Would it be bad (amd)

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vochtige

vochtige

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Jan 11, 2008
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hello folks

next month my pc is 3 years old. time to get a change.

what i need is/are:

-CPU, mobo, ram, hdd, OS, gpu.

what i'm planning to recycle:

-case, psu( xilence 600W)

so some questions for you all: would i go for socket 775? or the PII from amd?
can somebody tell me a good asus mobo for those PII's? (<150euro's)
ram: no problem to pick them. but wich mhz? ddr2?
hdd: 500 WD

gpu: 9800GTX+ or 4850

total cost: 750-800 euro's, i know it's tight, but i need a new system, and i'm not a hardcore gamer enymore. (asking myself if i was... my gaming years are over 😛)

so if you count if, i'm really stuck on the cpu!!

help please

or should i go for DELL I7 system: 750gb, 3gb ddr3, I7 920 and 4850 for less then 1000 euro's





 
If you are competent in building pc's then dont get the dell.

I think you are right on the fence between getting a phenom 2 940 or a Q9550 and an i7 920. Since you already have some parts to reuse and you dont need a powerful videocard you might be able to get an i7 system. IMO if you go with i7 then you should be getting at least 6GB or DDR3.

If you are looking for an asus mobo for the phenom 2 then get one with either a 790gx or 790fx northbridge and southbridge 750.

My suggestion is to try to make it work with i7, if you cant then go with the phenom 2.
 
nsimo86 thanks,

i ham using a new screen 22inch, so i need a gpu that is strong enough to handle 1600x1200 resolution

can you advise me one?

about I7: 920 costs 296 euros vs pII 940 that cost 280
 
even though the cpu costs are similar, i7 requires a more expensive mobo and DDR3 RAM.

I would see how much all the components excluding a gpu would cost you and then see how much money is left for the gpu. If you go i7 you'll probably be limited to a 4850 or 9800gtx. If you go phenom 2 you could go for a better card.

I am from the US so i dont really know where to buy stuff in europe and the price differences.
 
its not the price of the processor ..its the price of mobo and especially the price of RAM that makes all the difference .. A good PH2 or C2D board can be had for good 100 euro while the I7 board its hard to find for less then 200Euro ...and RAM ... 8 Gb of decent DDR2 can be had for as low as 80 euro while 8Gb of DDR3 cant be had for less than 200 euro ... I personally need all the RAM i can get... therefor i'd still go for the ddr2 ...my prediction is, that at least through 2009 there wont be significant acceptance of the ddr3 ... and ddr2 will live for another 3 years ....
 
If you decide to go for the Phenom 2 I would go for the 790fx chipset. Reason being is it has all the kinks worked out of it. Most 790fx chipsets support the new P2s as well. Price is also a factor. The 790fx MBs should be on sale in alot of places. Your ram would be 1066 ddr2 btw. It should be no problem running your new rig on old ddr2 800 as well. You are going to want Vista 64 with 4+++ gigs of ram as well.

Intel options atm are not that great imo. Only reason for me to say that is price vs performance. DDR3 and MB prices are just to high for me personaly. The i7 while its a wonderfull cpu its only decent price vs performance is when you use it specificly for the applications it is very good at. For gaming and the average user is not worth the investment atm imo. It all comes down to your price range.

I highly recomend when asking for hardware advice you list your monitor size, type(lcd ect), and native resolution as it is super important if anyone is going to give you advice on your GPU. For your average 22 inch lcd at 1680x1050 and below I highly recomend a 4850-1gb for graphics when on a budget. This would put your gpu in its sweet spot performance wise. I highly recomend the 4870-1gb models for that resolution and display size and above IF you plan on upgrading your display in the near future. I would steer far clear of Nvidia as the 8800s and 200 cards do not support most of the features we will be seeing next year and they do not natively support dx10.1. Basicly you are paying for a gpu with very old features that inside of a year will perform like bottom level gpus because of the lack of feature support.
 
samsung syncmaster T220 paired with my 17 inch 740BF. both great screens. currently i'm using both. i'm planning to game my old games, and i'm willing to play gta IV! i'm not an encoding guy or something. and the I7 gaming performance at the moment aren't so wonderfull. that's why i don't want to spend so much money.

