Out of the Game for a while. What core to buy?

[Wicked2010]

So I'm in the market for an AMD machine.

Haven't decided on single core or dual core yet.

It will be primarily used for gaming.

I see the Venice and the San Diego core are out in full force.

What core do you guys recommend... and more importantly... why?

 

[Geomagick]

It more depends on your budget really than which core to go for.

Venice is single core 512k cache
San Diego is single core 1024k cache

Manchester is 512k x 2 dual core
Toledo is 1024k x 2 dual core

If you have a high budget I would reccomend going for a dual core chip, if however you are seriously constrained budget wise then a Venice will still be excellent.

 

[Finns14]

Well I know everyone always say "You will be waiting for the rest of your life for the next big thing to come down in price" but in all honesty AM2 comes out in June I believe and I am waiting till then to get my X2 or dual core opty.

 

[996GT2]

Single Core S939-Venice; cheaper than San Diego, and the 512k L2 is not really a performance deficit to the 1MB in the San Diegos. Also the San Diego processors start at the 3700+, so you'd be paying a lot compared to OCing a Venice 3200+.

Also for single core you could go for Venus core if you want to Overclock. Venus core is identical to San Diego Core, but comes in lower clock speeds so you can pay less for an Opty 146 and OC it to FX57 speeds.

Dual Core S939-Manchester or Denmaek. The 2006 Manchester X2s OC very well, and the same can be said about the Opteron 1XX series dual core processors. The Opterons come with a very nice 4 Heatpipe heatsink tho, which evens out their slightly higher price.

 

[sourceninja]

i just got a AMD64 X2 4400. Its very nice.

 

[Luckyboy1]

Originally posted by: Finns14
Well I know everyone always say "You will be waiting for the rest of your life for the next big thing to come down in price" but in all honesty AM2 comes out in June I believe and I am waiting till then to get my X2 or dual core opty.

I think Finns brings up a very important point. When do you plan to do the build and for what games?

 

[Twsmit]

The amount of L2 cache isnt that significant, the raw clockspeed ismore of an indicator of performance. Right now the most affordable cores seem to be the 3200, 3500 and 3700. Go with whichever makes the most bang for the buck sense for your budget. Anyway you go a socket 939 chip wont disappoint you.

 

[Ultralight]

If it is primarily for gaming single core will do you very fine.

 

[potato28]

X2 3800+ is the best X2 for the amount of $$ that youll put out for the AMD dual cores.