Worth Upgrading 2.66 (533) to 3.0 (800)?

[ZappaFan]

I just upgraded my motherboard from an MSI 655 board (533 fsb) to a Gigabyte 8IK1100 with 800 fsb. I had a lot of instability issues with that old mobo, and rather than try to RMA it I decided to just replace it with a better mobo. From all the bad things I've been reading about the SiS 655 chipset compared to the 865/875 it was hard for me to want to work real hard to hold onto this 655 mobo even tho it's only just a little over a year old.

anyway, so now I have this 800 mhz fsb staring me in the face, and I'm getting a tug to upgrade to a processor that will more fully utilize my new mobo. I can get a 3.0C processor at newegg for $224 I think, so the price doesn't seem all that bad.

I'm already using corsair pc3200 memory. Would this upgrade be worth it? Am I only going to see a marginal performance increase or will it be fairly significant? I won't spend $224 for marginal, but if it's much more than just marginal I think it's probably worth it.

TIA for any constructive advice.

 

[myocardia]

If you plan on overclocking, you will see a huge difference. The average 3.0C, from what I've seen, is hitting about 3.7ghz stable at 1.65v-1.70v. That's awesome. The 2.66B seems to be one of the worst overclocking chips Intel has ever made. Plus, you will get hyperthreading with either a P4C, or a P4 3.06B, which seems to be a pretty good overclocker also. If money isn't an issue for you, and you ever use two cpu-intensive applications at the same time (or have wanted to!), then I think it would be worth it to upgrade. Why not see what your 2.66B will do first, though?

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Do you have 2 sticks of ram? If not get another stick because dual channel helps the P4's performance substantially by getting it the bandwidth it needs. The clockspeed difference between the two won't be drastic but having the 800fsb, dual channel, and HT on the 3ghz will make a for noticeably better overall system performance I should think. Duvie ran sone benchmarks between his 533 and 800fsb CPUs and IIRC, while the 533fsb showed a slight improvement of 5% or so on average, the 800fsb CPU showed much higher gains depending on the task/multitasks involved. BTW, have you considered overclocking? Obviously it was out of the question before since the system was never stable even at default speeds.

 

[ZappaFan]

Yes, I have two sticks of 512mb pc3200 running in DDR mode.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

That answers one question.......now what about overclocking? :evil: BTW, welcome to the forums

 

[THUGSROOK]

hey! who let you outta Descent land?

going from a 2.66b to a 3.0c is marginal at best ~ unless of course you are OCing :evil:
if you wanted 3.0ghz on more of a budget, id suggest OCing a 2.4c to 3.0ghz or just OC your current chip.

HTH

 

[ZappaFan]

Ha! Are you a Descent player? I haven't played in a while but I'm still active running the Wildcards... old Descent players never die!!

Aha!!! You're [THUGS]Rook! how ya doin man? (the lightbulb goes off) I posted this same question on the DBB, too.

I didn't O/C with the old mobo, but plan to with this new mobo. I have a real nice Xaser case with lots of fans so cooling will be good.

Originally posted by: THUGSROOK
hey! who let you outta Descent land?

going from a 2.66b to a 3.0c is marginal at best ~ unless of course you are OCing :evil:
if you wanted 3.0ghz on more of a budget, id suggest OCing a 2.4c to 3.0ghz or just OC your current chip.

HTH

 

[THUGSROOK]

its been a long time since ive played any multiplayer, but i still fire up D1, 2 and 3 for some singleplay action
its not quite the same as a night in Kegparty, but its still fun


if your goal is only 3ghz....
most of the ppl in this forum will tell you to try to OC your current cpu before buying anything.
theres a good chance it will run that speed easily.

HTH

 

[ZappaFan]

Well I tried simply overclocking my 2.66B. So far I've bumped the fsb up to 150 to get it just over 3.0G, and it has run without a hiccup. CPU temp has been steady, right about 40C.

 

[THUGSROOK]

nice cheap upgrade

congrats

 

[TAKKLE]

Might want to run some stability tests... what's your temp at full cpu usage?

 

[myocardia]

Originally posted by: TAKKLE
Might want to run some stability tests... what's your temp at full cpu usage?

I agree, so here are some links for you: Prime95 download page & Memtest86 download page. Every time you go higher, check to make sure your system is stable with both.

 

[ZappaFan]

good suggestions, thanks!

 

[TypeM]

Zappa,

I wondered the same thing with my 2.66B and I can tell you this.... I broke down and updated my PC. I am able to notice a difference in two areas The first area is with Hyperthreading. I am running 4 different applications right now (ShrinkDVD, IE, Media Player 9, and Dreameaver MX is ftping a website) and it is running smoothly without a hiccup. I also have OCed this chip to 3.522Ghz (235fsb) at the current moment. The only negative downside is that my RAM could not handle the 1:1 ratio, so I had to use the 5:4. My old 2.66B chip would only go to 3.06Ghz (150fsb) and did not have Hyperthreading. My system details are as follows:

Asus P4P800 non-dlx
3Ghz P4C @ 3.522 currently (all on default voltages)
ThermalRight SP-94 H/S with Enermax UC-9FAB-B 90mm Fan (currently 2720RPM for 64+cfm and 34db noise)
1GB Corsair XMS PC3200 PT v1.1
ATI Radeon 9800 Pro
Dual 36GB WD Raptor (SATA Raid 0)
Antec 550W True Power
Antec Super Lanboy Case

If you have any questions, let me know.

- Mack

 

[LouPoir]

Originally posted by: myocardia
If you plan on overclocking, you will see a huge difference. The average 3.0C, from what I've seen, is hitting about 3.7ghz stable at 1.65v-1.70v. That's awesome. The 2.66B seems to be one of the worst overclocking chips Intel has ever made. Plus, you will get hyperthreading with either a P4C, or a P4 3.06B, which seems to be a pretty good overclocker also. If money isn't an issue for you, and you ever use two cpu-intensive applications at the same time (or have wanted to!), then I think it would be worth it to upgrade. Why not see what your 2.66B will do first, though?

The couple of 3.06 hit 3.5 max stable.