Socket 939 vs 754

[seethoe]

I'm thinking of upgrading my PC. i was toying with AMD Athlon64 3200+ with MSI Neo2 Platinum for sometime but from the forum there's opinion that just stick with socket 754.

What's the major difference between the two? should i just upgrade to socket 754 or to 939 immediately, really need some input here...

 

[Tarrant64]

It depends on whether you want to upgrade to the latest things in the future. Eventually 939 will have all the latest stuff(which, actually it does right now). But if you just want something to upgrade to for now, and don't mind upgrading in the new few years to a whole new computer, i say stick with 754. There isn't that much of a difference to justify 939 over 754 except the upgradability. People will say 754 will be phased out, but it's not gonna be like that at all. AMD would've have released the sempron line of processors if that was gonna happen. For cryin' out loud, Socket A is still around.

Anyways, 939 if you want the newest stuff around and want a processor to last a long while. if you just want a quick upgrade and the same performance go 754. it's cheaper and it will still last a long while yet.

 

[ts3433]

S939 has Winchesters, but S754 has the DFI Lanparty board. (Overclocking may still be slightly in favor of Winchester.)

S939 has PCIe right now, but S754 should get it in the future. (Regardless, AGP still has plenty of life.)

S939 is going to accomodate new CPUs for a while to come, and S754 tops out at 3700+ for the Athlon 64 line and was supposed to get the new Semprons, but it looks like they may move to S939 as well. (This may be of concern.)

 

[hundesau]

major difference would be the dual channel, which the 754 lacks. in praxis dual channel wont bring u much more speed but its nice to have of course. furthermore u can get an 939 board with nforce ultra or kt800pro chipset which means that it has 1000mhz hyper link. makes no sense for unocced systems but is nice to have. socket 754 and 939 are available with nforce 3 chipsets and chipsets from VIA aswell. if u go for the new nvidia nforce 4 chipset ur goin to have a different graphics card connector, called pci express. intel has this system already on many of there boards and its goin to b the future, the old AGP is almost dead, most cards will come out with pcie port and in like 1 year or so u b lucky to still get an agp card. uhm...what was my point....ya: if u choose nforce 4 it will have pcie system and iam not sure but here in europe pcie graphic cards tend to be cheaper than agp versions. via brought out pcie chipsets too, but i dont know when exactly the first boards will be available.
one thing i forgot to mention is that for socket 754 there are only Newcastle CPU`s. On socket 939 there are Newcastles (size = 130micrometer) and tehre are the newer CPU´s called Winchester (90micrometer). Winchesters are better cuz they consume less power, get a lil less hot and will be slightly faster (not much, like 2% or so). My advice to u to buy something like 3000+. The difference regarding speed to the 3200+ is less than the rating may tell, i mean, the 3200+ is not much faster, so if u want to save a lil money, better get a 3000+ and buy a nice cooler. If u really need extra speed u can overclock the 3000+ and again it wont matter if u take a 32+ or a 30+, cuz both will be nice to overclock. hope u understand my point .

so my advice, if u want to save each Cent go for an 754 board, i guess the 754 boards will be the cheapest to find. CPU prices are very similiar, 754 cpu`s and 939 cpus and even winchester cost all the same...maybe differences of some bucks. Concerning speeds: 754 systems wont be much slower than 939 systems, maybe overall 5%. If u have the money for an 939 system, dont hesitate and get one of these. Id suggest u get something like aMSI K8N NEO 2-54G Platinum S939 NFORCE3 ULTRA or an cheaper ABit AV8 with kt800pro. Both are excellent boards with all features. uhm...get a winchester CPU. if u go for socket 939.

If ur interested in buying an pcie graphics card like an 6600gt or better - its no problem with the nforce 4 boards just coming out these days. here in europe these are hard to get, costing about 130,-$ with SLI and the cheapest version without SLI for about 75 bucks - geze iam not starting with explaining SLI too....maybe u heard of it...pcie is working fine and i guess u wont need SLI already. PCIE is not better eg faster than agp at this point of time but it gives u more opportunities to upgrade ur pc when its necessary. same counts for 939 system, as socket 754 is slowly dieing and no more processor upgrades will come out for that socket.

ok, hope you understand my explanations...maybe not..but i swear they true .

