Asus/4000+ or DFI/3800+? Or Asus/3800+ and better GFX?

[z0ny]

Is it better to go for an AMD Athlon64 4000+ San Diego with an Asus A8N-E board or an AMD Athlon64 3800+ Venice with a DFI Lanparty UT NF4 Ultra-D? The price difference is about 30 EUR. Although I must admit that I never oc'ed anything ... has the Asus some options to "tune" the system a bit? Just in case I wanna try that later.

Or maybe I should choose the AMD Athlon64 3800+ Venice and the Asus A8N-E board but go for a Sapphire X800GTO² (which can be unlocked to 16 pipes) instead of the Sapphire X800GTO I'm currently planning to buy? Thanks for any suggestions.

 

[pickxx]

Get a 3700+ San Deigo......
EPoX EP-9NPA+Ultra.......
Get the 7800GT......

if thats too much money for you get this
3000+
EPoX EP-9NPA+Ultra
7800GT


Get the pattern....get the 7800GT, EPoX EP-9NPA+Ultra, and the best CPU you can for your budget

Also what ram, PSU, and HDD do you want?

 

[z0ny]

The 7800GT is way too expensive! 8O Gaming is important but it's not the main focus of my system. So given the options from my first post, what's best for me? Anyways the EPoX EP-9NPA+ Ultra seems to be a good alternative to the Asus A8N-E, any reason why one should prefer the EPoX over the Asus (which is a bit cheaper)?

For the RAM, PSU and HDD I'll go for the 2x512 MB DDR400 OCZ Premier Kit, the LC-Power LC6550G 550W and the Hitachi 250GB HDT722525-DLA380 SATAII respectively.

 

[RichPLS]

Then I would go for the most San Diego you can afford with either of the boards mentioned with name brand RAM, then you will have potential to overclock it decent if desired later.

 

[z0ny]

Ok, from what I read about the boards the EPoX is way better for oc'ing so I think I'm going to buy this one as it's cheaper than the DFI but not much more expensive than the Asus.

Now you're suggesting to get a CPU with the San Diego core rather than the Venice core. After a short time of googling I found a core performance review that compares the performance between the two cores - showing that the power is pretty much alike.

But anyways I redefined my options now, which of the following is the best in price/performance (I am going to use the EPoX EP-9NPA+ Ultra for all options):[*:1059ae3984]AMD Athlon64 3700+ San Diego, Sapphire X800GTO² 256MB (~462 EUR)
[*:1059ae3984]AMD Athlon64 3800+ Venice, Sapphire X800GTO² 256MB (~508 EUR)
[*:1059ae3984]AMD Athlon64 4000+ San Diego, Sapphire X800GTO 256MB (~512 EUR)Thanks in advance!

 

[pickxx]

The 7800GT is way too expensive! 8O Gaming is important but it's not the main focus of my system. So given the options from my first post, what's best for me? Anyways the EPoX EP-9NPA+ Ultra seems to be a good alternative to the Asus A8N-E, any reason why one should prefer the EPoX over the Asus (which is a bit cheaper)?

For the RAM, PSU and HDD I'll go for the 2x512 MB DDR400 OCZ Premier Kit, the LC-Power LC6550G 550W and the Hitachi 250GB HDT722525-DLA380 SATAII respectively.

Alright but i am going to reccomend you change a couple things....
1. change that PSU to a enermax 400W one...it will be roughtly thr same price but about 22.75 million times better.
2. Get an IDE HDD, they are cheaper and for almost all situations you wont even notice the difference....
3. If you are going to OC get the 3200+ Venice, or the 3700+ San Deigo....All the Venice chips are the same, just with a different multiplier and they all get to the same speeds....3200+ is the sweetspot for those....same with 3700+ its the lowest you can get because they all OC to the same range.
4. if you are going to OC your CPU you need a aftermarket heatsink and fan....
5. My personal choice would be the 3700+ San diego, an SI-120 heatsink, and this fan....CLICKY That will give you speeds above the highest San Degio and FX on the marekt pretty easily with a RAM divider.

 

[z0ny]

1. change that PSU to a enermax 400W one...it will be roughtly thr same price but about 22.75 million times better.

An Enermax PSU with 400W costs about 20 EUR more than the LC. I think the one I chose is enough for my needs...

2. Get an IDE HDD, they are cheaper and for almost all situations you wont even notice the difference....

The prices for a 250GB ATA133 or SATA-II HDD do not differ that much, both of them are between 90 and 100 EUR so I'll buy the Hitachi drive.

3. If you are going to OC get the 3200+ Venice, or the 3700+ San Deigo....All the Venice chips are the same, just with a different multiplier and they all get to the same speeds....3200+ is the sweetspot for those....same with 3700+ its the lowest you can get because they all OC to the same range.
5. My personal choice would be the 3700+ San diego [...]

And what if I don't plan to overclock my system right now? I mean I'm currently not planning any oc stuff but maybe later I will. But anyways I guess the 3700+ San Diego is a pretty good solution for me so I'll go after this one.

4. if you are going to OC your CPU you need a aftermarket heatsink and fan....
5. [...], an SI-120 heatsink, and this fan....CLICKY That will give you speeds above the highest San Degio and FX on the marekt pretty easily with a RAM divider.

Well okay so I'm going to buy the tray version of the CPU and a fan. Please have a look at the fans available here: www.norsk-it.de (in the menu on the left select "Prozessoren & Kühler"). Which one would you recommend? I thought about the "Thermaltake Silent Boost K8" or the "Thermaltake Silent 939".

Thanks for your help.

 

[RichPLS]

If you do not overclock, the AMD stock cooler is excellent... infact it is impossible to beat for the price...

 

[z0ny]

Well I said I don't want to overclock right now. But as I don't want to change the fan when the time has come I prefer to buy a better one right now. So any recommendations from the shop above concerning overclockability and noise?

 

[RichPLS]

The stock fan is good and costs less. If your time frame to overclock is 6 months or more, waiting for cooler could be wiser.
That way you use your stock cooler now, and later upgrade to a then current and new cooler, whether it be water or air, besides, you can overclock some with the stock cooler if you keep it around 10% or so...

 

[z0ny]

Well okay, makes sense. Then I'll buy the 3700+ SD boxed. Thanks for the help guys.