Upgrade Sempron with Venice?

[DS9VOY]

Does anyone know if this would be a worthwhile upgrade?

I have vista installed on my office PC. I built it a few years back just for office work and didn't put much money in to it. Of course, after I installed vista the same hardware wasn't as up to speed as it was running XP.

Basically it is a socket 754 system that I put a low end sempron 2600 processor in. (Runs at 1.6GHZ) Anyway a buddy of mine told me he had a 3200 socket 754 Venice I could have for $30.

I think maybe it would be worth $30 just to get it up to a little bit more of a useable speed? My question is - would an upgrade from my sempron to a 3200 Venice make a noticeable speed improvement when running vista? Enough to make the $30 worth it anyway?

All I use the PC for is internet browsing, MS Office, etc. It is pretty slow right now just doing that stuff though....

Thanks for any advice.

The rest of the hardware is:

Radeon 9700 AGP card
SATA 250GB 7200RPM drive that is pretty fast
1.5GB DDR 400 RAM

 

[o1die]

It would help a little. But I would switch back to xp and save your money for a better upgrade. I switched back to win 2k pro cause I couldn't access the internet for almost 5 minutes after startup. My internet software was taking too long to load using vista.

 

[Flipped Gazelle]

Originally posted by: o1die
But I would switch back to xp and save your money for a better upgrade.

+1

How long ago did you install Vista? During the first few weeks after installation, Vista can seem pretty slow because it is analyzing how the computer is used and caching data. This will result in the PC feeling faster in a few weeks.

 

[error8]

Originally posted by: DS9VOY
My question is - would an upgrade from my sempron to a 3200 Venice make a noticeable speed improvement when running vista? Enough to make the $30 worth it anyway?

The short answer is : NO! I don't think you'll see any improvement.

Venice 3200+ works at 2 ghz opposed to 1,6 ghz of the sempron. The biggest difference, except frequency, is that the Venice has double the L2 cache if I'm not mistaken. You'll do better by keeping those money and overclock the sempron and...yes, switch back to XP. You need a dual core for having " a full Vista experience" , at least 2gb of ram ( 3 or more recommended) and for Aero maybe another more recent videocard. You just have to change everything.

 

[Denithor]

Well...

$30 isn't bad if the hsf is included, the oem chip is $27 from geeks.com.

But I gotta side with error8 here, vista really needs 2GB memory and a dual-core processor to run as smoothly as XP will with 1GB and a fast single-core.

So either switch back to XP (was everything fast enough for you before Vista?) or plan on a full upgrade in the near future.

And keep in mind, you can upgrade cpu/mobo/ram/powersupply, recycle your HDD/DVD/case and be done for like $200-250 (add another $75 for a much faster video card if you game at all, otherwise on-board graphics are adequate).

 

[exar333]

If you like Vista, it might not be a bad idea to do a fresh install and clear any extra bloatware you might have. That might quicken it up too...if that doesn't work, go back to XP. You know that works fine.

 

[GundamF91]

The reason for getting Venice? Enjoy the pleasure of overclocking that AMD chip. It was the golden age of overclocking....pre-Core2 that is. I dont' think you'll notice much by ditching Sempron, may be a few FPS more in games, but in general, you'll enjoy more of a difference by doubling up on memory.

I used to have a Tbird, which I went up to Sempron754, then up to Venice754...did'nt make a whole lot of difference, but IIRC Venice is end of line for Socket754, so if you want to keep that motherboard going for more years, then go with Venice. Otherwise you should look at getting a cheap Intel P35 board, and get an inexpensive Core2. You can get these new Intel E5200 for under $90. You'll definitely notice a difference then, but you also will be forced to buy new DDR2 memory and PCI-e cards.

 

[SunSamurai]

I have a Venice 3000+ (1.8Ghz). It will easily OC to 2.25Ghz. Multiplier @ x9 and up the FSB to 250, adjust RAM settings so they dont melt and its stable. 30$ is a GOOD price for that. The preformance is good. If you install Vista, install the 64bit version. Its much more compatable than I thought it would be. All my games, programs ect that ran in 32bit Vista ran great on it.

I would suggest though, you save $400 and get a Core2, mobo, and ram for it instead. Much better upgrade and it will last you 6+ years, as it will run windows 7 as well if not better than Vista.

 

[A554SS1N]

Didn't Venice 3200+ on Socket 754 run at 2.2Ghz? Amdcompare says so.... 600Mhz as well as the extra cache is quite an improvement I would have thought.

 

[myocardia]

Yes, the Venice 3200's were 200 Mhz faster than the previous steppings, but with half the L2. They ran @ 2.2 Ghz, with 512KB of L2, as compared to the Clawhammer & Newcastle cores, which ran @ 2.0 Ghz, with 1MB of L2. I also think that an extra 600 Mhz, and 4x the L2 is worth $30.

 

[Sureshot324]

If you can get it for $20 then go for it.