XP's they made, that had a 100 MHz FSB, that noone bought.

Fern, your FSB was ~200 Mhz on your Athlon XP. Your RAM was/is running @ ~200 Mhz, ~400 Mhz DDR.

 

[Fern]

Thanks guys :thumbsup:

I think you've covered it all.

myocardia, yeah it's been a while and I remembered incorrectly. Good news in a way, the FSB thingy has been bugging me. 333 MHz now sounds like a real improvement over 200 MHz. Now that you've reminded me, a FSB of 240 MHz was good OC back then.

Thanks again,

(and yeah, I'll check out a Dell, but that won't be as much fun )

Fern

 

[Denithor]

Originally posted by: Fern
(and yeah, I'll check out a Dell, but that won't be as much fun )

Fern

Yeah, the fun factor is why I keep building my own instead of buying. These days you can get a quite good box from any of the OEMs with prices that are staggering when you consider what you're getting (I saw a Dell Q6600 system with 24" LCD + FS for like $650 about a month ago).

Now, this evening I get to pull the e6400/IP35-E/4x1GB HP outa my box and replace with a shiny new e8400/IP35 Pro/2x2GB mushkin and start bumping up the speed to see how high it will go.

:beer:

 

[DarkRogue]

Thanks for the info myocardia - never knew that.

 

[DarkRogue]

Whoops, doublepost.
GG internet. Mods, please delete this if possible.

 

[Gillbot]

Most of it's been covered already so i'll come in a day late and toss my $0.02 into the mix.

With DDR2-400, you have extra OC headroom but you can also go with more aggressive timings at lower FSB speeds. Usually DDR2-400 is cheaper also since it's more "in demand" from what i've seen. More specials and sales, etc.