 

[seethoe]

hundesau: yes, i got what u meant.

i have the same prob here. The nForce3 mobo + AGP card is cheaper than nForce4 mobo + PCIe card. I do plan to OC , so i guess the 1Ghz hyberlink and dual channel DDR is important.

one opinion: how much can Athlon64 3200+ oc to? and 3000+?

thanks, i think i shall invest in Socket 939....

 

[hundesau]

i agree socket 939 is the best choice when u got the lil extra money, concerning oc the winchester 3000+ has shown excellent results. it has reached up to 4000+ niveau. Of course nobody can tell u how high u can clock a cpu cuz it always depends on the one u got, some go better some not, but results of alot of people i know are promising a good overclock performance. the 3200+ should have the same abilities as my guess is that they used the same processors and just labeled 50% as 3000+ and 50% as 3200+. Maybe naive but the point is that the difference is little and both are good overclockers and will reach similiar results. the boards i mentioned are good for overclocking, cuz they have agp&pci lock. the msi platinum is a lil better but the abit is still a top s939 board.

 

[seethoe]

hundesau: this means i should get a 3000+ since its cheaper and perform similar to 3200+? I plan to use the stock HSF and later get better ones...

ive seen some good review on the MSI.

 

[ts3433]

The stock HSF should propel any Winchester to at least 2.4GHz. Often it can push them to the current air cooling top-out range of 2.6-2.7 GHz.

Good NF3 boards for overclocking include the MSI K8N Neo Platinum and the Epox EP-9NDA3+ (nick1985 has his and a 3000+ Winchester at 300MHz HTT). I'm sure VIA-based boards are okay too, but it's generally agreed that nVidia chipsets are better.

 

[seethoe]

wow, so i should get the 3000+ and save some money...

 

[hundesau]

yap, i think u can save the extra money and buy a nice cooler. btw i must disagree to ts3433. VIA vs Nvidia is not a big deal. For the average user and even for the overclocker there is no big difference between a nforce3 ultra chipset or a VIA kt800pro. the speed is the same, maybe 1% more for nvidia, can u tell the difference? the features are similar, nvidia has nxbit, which is an hardware antivirus protection, nice to have i agree but it wont save u from having antivirus tools installed or having a firewall. So why is nvidia more expensive? cuz nvidia knows taht there enuff people who will still buy it due to nvidias big name and fame, VIA on the other hand knows that there b guys buyin their boards cuz they are a lil cheaper. Most reviews concluded when comparing the ABIT AV8, Asus A8V and the MSI Neo2 PLatinum that the Platinum wins but very close and that Asus and Abit share the 2nd rank and that the overall differenes are that small and mostly not within the chipset but within board design or stuff like that, that if u want to save some money it wont hurt u to buy an VIA based motherboard.

so u got 2 options, if u have the extra money buy the nvidia branded board but if u think, hey why spend 20$ just for havin a nvidia sticker to put on my case go for an via chipset. in praxis u will have all the required features and speed regardless which chipset, differences are minimal and thoise features u dont have with via, like nxbit u wont miss them anyways. maybe u just look how much it would cost ya and decide then but remember its not the price that makes the thing be good or bad - the features and performance are almost the same and in most cases not worth extra money.

 

[seethoe]

hundesau: thanks man, you have been a great help to me. Before i read your posting, i asked the same question, getting the 3000+ or the 3200+ on the MSI K8N Neo2. I think i've more or less decided on the 3000+.

 

[hundesau]

yep, think the 3000+ will make it, i have some european reviews that achieved the same results when occing the 3000+ like this one here from hexus.net: http://www.hexus.net/content/r...05MzMmdXJsX3BhZ2U9OA==
as i said, the 3000+ when unocced provides u with good performance already, if u need more speed somewhen in the future u can easily overclock it and it wont make a difference then if u have a 3200+ that u want to oc or if its a 3000+. U will reach similiar oc results. it will not be that a 3200+ will be occable up 4200+ and the 3000+ will go up to 4000+, both will reach the end at like 4000+ maximum i guess. So saving cash is a reasonable decision.

 

[roninmagik1]

Thanks for this thread, i've learned alot!!! I had pretty much the same questions in my head as seethoe =)