Newbie question about 939 vs. 940

[imported_boe]

Hello,

I'm thinking about getting my first AMD system since my 386-40 MANY years ago.

I was thinking about building an entirely new system - possibly a 4600 x2. I'd like to plan towards potential upgrades. I heard AMD was done with the 939 after their latest chip and were going 940. If this is so, any word on when the x2 version of the 940's are coming out?

 

[ayabe]

Slightly incorrect, 939 isn't being replaced by 940 it's being replaced with AM2 - which will support DDR2 and some other tweaks. These won't be out until around June. 939 will still be a valid platform for some time to come and AM2 might have a short lifespan since DDR3 should be here shortly thereafter.

940 also requires registered DDR which is much more expensive than non-registered. If I were building a completely new system I wouldn't have any qualms about going 939.

 

[JAG87]

wrong again...
AM2 is a 940 pin socket, so you can call it 940. Just dont get confused between AM2 and the actual socket 940 for opterons. Those like you said require ECC ram.

I doubt we will see DDR3 until 2008, most likely it will be arising at the same time 45nm technology will be stepping in.
Your looking at:
939 = 90nm + DDR
AM2 = 90/65nm + DDR2
future sockets = 45nm + DDR3

The first chips for AM2 in May/June will be released in 90 nm. It wont be until the end of this year, or possibly early 2007 that 65nm AMD chips will come out. Intel's 45nm is kickin in Q2 2007, so I would expect AMD's 45nm to come in Q1 2008. This is roughly the same time we will see DDR3.

AM2 operates at 333 mhz bus speed, and of course you can use 667 mhz DDR2 modules. now some people will tell you that A64 is not hungry for bandwith, rather it likes tight timings. I beg to differ. Nobody has ever tried running an A64 at 333 bus speed. The most you can overclock a board to today is 300 mhz, if you cool the chipset properly. But you ram cannot do 1:1 with that fsb (the most you can get ram to is 240-250) So your ram is bottlenecking the mobo + cpu. We will have to wait and see, wont we?

Now that you know the facts a bit better, make your decision.

 

[ayabe]

Originally posted by: JAG87
wrong again...
AM2 is a 940 pin socket, so you can call it 940. Just dont get confused between AM2 and the actual socket 940 for opterons. Those like you said require ECC ram.
Now that you know the facts a bit better, make your decision.

Noone in their right mind would refer to AM2 as socket 940 which is what he was referring to.

Also the new socket 1207 Opterons will support DDR3 and could be here as soon as May.

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=29346

 

[JAG87]

the memory controller might support ddr3, but i doubt we will see any chipsets or motherboards with ddr3 slots for a while...

and yes, you would not refer to it as socket 940, but you could call it a socket with 940 pins.

 

[ayabe]

Originally posted by: JAG87
the memory controller might support ddr3, but i doubt we will see any chipsets or motherboards with ddr3 slots for a while...

and yes, you would not refer to it as socket 940, but you could call it a socket with 940 pins.

Well here's to hoping :beer: I would much rather skip DDR2 altogether.