Up the creek with my Socket 939...

[Rip181]

This is taken from an article from Toms Hardware

"In some cases however, we have seen certain cards offered with far lower speeds than the reference cards, that are still advertised with the name of the higher-performing card. If you see a 7600 GT, X1650 PRO or 8600 GT (to name a few) with DDR2 instead of GDDR3, memory speeds might be as low as 50% of the reference speed. These cards are often available with an impressive-sounding 512 MB of video RAM so that consumers will assume they perform better than their 256 MB GDDR3 counterparts. In reality, the extra RAM will not make up for the large clock speed deficit."

 

[Shecky]

This is taken from an article from Toms Hardware

"In some cases however, we have seen certain cards offered with far lower speeds than the reference cards, that are still advertised with the name of the higher-performing card. If you see a 7600 GT, X1650 PRO or 8600 GT (to name a few) with DDR2 instead of GDDR3, memory speeds might be as low as 50% of the reference speed. These cards are often available with an impressive-sounding 512 MB of video RAM so that consumers will assume they perform better than their 256 MB GDDR3 counterparts. In reality, the extra RAM will not make up for the large clock speed deficit."

50%? Holy crap. Thanks for finding that! It REALLY solidifies my choice.

 

[Shecky]

One final question, about the differences between PCIe and PCIe 2.0:

The 2.0 will work with no problems in a regular PCIe slot, right?

 

[jrnyfan]

nm...my post didnt make sense

 

[Rip181]

I think some of the very first PCIe slots needed a Bios update.

but yes there should be no problem at all. Ihave a 2.0 card in a regular PCIe slot and all works fine. it is backwards combatable.

 

[MooseMuffin]

Same here - running a pcie 2.0 card in a 939 mobo with pcie 1.0 slot. It all works fine.

 

[Eviltwin17]

ok, your main problem here is the video card and ram

the recommended specs for the game are a pentium 4 3ghz... which you are well above that, and a radeon 9800, geforce fx5600 or higher which you dont meet. you could also use another 512 mb to put you up to 1 GB of ram.

so for $100 you can do this:

8600gt ~ $80 (including shipping)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814141059

512 mb GSkill ~ $21 (including shipping)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231078

 

[Grimmy]

One final question, about the differences between PCIe and PCIe 2.0:

The 2.0 will work with no problems in a regular PCIe slot, right?

Yes. The difference would be your wouldn't be getting the full speed of the card:

PCI Express 2.0 Due By Year's End

According to PCI-SIG, the base 2.0 specification will be backwards compatible with all existing PCI Express 1.0 and 1.1 systems, supporting both 2.5 Gbits/s and 5 Gbit/s signaling rates.

 

[Shecky]

nm...my post didnt make sense

Nor do mine. But does that stop me? :lol:

 

[Shecky]

ok, your main problem here is the video card and ram

the recommended specs for the game are a pentium 4 3ghz... which you are well above that, and a radeon 9800, geforce fx5600 or higher which you dont meet. you could also use another 512 mb to put you up to 1 GB of ram.

so for $100 you can do this:

8600gt ~ $80 (including shipping)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814141059

512 mb GSkill ~ $21 (including shipping)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231078

Already got 2G RAM - posted it earlier in the thread.

 

[Shecky]

Yes. The difference would be your wouldn't be getting the full speed of the card:

PCI Express 2.0 Due By Year's End

According to PCI-SIG, the base 2.0 specification will be backwards compatible with all existing PCI Express 1.0 and 1.1 systems, supporting both 2.5 Gbits/s and 5 Gbit/s signaling rates.

Wait - I'm confused. Does that mean that, because I have a non-2.0 slot, a 2.0 card will run slower than a non-2.0 card with the same specs?

 

[Grimmy]

Well... even with the AGP's, I've mentioned that I got a 6800 GS AGP X8. Heh, my MB was only AGP X4. The card was backwards compatible. It also meant I wasn't running the card at its full speed, but then I don't believe at the time I had it, that I could flood the X4 bus.

