Which is better?

[zizo]

If I had a chance to go back, I would buy a 3000+ venice and a good ram and a pci-e video card! If you're playing games buy a good video card and a decent overclockable cpu.

 

[dguy6789]

Originally posted by: Inspector Jihad
so the socket 754 3400+ is better and cheaper than teh socket 939 3500+...but no upgrade possible. hmm, this is getting more complicated.

The socket 939 will live shorter than the 754. Socket 939 will soon be replaced(in a year or so) by the new m2 based socket 940 chips. 754 will no longer have athlon 64s, but it will continue to have the semprons.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Originally posted by: dguy6789

Originally posted by: Inspector Jihad
so the socket 754 3400+ is better and cheaper than teh socket 939 3500+...but no upgrade possible. hmm, this is getting more complicated.

The socket 939 will live shorter than the 754. Socket 939 will soon be replaced(in a year or so) by the new m2 based socket 940 chips. 754 will no longer have athlon 64s, but it will continue to have the semprons.

There will soon be skt939 Sempr0ns available, so who knows? Buy a X2 OC@2.7-2.8ghz and you shouldn't need another system for a few years anyhow

 

[bjc112]

Originally posted by: dguy6789

Originally posted by: Inspector Jihad
so the socket 754 3400+ is better and cheaper than teh socket 939 3500+...but no upgrade possible. hmm, this is getting more complicated.

The socket 939 will live shorter than the 754. Socket 939 will soon be replaced(in a year or so) by the new m2 based socket 940 chips. 754 will no longer have athlon 64s, but it will continue to have the semprons.

939 at least has X2 coming for it.. 939 has plenty of life left.

 

[Inspector Jihad]

whats an x2?

 

[Zebo]

Originally posted by: Inspector Jihad
whats an x2?

Blasphemy!!

 

[Inspector Jihad]

haha sorry, i just started with this computer stuff...

 

[Zebo]

Originally posted by: Inspector Jihad
i want to use it for games mainly...also, does overclocking decrease the life span of the chip?

Chips rated for 20yrs!!! In other words you'll be so out of date before processor breaks itself. Overclocking does'nt hurt long as you keep it cool and factory volts and speed of highest rated chip in iteration.

Anyway my rec if you high and cheap performance is to get:

Chip- 939 3000 retail box for (advantage here is heat sink and 3yrs warranty) $150
Mobo- MSI K8N Neo4/SLI because it has sound blaster live on board -$150
Memory- Crucial 8t 2x 512 MB = 1 gig $88
Video- Connect3D x800xl- -- $280
Hard Drive- Seagate Sata/NCQ 80 gig -- $63


Clock to 3800 levels and call it a day...High performance for a long time on the cheap.

 

[Inspector Jihad]

^^^i like your suggestion.
I just bought a HD


i'm looking for other stuff now...my buddy told me to get one 1 gig stick cause then i could upgrade later.


edit: also, what is soundblaster live? I'm assuming its somethng to do with better audio...

 

[Zebo]

Originally posted by: Inspector Jihad
^^^i like your suggestion.
I just bought a HD


i'm looking for other stuff now...my buddy told me to get one 1 gig stick cause then i could upgrade later.


edit: also, what is soundblaster live? I'm assuming its somethng to do with better audio...

Your buddy is advising you incorrectly. You need at least two sticks for dual channel performance, single gig sticks cost more per MB, besides you can upgrade to 4 x 512 later...which performs better and is cheaper than 2 x 1024.

Soundblaster live is hardware decoding of audio.. puts less strain on CPU. Most crappy on-board solutions use 8-10% of your CPU power messin around with audio, this will use about 1% and sound better.

 

[Inspector Jihad]

oh ok, but is it worth the extra 50 bucks over this mother board:

MotherBoard

and also i found this memory:

Memory what do you think?

