New PC, to wait or not?

[sisooktom]

I'm looking to build a new PC sometime in the next few months, as my PIII 600E is showing it's age. I am open to anything but am leaning towards an A64 at this point, although I'll probably wait for Nforce3-250 to come out. Anyway, I'm looking to build probably a mid-to-high end system for general use with some gaming. I know that new sockets are coming out for both AMD and Intel, and that PCI-X is on it's way too. My initial thought was to wait for them, but after doing some reasearch, it appears that the cheapest thing AMD is going to offer on 939 is the upcoming 3500+. Basically, I'm wondering if these upcoming components are going to be much more expensive than I'm willing to spend. . . I can't imagine going much over $500 for CPU, mobo and RAM, and $150-$200MAX for a graphics card. Am I going to be able to get into a 939 or Intel equivalent platform for those prices within the next 3 months or so? Or should I just buy into 754 even though it's going away?

 

[HardWareBoss]

Vid card for your price range 9800Pro.

 

[endyen]

A P3 600? You have suffered enough, it's okay to buy now.

 

[sparks219]

Telling you the truth, computers are so fast now days, it really doesn't make a big difference to most users going from a P4 2 gig to a 3 gig...

I'd just purchase mature technology at a reseaonable price right now. AMD A64s are great CPUs and I think you'd be happy with them.

Sparks

 

[Carnivore]

The 939's may show some speed increases, but it wil be another 3-6 months after release before prices start dropping. So your talking mid-to-late summer. As stated before, the current components on teh market offer all you'll need to keep your running fine for the next year+. Yes there are alot of new thinsg hitting the deck soon, but there are few mainstream apps otu that can take full advantage of teh current standards. I imagoe it will be atleast a year before software is produced that takes advantage of the upgrades in memory, HD, and PCI-X/Express. Buy now and enjoy it. Buy all the new trash in a year or two when it will have an actual application.

 

[sisooktom]

The more I read, the more it seems like none of these new technologies are gonna mean a hill of beans for at least the next 6mos - 1yr. I probably will go A643000+, but I'd like to wait for NF3-250, as I've heard the current NF3 is subpar, and I'm not thrilled about buying a VIA board. Any idea when we'll see these new NF boards?

 

[Carnivore]

Well a reference board was just being kicked around at AnandTech, so probably in a couple mounts?? If your not an overclocker the VIA boards are nice boards. They just don't overclock so well, and the onboard sound is butt. It looks like the 250 boards will mostly be built for 939 boards though,you will end up with another quandry. When teh 939 boards and chips come out the 754 chips will go down in price. So you will will have to ask if the performance boost is worth the cost.

 

[blackphoenix77]

Buy now...even if you do wait for the new stuff they won't be that great.

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