Yet another "WHICH CPU?" thread

[Squisher]

My XP2000+ on my gaming computer died on me the other day so of course I can't just replace it with another of similar performance. I wanna upgrade my Gaming Computer.

I am willing to move over to the dark-side and use an Intel CPU with a new mobo.

As for price, I don't want to say the price is no concern because I know that the latest/fastest CPUs are often priced at such a premium over that next best CPU that I don't want to be a chump and just buy the most expensive, but I could drop $500-600 on the CPU/mobo/(ram?) combo.

I am willing to oc and I am willing to wait a little while if something better is coming out soon.


BTW-I can always price match these components down the road with my AMEX card, so I'll really will be buying the stuff at the prices they will be 90 days from now.

Present system:
Soltek 75DRV4
XP2000(dead as a door nail)
Adaptec 39160
Seagate Cheetah 18.0 GB @ 15000 RPMS
512MB Crucial 2100DDR
Toshiba DVD
Intel NIC
SB Live
Leadtek Geforce4 4200

Win98se

 

[DAPUNISHER]

You could do the ABIT IT7 MAX2 ver.2.0 w/ Corsair XMS 3200LL and a 2.4B C1 stepping and the Alpha 8942T and have a good shot of 3.1-3.3ghz maybe on default Vcore for right@600$ or less. PastorJay has a thread going with this board and CPU but with OCZ 3700 ram and it's a screamer, a couple others cats are getting crazy overclocks on default voltage with the new C1 2.4Bs as well so if you can get your hands on one of the newer C1s you'll be all set.

 

[Squisher]

Well, does anyone have any suggestions on where to go to find the new C1 stepping? I seem to have lost all my searching prowess.

 

[DivideBYZero]

How did you kill your 2000?

 

[Squisher]

It was the strangest thing. I had installed a GF4 4200 in place of a Voodoo5 5500 and the machine was acting a bit flaky, so I was formatting, I had put the win 98se cd and scsi boot disc in and hit reset and the computer restarted then one long beep, then shut itself off. All subsequent startups resulted in the same scenario, turn on, beep, off.
I never heard of someone losing a cpu this way before. I had been running a mild OC(139mhz) on it for a year with no crashes. Temps never got over 49C running prime95(AlphaPAL 8045 with a 92mm fan on a homemade adapter). Of course, the cpu was the last thing I swapped out before it booted