Upgrade from socket A to AM2-S939?

[Heff2k]

I have been waiting until the 939 prices have come down and now they have but my new question is to go with 939 or AM2. @ Mwave I can get a AM2 3500 combo for roughly same price as S939 setup, what should I do?
Currently running a Athlon xp Barton 2500.

 

[larciel]

only reason you should choose s939 is if you want to recycle your currrent system memory. otherwise, get am2

 

[Heff2k]

So original DDR will not work in AM2?

 

[stevty2889]

Originally posted by: Heff2k
So original DDR will not work in AM2?

Nope, AM2 uses DDR-2.

 

[Heff2k]

Well that's another $100 or so, anyone notice a difference in DDR2 value and high end?

 

[the Chase]

I'd go with some value DDR2-667. I don't have AM2 but from what I've read lately AM2 CPU's are not nearly as sensitive to timings (esp. CAS) as were the 939 CPU's. Of course you also have to look at Intel's new Conroe CPU coming soon.......

 

[Heff2k]

Yes the preview benchmarks are impressive, especially if I need more then just mobo & cpu, last Intel I had was a 120mhz.....Yikes! Intel again? Maybe wait another month and see what happens.

 

[Bateluer]

Originally posted by: the Chase
I'd go with some value DDR2-667.

Go with DDR2-800.

 

[Captante]

If you are building a new A64 system, the best bet is to go with AM2 for the upgrade path, however the additional expense of the required DDR2-800 has to be figured in & if you don't upgrade very often could easily sway things back towards socket 939.. if anything 939/DDR1 is a bit faster with current hardware, although down the road that will very likely change.

 

[Malladine]

Originally posted by: Bateluer

Originally posted by: the Chase
I'd go with some value DDR2-667.

Go with DDR2-800.

From your link, I found this to be quite interesting:

Originally posted by: XBITLABS
Theoretically, DDR2 should provide a pretty tangible performance improvement in games. The fastest DDR2-800 SDRAM may ensure up to 6-7% performance growth. However, we cannot yet state any quality advantage of the new Socket AM2 platform from AMD. At the same time the preliminary results of the promising Conroe processor suggest that it will show a significant performance improvement of the Intel platforms in games when it comes out. In other words, even though AMD processors retain their leading position in gaming applications in the meanwhile, the situation may change dramatically very soon. And AMD fans should be ready to take the blow

6-7%? blah

imo you should go with 939. AM2 ain't much, not for gaming anyway. If you want to wait a while for real pricing to surface, Conroe appears, as others have said, to have serious potential for gamers. Course, AMD will probably have a counter"blow"...w/e

 

[Heff2k]

Good discussion, keep it going. Any other thoughts?

 

[akugami]

From Socket A, I'd go AM2. Wait for the price break and you should get a decent AM2 X2 3800+ for about $160'ish. The overall cost of upgrading to both S939 and AM2 are roughly the same. I'd just go AM2 due to it's guaranteed longer life cycle (K8L, lower power consumption cpu's, possibly quad cores) since cost is a minor issue.

 

[TomMe]

I'm on a socket A 2000+ and going for AM2 (for all the good reasons stated above + passive nF5). Prices for single core AM2 CPUs dropped recently, so I went out and bought an AM2 3500+.

If you're going single core, then there will probably be no significant performance increase of DDR2-800 over DDR2-667..that's why I went DDR2-667.