What Now?

[coolego1]

Hello All,
I am looking to build a new system as my old P4 Prescott runs very hot... I've been looking at new CPUs and have reached the conclusion that right now is a bad time to buy processors. Am I correct? What should I do at this point? Does it make sense to wait for Penryn? I kind of need a new system soon because my current one runs very hot with the graphics card I just put in it (X1950XT). I am not rooted in Intel or AMD so anything is welcome...

 

[kenny0813]

i wouldnt say it's a bad time to get a new comp right now. What's new recently are:

- the new 1333 fbs cpus
- some cpus have the G0 stepping
- price drop couple weeks ago

 

[Markfw]

Now is a great time ! What motherboard do you have ? You might even be able to use it !

 

[asdftt123]

I've had the same dilemma as you but as a lot of other people on these forums have noted, buy your system as you needed because there's always something new around the corner. If you consistently wait for the next best thing you'll never have your rig built. I've decided to build my system in about a month, when I'll be needing it. It's a good time to take the plunge now although I think the price of video cards is insane because ATi currently has nothing to compete.

 

[myocardia]

Originally posted by: Markfw900
Now is a great time!

Yeah, it is. And CPU's are going in the multiple cores per cpu direction. For the future, a dual-core will be the minimum, and quite a few apps will require 4 cores. BTW, CPU's, RAM, and hard drives are cheap now. You should be building a new system before the prices start rising again, like it already has on the RAM.

 

[Cogman]

It really depends on what you are getting it for. If you are doing some heavy Video Encoding, then I would say waiting for Penrynn might not be such a bad Idea. The Reason? Penrynn has SSE4 (Current CPUS do NOT have it, What is marked as SSE4 now is actually just an extension to SSE3), some initial test results are putting it at 100% increase in speed. That is worth the couple months of wait.

Now if you just want a speed increase, then Current Core 2's and Quads are more then addiquite The Core 2's run pretty cool and the quads should be a bit cooler then what you run now. As well they should last you for a fair amount of time. Prices are just right. As well you could go with a cheep 65nm Amd Dual core to tide you over, they run pretty cool, and should even be faster then your current setup. AMD's Phenom could be interesting as It should utilize bandwidth a bit better then Intels Quads do. They also should be able to run in AMDS current AM2 boards, so an upgrade now wouldn't be completely waisted.

The choice is up to you

 

[coolego1]

Are there any details on a release for Penryn, and/or will it follow with the same price trends we see now. Will Penryn have the same socket as current processors? (Still LGA775?) I need to get rid of my current motherboard (I hate it) but it has the LGA775 socket on it with PC3200 RAM...

 

[asdftt123]

Gigabyte motherboard that I will be using for my build - GA-P35C-DS3R will support both 45nm CPU's and DDR3. As far as I know with releases, the only ones that will be released in 2007 (if any) will be the high end Extreme Edition CPU's that will be around $950-1200, for example the QX6950 Yorkfield. It won't be until later in 2008 that we will see the more mainstream Penryns.