 

[Zebo]

You're comparing china junk with cheap china capacitors to a top end board with Japanese capacitors. In sum: no compitition. You want a board for more than a year, right? No fying your high end parts? MSI, ASUS, ABIT, Gigabyte or DFI.
http://www.newegg.com/OldVersion/app/Vi...Desc.asp?description=13-130-492&depa=0

Crucial, Crucial, Crucial ... TOMS did a grand slam 15 board, 15 ram review and the only ram 100% compatible with every product was Crucial. Some ram had dismal charts, like 3/15.
http://www.newegg.com/OldVersion/app/Vi...Desc.asp?description=20-146-541&depa=0

 

[Inspector Jihad]

is this the same board? and do i need agp in my board cause i was told that i should, as most cards will be cheaper for agp.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16813130492

and i guess i'll get this memory x2

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820146541

 

[Zebo]

Yes you want that crucial 8T because it's single sided. The main reason is when you upgrade later it's the only ram that will allow you to keep 1T command rate (this is important) ...Double sided ram, all others, results in 2T when running 4 x 512.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/athlon64-venice_3.html

"Athlon 64 processors based on Venice can work with four single-side DDR400 SDRAM modules without any limitations, and if there are double-side DDR400 SDRAM DIMMs installed, they can work at 400MHz with 2T timing."


I am going to do a review on this ram sometime this week. Overclcoking and such if you want to wait a bit....

 

[Inspector Jihad]

cool man, thanks...looking forward to those reviews. So that combination of motherboard, processor and memory is ideal?

 

[Zebo]

No you don't want an AGP board. AGP is going way of dinosaur... Plus the cards costs more. cards you want x800xl and/or 6600GT..who's advising you? intelia?

 

[Inspector Jihad]

ok no agp...one more thing...what about a good case/psu...and whats the max power i need, 350w?

 

[Zebo]

Case and PSU is personal choice...

These have a good PSU
http://www.newegg.com/OldVersion/app/Vi...ufactory=1389&DEPA=0&sortby=14&order=1

These are pretty
http://www.newegg.com/OldVersion/app/Vi...Desc.asp?description=11-133-140&depa=0

so are these
http://www.newegg.com/OldVersion/app/Vi...Desc.asp?description=11-119-045&depa=0

This one has a good PSU too and only $50
http://www.newegg.com/OldVersion/app/Vi...Desc.asp?description=11-173-005&depa=0

 

[Inspector Jihad]

how much power do i need? is 300w enough?

 

[birdpup]

For the Power Supply Unit, read PSU 101. Basically, 350W is minimum, 450W is good, 550W may be too much. You need to pay attention to the number of amps on the +18V rail (power line). 18-22 amps is minimum, 23-28 amps are good, and 28 - 36 may be too much. However, it all depends on what the PSU will be powering. An overclocked cpu requires more amps to provide stability. Dual (pcie) video cards probably require the 550W (28-36 amp) range. A single GeForce 6600 or 6800 would probably require the middle range of 450W and 23-28 amps.

You can also find the answers to many of your questions by reading through interesting posts in other categories within the AnandTech forums. Try a search for "PSU" in the Cases & Cooling category.

 

[richardrds]

This is a great looking case for the money ($54), it says it comes with a 350W power supply, but the one i received had a 420W power supply (12V@18A) and it is running my rig just fine and i overclock my 3000+ winchester and my 6800 graphics card. I am pretty sure they are all shipping with the 420W power supply now (TurboLink LC-A420ATX)


http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16811144076

 

[classy]

Originally posted by: Zebo
No you don't want an AGP board. AGP is going way of dinosaur... Plus the cards costs more. cards you want x800xl and/or 6600GT..who's advising you? intelia?

Actually agp is a lot of cheaper. You can get real high end agp cards for a lot less than pci-e.

 

[Lord Banshee]

Originally posted by: classy

Originally posted by: Zebo
No you don't want an AGP board. AGP is going way of dinosaur... Plus the cards costs more. cards you want x800xl and/or 6600GT..who's advising you? intelia?

Actually agp is a lot of cheaper. You can get real high end agp cards for a lot less than pci-e.

Show me with a Link??

 

[classy]

Originally posted by: Lord Banshee

Originally posted by: classy

Originally posted by: Zebo
No you don't want an AGP board. AGP is going way of dinosaur... Plus the cards costs more. cards you want x800xl and/or 6600GT..who's advising you? intelia?

Actually agp is a lot of cheaper. You can get real high end agp cards for a lot less than pci-e.

Show me with a Link??

6800 Ultra agp $50 or more less than PCI-e
850 XT PE same thing
6800gt same thing

Not to mention deals on cards like the X800 XT

AGP has some really nice deals right now.

*The links didn't hold but, a PCI-e costs more money than a agp version of most of the high end cards.

 

[Zebo]

Classy right that's why I put caveat in there..bang for buck cards are cheaper PCIe.

The ultra unaffordable high end stuff I would never buy in a million years since it offeres such a poor bang for buck so I don't feel need to comment on it.