transitory upgrade

[greyfade]

i've been giving this upgrade a lot of thought lately, especially since i recently figured out why my SATA is so slow.

i thought this might be the best place to get some advice on my upgrade path.

as my system is now, i'm running an unfavorably-viewed linux distribution with kernel 2.6.11-ck4 (at the moment 😉 ) and everything configured just the way i like it. on the hardware side, i've got an aging MSI KT2-Combo-L with an Athlon XP 2100+ and an almost obsolescent GeForce FX 5900. ever since AMD started pushing their socket 939 platforms, i've been driveling over the benchmarks and reviews, and i want to make the move to that platform - maybe up to an SLI setup at some point.

right now, what i'm considering doing is to make the move to an SLI-capable platform over a very long period of time. i don't have much of a budget, so this has to happen piecewise.

i've decided that this might be a good progression: get a solid socket-939 motherboard and a matching 90nm CPU straight off - probably as cheap as possible. but the hitch is that i can't afford a PCI-Express video card anytime soon. so the motherboard needs to be an AGP solution. then, save up and get myself a nice new pair of BallistiX RAM, and then when i can afford a cheap PCI-Express video card, make the switch to a higher-end SLI-capable motherboard, and later on to the (by now, hopefully) very cheap Athlon 64 X2.

again, it's a long-term transition, so i want to make sure i get it right each step of the way.

what might some of you more experienced folks suggest for the first step? a socket-939 motherboard that is solid, well-established, and has an AGP slot suitable for my setup would be ideal - i have four hard drives (40GB PATA, 80GB PATA, 160GB SATA, 200GB SATA, all Seagates) and a DVD+RW drive (a BenQ DW400a, if it matters). it needs to have a solid SATA controller that is friendly to Seagate drives (unlike my Adaptec 1210SA controller), at least one built-in NIC (needed for my rather obtuse network), and be fully supported by a linux 2.6 series kernel. once i phase it out, i'd like to reuse it in a second computer - eventually - so it needs to be reliable as well. i've heard the Athlon 64 3200+ 90nm is very cheap and overclockable, so overclockability would be a bonus, but not really that big of a deal. what might you guys suggest?

also, i'm curious if it's possible to run a motherboard like this single-channel until i can afford a RAM upgrade? i've only got one 512MB stick of PC2700 DDR that i can use for this upgrade, and if i can save a hundred or two here, that'd be a huge bonus as well. i haven't heard if this is doable, so i'd like to know if i'm just dreaming about the impossible. 🙂

anyway, thanks for reading my driveling post, and thanks in advance for any advice you can offer. 🙂

 

[xsilver]

any s939 board is going to be dual core capable so you wont have to upgrade again for that
however if you dont want to upgrade your video card and want to stick with AGP only to upgrade your board again, it might be a waste
therefore if you HAVE to get a AGP s939 as a short term solution then just get something cheap like
http://www2.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813128286
but seeing as how you want to plan for the long term, I dont know how thats going to work out

if you could find a way to sell your 5900 and get a mid range PCI-E card to replace it, (one that will be about the same speed as the 5900. eg.x700 or 6600GT) then you may be better off in the long term as you could get a board like this
http://www2.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813136151
or this
http://www2.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813136157
which everyone here at AT recommends highly

 

[greyfade]

first, thank you for the suggestions. i was already considering that specific DFI for the long-term, but i need an AGP board for the short term.

the idea (which i might not have gotten across) is to move to socket 939 with minimal investment and then move to SLI once i have the funds for a PCI-express video card. the waste in this case is only ~$100 - seems reasonable. i tend to like holding on to my old video cards since they work exceptionally well as replacements for backup or additional systems. 🙂 (for example, i still use my old i740 for emergencies.)

again, thanks for the suggestino on the Giga-Byte part. but my other question remains unanswered: will it run single-channel, at least temporarily? i've never seen a clear answer to this question anywhere. :\

 

[xsilver]

Originally posted by: greyfade
first, thank you for the suggestions. i was already considering that specific DFI for the long-term, but i need an AGP board for the short term.

the idea (which i might not have gotten across) is to move to socket 939 with minimal investment and then move to SLI once i have the funds for a PCI-express video card. the waste in this case is only ~$100 - seems reasonable. i tend to like holding on to my old video cards since they work exceptionally well as replacements for backup or additional systems. 🙂 (for example, i still use my old i740 for emergencies.)

again, thanks for the suggestino on the Giga-Byte part. but my other question remains unanswered: will it run single-channel, at least temporarily? i've never seen a clear answer to this question anywhere. :\

if you have only 1 stick of 512 ram, there can be no way of dual channel as it requires 2 near identical sticks to run.... s939 supports dual channel (unlike s754) so if you get a stick that is very similar to the one you have now, yes you will be able to run dual channel

but then again, since its pc2700... i dont know if you want to keep that for the long term as it will degrade performance by about 10%

and when you say your willing to waste $100 on the transitionary mobo, you dont have to do that if you get rid of the 5900, yes its hard to let go, but you can get something of equivalent value for around $150 (6600gt) so if you sell your 5900 for around $50 you can get the DFI mobo and not have to mess around with too many mobo changes

 

[greyfade]

ok, thanks for the clarification. i thought that was the case, but i was hoping i could put off the memory upgrade for later.

also, i don't plan for this being long-term. again, i intend to upgrade piecewise to a more powerful system, one small step at a time - which is why i chose to upgrade the motherboard twice.

 

[imported_Gelfling]

Also, don't forget that you will need a new power supply with the 939 (or use your existing and run the risk of insuff power).

 

[greyfade]

it's a 500-watt supply, but point taken. i had planned to switch it for a more stable powersupply at some point anyway.