Upgrading from Socket A to 939, recommendations on setup?

[imtylerb]

I have been out of the loop for a couple years (had to make a new user name on here because I couldn't remember my old one.)

Im upgrading my socket A XP 2100 +, 512 MB 266mhz RAM, Geforce 4 Ti4600 setup.

I would like my new setup to last about 2 years with my upgrade.

I'd like to keep the cost under $700 total. I'm thinking about going with a socket 939 mobo and something like a 3700+ athlon 64. I plan on putting in 1 gig of RAM to start with.

What model mobo, video card, kinda of RAM, and CPU would maximize my performance for this budget? Does it make sense to buy a board with PCI express vs. AGP? Which products have you guys currently had good luck with?

I just want the best performance/stability with these components, I don't plan on overclocking at all.

Thanks,
Tyler

 

[trueimage]

Are you going to be playing a lot of games or no? This will help you decide where to spend more of your money : cpu or video card.

Either way I'd suggest trying an Opteron 148 or something (Can't remember which has a similar clock to the 3700+). They are server-grade and have 1mb L2 cache. Plus they o/c like crazy in case you change your mind about that stuff.

As far as ram goes, without overclocking, you will be running pc3200 at stock speed, so get some of that. get something that runs at 2-2-2-5-1T at those stock speeds, to get the fastest performance out of your memory. OCZ, Mushkin, GeiL, Corsair... all decent.

Video agaig depends on gaming or not. I don't play a ton of games, so I just decided on a 6600GT but you could go much lower if you don't play any games. Also I figure once that gets a little sluggish and goes down in price, I can buy a second one and run SLI for a while before upgrading.

If it is high end gaming, then either a lower end SLI setup like 2x 6800nu or even GT, or maybe 1x 7800GT, those should drop a bit shortly as the 512mb ver of that card is coming any day.

I can't recommend a motherboard because I've become obsessed with the DFI LanParty UT NF4 Ultra-D, but I've seen some posts about people getting fed up with all the tweaking options since they didn't care about overclocking. I'd guess that the "budget" version DFI NF4 Infinity or SLI Infinity would be good too, but again I'm not sure. Any PC is going to require tweaking to get the best performance and stability, even without ocing so I'd go with the best board possible either way. imho this is the Ultra-D.

Also consider a PSU upgrade depending on what you have. OCZ Powerstream 520w or Anter 550W TruePower 2.0 ESP12v are both excellent price/performance, and will give you the power to upgrade to SLI if you decide to in the future.

 

[potato28]

The Asus A8N-SLI Premium has the heatpipe cooled chipset, so if u hate sound look into it. Ummm well the rest is explained in the above post.

 

[imtylerb]

Thanks for the suggestions trueimage...

I do plan on playing games, thats probably my biggest reason to upgrade (Elder Scrolls Oblivion) although I use my computer at least 5 hours a day to do other stuff too. Do you think an Opteron will be better than the 64 cost/performance wise? Opterons are all 754 right, I was thinking on a 939 because when those other processors get cheaper I could upgrade again cheap in a couple years? I really dont plan on overclocking....I hated stability issues with my last setup. My 420 Watt PSU should handle a video upgrade I think.

Does anyone know if just upgrading to like a 6800gt with my current XP 2100 + VIA KT333 chipset would make a reasonable difference in performance over my Ti4600? My mobo does support AGP 4X

 

[trueimage]

Originally posted by: imtylerb
Thanks for the suggestions trueimage...

I do plan on playing games, thats probably my biggest reason to upgrade (Elder Scrolls Oblivion) although I use my computer at least 5 hours a day to do other stuff too. Do you think an Opteron will be better than the 64 cost/performance wise? Opterons are all 754 right, I was thinking on a 939 because when those other processors get cheaper I could upgrade again cheap in a couple years? I really dont plan on overclocking....I hated stability issues with my last setup. My 420 Watt PSU should handle a video upgrade I think.