But yes.. the 1-1.1 versions use up to 2.5GB, while the newer 2.0 uses up to 5GB. So when you use the 2.0 version, its going to revert to the 2.5GB transfer signal.

Edit:

Even my new system P6N Plat uses the 1.0a PCI-E. So I'd be even running the card slower. On top of that, if I run SLI on it, the cards would also run X8 X8, rather X16 X16, for 2.0 PCI-E cards.

 

[vonbose]

Here is your best bet I imagine:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=2010380048+4027+106791921+1067928567&name=GeForce+8600GTS

you should be able to play DDO at max settings easy. If I remember right I played that game on full setting with my old dog PC which was an athlon XP 3200 (2gig) w/ 2gigs ram, and a 7600GT.

 

[Shecky]

Well... even with the AGP's, I've mentioned that I got a 6800 GS AGP X8. Heh, my MB was only AGP X4. The card was backwards compatible. It also meant I wasn't running the card at its full speed, but then I don't believe at the time I had it, that I could flood the X4 bus.

But yes.. the 1-1.1 versions use up to 2.5GB, while the newer 2.0 uses up to 5GB. So when you use the 2.0 version, its going to revert to the 2.5GB transfer signal.

Edit:

Even my new system P6N Plat uses the 1.0a PCI-E. So I'd be even running the card slower. On top of that, if I run SLI on it, the cards would also run X8 X8, rather X16 X16, for 2.0 PCI-E cards.

Sorry if I'm sounding dense here, but... is that addressed to my question about whether a 2.0 card is going to run slower than a non-2.0 card in a non-2.0 slot?

 

[vonbose]

Most of the cards you are in the position to choose from don't take full advantage of pci 2.0 anyway. So no there should not be a slow down of a 2.0 card vs. an older 1.0 card. The cards should all be backward compatible. I mentioned above the 8600 GTS would be your best bet, but after looking at earlier posts the radeon 3650 is also a fantastic card for your price range.

You could also buy someone's hand-me-down of craigslist. I see high-end cards from a generation ago going for under $100 all the time and I live in Alaska.

 

[Shecky]

Most of the cards you are in the position to choose from don't take full advantage of pci 2.0 anyway. So no there should not be a slow down of a 2.0 card vs. an older 1.0 card. The cards should all be backward compatible. I mentioned above the 8600 GTS would be your best bet, but after looking at earlier posts the radeon 3650 is also a fantastic card for your price range.

I understand that they're backwards compatible. What I'm not sure of is whether the stats of the 2.0 cards actually depend on using 2.0 - in other words, will the card be slowed down significantly by being used in a non-2.0 slot? If so, is the slowdown enough to make it not worth getting a 2.0 card when a non-2.0 card works just as fast (and usually costs less)?

And yeah, I'm sticking with the ATi chipsets for simplicity's sake.

 

[cisco]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103037
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=80108-R
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=80109-R

The first is one everyone has already shown you, the other 2 are from zipzoomfly, they are Optys 175,180. A little more than you wanted to spend but if your are planning on keeping that for a while you'll need to get the best processor you can afford. The Optys are great, I have a 170 and it overclocks well, they are the cream of the crop in AMDs. They also have 2mb of cache vs 1mb on the 4000+.

 

[caamsa]

@ Shecky did you ever tell us the max you can spend on a video card? If I were you I would get the best that you can.

 

[Shecky]

@ Shecky did you ever tell us the max you can spend on a video card? If I were you I would get the best that you can.

Yeah, I'm looking in the $100 range. Mostly, I'm looking for max bang for the buck, which isn't necessarily getting the "best" - as people have said here, some of the features on some of the cards we've looked at would be like getting a car with a top speed of 200 mph when I'm never going to get off city streets and don't have access to a track: cool, but a waste of money for my purposes.

