Yet another upgrade question

[Paladin3]

My ECS K7S5A Pro motherboard has a 133 FSB and I'm thinking about upgrading from my athlon 1800+ to mobile athlon xp 2600+ for $85. My other option is a sempron 3000+ & cheap (ecs?) motherboard bundle from Fry's for $129. Which sounds like more bang for the buck for gaming?

 

[CaBoOse999]

Go with the mobile xp 2600. It has good overclocking capabilies and the sempron is not meant for gaming. Did i mention the sempron 3000 has 128 Kb cache?

 

[ChineseDemocracyGNR]

What is your current video card?

Is that motherboard combo with a socket A or 754 Sempron?

The Mobile XP 2600+ is a 2.0GHz Barton (512KB L2 cache) with 133MHz FSB. The socket A Sempron 3000+ is a 2.0GHz T-bread (256KB L2 cache) with 166MHz FSB. They should have very similar performance. If it's a socket 754 Sempron then it's a different story, as the K8 processors are very good for gaming.
I don't know what Fry's will offer you but at newegg you can buy a socket 754 mobo for $50 and a Sempron 2800+ for $90. If you overclock it may be worth spending a few bucks more on a board with working AGP/PCI locks, like the EPoX EP-8KDA3I, and if you want future-proof you may consider the ASRock K8 Combo-Z.

 

[Paladin3]

My current video card is a Prolink FX 5200. It overclocks well and is just sufficient for me to play HL2, CS:S and Doom3 on medium to low settings at 800x600 with my current processor. It choked a bit on FarCry so I'm considering upgrading to a 6600GT.

The Fry's combo I was looking at is HERE. Clilck on the left cpu/mobo combo in the ad. I'm guessing it's not a socket 754 combo.

I'm thinking the mobile XP processor will be the better upgrade and the money I save by using my current mobo can go towards that 6600GT. I just bought a new HD and DVD burner so this will have to wait at least until next month anyway.

Thanks for your advice.

 

[ScrewFace]

I've got a mobile Athlon XP 2600+ (2.0GHz, 266MHz HTL) overclocked to 2.575GHz on a 410MHz bus. The best thing is that the mobile's multiplier is UNLOCKED!