Does anyone know if just upgrading to like a 6800gt with my current XP 2100 + VIA KT333 chipset would make a reasonable difference in performance over my Ti4600? My mobo does support AGP 4X

For games the single biggest factor is gpu. so yes it probably would. but a 2100+ is a bit older nowadays. I'd suggest staying at 3000+ or above. The Opteron 144 is the same as the 3000+ but 1mb l2 and supposedly better silicon and memory controller. These new opterons are 939. The reason they are so popular is 1. overclockability and 2. 1mb l2 cache. even without wanting to overclock one, I can't imagine why not getting one if you can find a good deal. the 146 is the same as the 3200+, and its about 150 at monarch computers... not bad. (PS - all the non opterons i'm talking about, i mean venice core for the enhanced instruction set etc)

I guess the bottom line is will a 3000+/144 or 3200+/146 be enough cpu for your "regular" tasks. Unless you are doing something major, for office, surfing, email, even dvd encoding, those chips should be ok. if you do 3d modelling or work for pixar from home then probably not. take that extra money and buy one or two good video cards, then you will get amazing games performance, while still having enough cpu to do your windows stuff and stay under budget.

Another thing about your current setup is bus speed.. kt333 is slow compared to today's machines, while its not a direct comparison, the A64 "bus" or HTT is rated at 2000mhz. while these are not directly comparable, and I'm by no means an expert, it simply will be faster overall, even at the same cpu speed.

A last thing is ram. get some good pc3200 ram to go with this system and you WILL notice a major difference. and the more the better. ram helps in all areas.

little things like having a faster rpm hard drive and sata vs pata connector, etc will help slightly but is not that major a factor unless you already have all the other sutff and wanna squeeze that last bit of performance out.

You should be able to get a new mb, cpu, ram and power supply fairly inexpensively. then the video card is where you can spend a little or a lot, according to your budget.

pricewatch, froogle, anadtech labs is your friend. if you live in the states (i live in canada) you will be able to take advantage of low/free shipping prices and great deals overall from places like newegg, monarch, zip zoom fly, etc.

I've just gone through the agony of choosing and re-choosing parts for a new build, and i know its difficult to nail down exactly what you want with so many slight variation on every part, but it is worth it to search out the best deals and even look at the used market - here and elsewhere - and save dollars where you can to get the best bang for your buck.

 

[imtylerb]

Yeah Im going with a DFI lan party board, opteron 148, 1 gig OCZ pc3200 copper ram, and a 6800 gs. Most of the stuff from monarchcomputer.com and new egg.Thanks for the info.

 

[fbrdphreak]

That sounds like a great setup. As others mentioned, make sure you've got a nice PSU to go with it. FYI, Monarch has had probs lately with stock on the DFI nF4 Ultra. NewEgg had it on sale for $115, so check with them first. I'm still waiting for mine to ship :roll:
Make sure that OCZ runs around 2-3-2 latencies.

You might consider going with 2GB depending on what games you play. Right now, 1GB is on its way out. BF2 & FEAR show reportedly good increases in playability from having 2GB RAM. I fear that if you spend the money on 1GB now you might regret it soon....

I hear this set of RAM is good for the money:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820227210

If you're OCing tho, go with this RAM:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820146970

(disclaimer: there might be better 2GB kits out there! I'm still looking myself)

 

[coomar]

you should be able to get a gig of great ram for 100-120 US

i play bf2 fine on a gig

i would suggest beefing up the videocard to a 7800gt or at least a 6800gt for oblivion, its looks like it will be extremely intensive

it would be better to go with the opteron 146 and get a better gpu

remember not to SKIMP on the psu

 

[imtylerb]

isn't the gs 6800 GS equal or better than the gt just newer and cheaper? isn't the 148 opteron (2.2Ghz) faster than the 146 (2.0Ghz)?

 

[imtylerb]

the latencys for the sticks i was looking at were 2-3-3-6 which i think will do OCS PC3200 Copper....after reading this article on anandtech here about timings it makes it sound that the timings aren't as much of a big deal in gaming as they are in video editing type stuff and that ahtlons aren't as vulnerable to performance drop with slower timings as intels cpus are, so im just buying 1 gig of this 2-3-3-6 stuff for $115...I probably wont overclock, if I do not very much...im just going to go with a gig at first and see how it does, then buy some more when i have the money...thanks for the help

 

[Spike]

Man there is some strange opinions going around here... SLI for a non hardcore gamer? low latency when not a uber performance freak? I compiled a small list of parts all from newegg (feel free to look at other vendors, newegg just has nice search features) for a decent gaming setup. This will serve you well stocked or overclocked, your choice.