Believe me, I understand the attraction of getting the absolute best I can afford; it's just that I have a severe dislike in general of unnecessary expenditure. Hanging a lot of ubercool kerfluffle that I'm never going to use is, yes, cool, but it's still kerfluffle. :lol:

 

[Shecky]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103037
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=80108-R
http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=80109-R

The first is one everyone has already shown you, the other 2 are from zipzoomfly, they are Optys 175,180. A little more than you wanted to spend but if your are planning on keeping that for a while you'll need to get the best processor you can afford. The Optys are great, I have a 170 and it overclocks well, they are the cream of the crop in AMDs. They also have 2mb of cache vs 1mb on the 4000+.

Cisco, everyone else here is telling me that what I "need" first (i.e., I HAVE to choose between CPU and GPU, and they've convincingly argued that GPU is the way to go here) is a GPU. Unfortunately, that means that by the time I dig myself enough out of this hole to upgrade the CPU as well, they probably won't even be making Socket 939 AMD processors any more; I'll have to look for a used one. 🙁

 

[B-Unit]

OK lets break cars out again to describe PCIe 1.1 vs 2.0

Lets say that PCIe1.1 is a highway with a speed limit of 75MPH. PCIe2.0 has a speed limit of 110MPH. However, you drive a Pinto that maxes out at 55MPH. No matter which highway you drive on, your still only going to go 55MPH.

That is similar to the PCIe situation, PCIe2.0 has the ability to go faster, but no card yet uses the full speed of v1.1, so no, a PCIe2.0 card in a 1.1 slot will not suffer any performance loss.

Hope that makes sense for you.

 

[B-Unit]

Just saw your last reply. For the type of use you subject it to, your current CPU will get you by for at least another year, if not two. A that time, upgrading is going to be almost out of the question, you will be way ahead to just get a new system. Skt939 is already out of production, new motherboards are almost all gone, and the processors are going away quick. i expect in 6 months, ebay will be the only source for this generation of tech.

 

[Shecky]

OK lets break cars out again to describe PCIe 1.1 vs 2.0

Lets say that PCIe1.1 is a highway with a speed limit of 75MPH. PCIe2.0 has a speed limit of 110MPH. However, you drive a Pinto that maxes out at 55MPH. No matter which highway you drive on, your still only going to go 55MPH.

That is similar to the PCIe situation, PCIe2.0 has the ability to go faster, but no card yet uses the full speed of v1.1, so no, a PCIe2.0 card in a 1.1 slot will not suffer any performance loss.

Hope that makes sense for you.

Yes, it does. We're all driving Pintos on the Autobahn. :lol:

Seriously, that helps - I just needed to know whether that potential in the 2.0 was actually being fully USED by these cards, whether the listed capacities/speeds of those cards DEPENDED on the 2.0 having a faster potential. If I understand you correctly, the answer is "not at all".

PS With the prices of Socket 939 single-core CPUs being as low as they are (just checked) I may be able to add one in far sooner than I planned, especially since people are telling me that dual-cores are a waste for my purposes. Might even be able to swing it in the next month or two (some friends owe me a couple of hundred bucks, and it looks like they may be in a position to repay me soon). I intend to make this system last as long as I can - having learned in the past two years (bought current system two years ago) that the opportunities to get a completely new system aren't all that common for me.

 

[B-Unit]

Yea, I can understand that, my current system is actually the only one Ive ever owned that was actually "new". Im not sure where all your looking, but if you cant find a single core running at least 2.6 Ghz, your not really going to see a speed improvement. As I said, I would just run your current one untill the entire system can be replaced.

 

[ZOldDude]

Any of the 939 Optrons will OC 3Ghz+ on stock volts (some hit 3.4 but 3.2 is about it for most even with a volt boost on air/water).

Even the Optron 146's in my profile (2Ghz stock and have seven on my LAN) are all OC'd 50% to 3Ghz (well 2.950) with -all- voltages stock (even the DFI MB's and RAM) on air.
The systems will go higher but I need that extra .1 volt boost that I don't want to have to use.

If you don't want to build a whole new system grab the Optron 180/185's that are left befor they are just a memory.