Newegg Build

This is a build I am setting up for my brother. It's pretty decent and comes in a $664. You can change the mobo to a better one and still be under $700. This is a complete setup for good gaming and general purpose. The only things I would look at changing if you had more $$ would be the vid card (go for a 7800GT, would be ~$100 more) better hdd ($20-100 more) and like I said, better mobo.

If you really don't ever want to overclock then get rid of the zalman cooler I added and spend that money on any of the above suggestions. Just for reference, this rig is more powerful that my current one (AXP 3200+, 6800GT) and I have been playing all the latest games including FEAR, COD 2, SS 2, AOE 3, CS S, and BF 2. All of which I run at 1680x1050 with the exception of FEAR.

-spike

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: trueimage
Any PC is going to require tweaking to get the best performance and stability, even without ocing so I'd go with the best board possible either way. imho this is the Ultra-D.

Your "Any PC" must mean any computer with a DFI board. Most boards run just fine and fast with BIOS options left at default.

Originally posted by: imtylerb
My 420 Watt PSU should handle a video upgrade I think.

You may want to price in a PSU to your upgrade because the new motherboard needs a 24 pin plug and the new video cards need a 6 pin PCIe plug. It won't necessarily cost a lot - you can get a good Fortron unit for about $50 that has those features and is nice and sturdy.

Originally posted by: imtylerb
....after reading this article on anandtech here about timings it makes it sound that the timings aren't as much of a big deal in gaming as they are in video editing type stuff and that ahtlons aren't as vulnerable to performance drop with slower timings as intels cpus are

Actually Intel netburst CPUs are vulnerable to slow memory speeds, not latency. AMD Athlon 64 aren't as vulnerable to slow memory speeds. Now, all else being equal of course the faster memory at lower timings will be faster. However not all else is equal - mainly price of fast RAM. If money is no object, do it - guaranteed happiness! If you have to decide what to get, as a gamer spend most on the video card, second most on CPU... RAM is probably the least important to spend extra on.

 

[imtylerb]

Yeah I looked its not the new ATX standard, although the 12+ rail is 18A. I was looking at some anandtech roundups for the past couple years and they rated a Fortron good. I thought thats kinda what I said about the AMD vs Intel RAM thing, maybe I worded it funny. I dont think I have the money to invest in more expensive RAM that will only give me a 5% increase at most. Im getting some 2-3-3-6 stuff for about $110. Going with a 6800 GS and an Opteron 148 (2.2 GHz). Anyone have any heatsink/fan suggestions for under $50 for a socket 939 CPU? I hear the Opterons overclock pretty good even on stock cooling but I would be willing to put that much into an aftermarket one. Thanks.

 

[Zebo]

Problem is you're gonna need to upgrade PSU witha new system unless you have something killer already like an old 465W enermax or something..

Anyway

Graphics is most important
BFG 7800GT with game $329
http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview...atid=40&threadid=1735537&enterthread=y

-Processor- Opteron 146 $165 from tankguys or a 3200+ for $145

- Motherboard - Asrock Sata2 $63

- Ram - Cheapest Cas 2.5 PC3200 you can find $75
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820145440

=$612 or $632 and some left over for PSU

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817101518

 

[Zap]

I'll second Zebo...

Set aside at least $50 for new power supply. No need to spend $100+ on a fancy name, but don't get anything crappy. I had gotten a Fortron FSP400-GLN for my wife's computer for $51 from Ewiz (they no longer have it though ). Fortron usually makes nice, solid units. This particular PSU has active PFC, all the new plugs, 120mm fan, 85% efficiency and is reasonably priced. What it does NOT have is a high price, fancy name, fancy lights, fancy colors.

Since your "biggest reason to upgrade" is games, then video card should take the biggest chunk of budget and the 7800GT is your card of choice. Make sure to find a good deal - deals can be had if you look. Very common to find it for $300-340 so don't pay higher.

RAM probably has the least impact on performance after #1 video and #2 CPU, so spend the least out of the three. Since CAS 2.5 is pretty much as cheap as CAS 3, but definately cheaper than CAS 2, get budget CAS 2.5. You'd probably notice more performance difference spending the extra $30 on a faster CPU than on CAS 2 RAM. Good place to start is a 1GB dual channel kit.

Motherboard is important only if you overclock. I'll go out on a limb and publicly state that as long as the board is functioning properly and all drivers are installed if you are not overclocking/tweaking then choice of motherboard makes as little difference than choice of RAM. However, motherboards can range from $60 to $200+ so you can save a lot here since you stated that you don't overclock. The ASRock SATA2 is good. The budget Nforce4 boards from Chaintech or Epox are good.

Processor... after you buy the other stuff, take whatever money you have left and get the fastest CPU that fits the price. Honestly it's difficult to feel a difference less than 10-20% if you don't have side by side comparison (or directly before/after) so don't obsess over fast CPUs. You are a gamer, so obsess over fast video cards instead as long as your CPU is fast enough and your RAM is of sufficient amount (usually 1GB).

One more thing... do you plan to use surround sound in gaming? By this I mean do you plan to use a 5.1 (or better) speaker system and enable EAX/3D sound in your games? If so, then consider a PCI sound card such as an Audigy2. The reason is that 3D sound acceleration can eat up CPU usage. I mentioned not being able to feel under 20% of CPU speed difference... sound can eat up that 20% and then some. If you use headphones or only a stereo pair (or 2.1) then don't sweat it. Also note that some motherboards have special sound chips and drivers that drastically lowers CPU usage - specifically some MSI and Gigabyte boards have Soundblaster Live chips built-in, plus some DFI LANPARTY boards have some "karajan" (sp) special sound module that lowers CPU usage. Those boards usually cost about as much as a cheap board and a basic OEM Audigy2, so up to you how you'd go.

 

[Zebo]

This is a hot deal on PSU $38!!! High power +3.3V@26A, +5V@45A, +12V@28A,.
http://www.mwave.com/mwave/viewspec.hmx?scriteria=BA21492

And Mwave has the best priced mobo combos around.


Reason I say that PSU is HOT HOT HOT, is it's the same thing as OCZ modstream line up. Same as OCZ built by Topower, look identical on insides, have same power ratings etc.. but less than half the cost cause you don't have to pay advertising of OCZ and for employees who spend lots of time at various forums pimping thier gear!

 

[Hacp]

Originally posted by: Zebo
Problem is you're gonna need to upgrade PSU witha new system unless you have something killer already like an old 465W enermax or something..

Anyway

Graphics is most important
BFG 7800GT with game $329

-Processor- Opteron 146 $165 from tankguys or a 3200+ for $145

- Motherboard - Asrock Sata2 $63

- Ram - Cheapest Cas 2.5 PC3200 you can find $75
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820145440

=$612 or $632 and some left over for PSU

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817101518

Agree, except I would go with this ram.They are single sided sticks, so they will alow you to run 1T if you upgrade your setup to 1.5 GB with single sided 256MB sticks.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820146541

Edit: I would go with the 3200+ if your not overclocking. 2.0GHZ 512kB of cache def beats up 1.8GGHZ 1MB of cache.

 

[Zebo]

You know I had a few sticks of those and could'nt get stable at even 3-3-3 PC3200 in A64.. crucial is normally great, there is another value PC3200 they sell that is same chips as ballistix and I also have those in a few boxes at work and about half can hit 2-2-2 stable.

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: Zebo
This is a hot deal on PSU $38!!! High power +3.3V@26A, +5V@45A, +12V@28A,.
http://www.mwave.com/mwave/viewspec.hmx?scriteria=BA21492

Sounds good. Though the manufacturer claims it is very quiet, a shame that it uses an 80mm fan.

BTW, does this have a PCIe video power connector? I think the Fortron does.