about the gpu: the 9800GTX+ and 4850 are at the same price. i'm using nvidia for many years, don't know what ati has to bring me.
i know myself, and i'm a person who buys a new gpu after 1.5 years. so spending more money for a 4870 isn't my thing.

can someone give me some numbers about asus motherboards? like m3n ... because intel is known for me, but amd is an unknown path for me.

about the cpu. i hear here and there rumors about Phenom II to be only an upgrade cpu. but what about the people who don't want to spend so much on mobo and ram? i payed for my old pc 1005 euro's (let's say it's the same in dollars at that same time). i got a p4 630 3.0 ghz, 6600gt xxx 256mb xfx gpu, 2x80 gb maxtor sata 1 and a cheap nec dvd burner that doesn't work enymore. in those 3 years i changed the gpu to a 8600 (what dubbled my performance in fps, but didn't do what a 8600gt suposed to do... all known subject 😛p)

so now i can get for 800 euro's the best amd processor, a X8XX model card and more ram...

are there reasons to go for intel again?
 
If you buy a 790fx/gx mobo it should have support for future AM3 phenom 2 cpu's so there will be some upgradability. You wont be able to use DDR3 but it is shown to have less than a 10% performance increase over DDR2.

The asus model is the M3N79-T deluxe. However on newegg it is priced much higher than its MSI, DFI and Foxconn counterparts. I dont know if it will be the same for you in Europe though.

I would go for the radeon 4850 or 4870 as both prices have come down a long way and can be crossfired in the future.

The reason to go intel is if you are a true enthusiast and need the best of the best. Anything lower than that comes down to loyalty as the Core2Quads and Phenom 2s perform similarly, although I'd lean towards AMD for the AM3 upgradability.
 
thanks!! that's the info i needed most.

one more question: the OS:

is vista basic 64bit enough? or do i have to go for premium?

an other new question: 2.8 or 3.0ghz amd pII? is 200mhz worth the extra money?
 
oke, maybe i'll get basic, i don't know yet (it's the last step after the build)

1 x OCZ 4GB 1066-555 Reaper
1 x XFX GF9800GTX+ 765M
1 x Microsoft Windows Vista Home Basic 64 bit (System Builder, Nederlands, SP1)
1 x Asus DRW-20B1LT (Bulk, Zilver/Zwart, 12x DVD-RAM schrijven, Lightscribe)
1 x Western Digital WD5000ABPS (RE2-GP)
1 x AMD Phenom II X4 920
1 x Asus M3N78 PRO (Retail, Sound, HDMI, Gb-LAN, FW, SATAII-RAID)
756,28EUR

what you guys think for the money? the mobo suports PII (says asus on the website)

if the amd pricecut for the 920 is coming to europe, maybe i can spend more at the mobo... or the other 940 cpu
 
Just to warn you if you're going to go Phenom II, that you may run into a whole lot of problems getting your board to post. I bought the Phenom 920 with an Asus M3A78-T which supports the CPU by flashing the BIOS. However, you can't get the board to post so you can't flash the BIOS. I had to take my board to a buddy's house and pull out his Athlon 64 X2 and put it in my board to flash it. If you're board comes with the original BIOS which it mostly likely will, then good luck getting it flashed.
 
Well watch some of the info offered here if you get an AM2+ board your not going to be able to upgrade to AM3 socket. Pretty darn sure it will be totally different socket on those.
 
Thanks guys for the income!!

i think i'll wait what the next month will bring. the pc is still working now, and i start Thursday for my look after a new pc! thanks for the income!!!

i'll post my new setup if it runs.
 


AM3 CPUs will have both a DDR2 and DDR3 memory controller and therefore can be used on either an AM2+ or AM3 motherboards. AM2+ Phenom 2s have only a DDR2 controller and therefore will not work on a AM3 motherboard.
 
little update: the price for phenom 940 is come down as the price of the 920. but the question is: is the 940 worth the extra 34 euro's? i'm not an overclocker! so the system would be like this:

1 x OCZ 4GB 1066-555 Reaper
1 x XFX GF9800GTX+ 765M
1 x Microsoft Windows Vista Home Basic 64 bit (System Builder, Nederlands, SP1)
1 x Asus DRW-20B1LT (Bulk, Zilver/Zwart, 12x DVD-RAM schrijven, Lightscribe)
1 x Western Digital Caviar SE16 (Bulk, WD5000AAKS)
1 x Asus M3N78 PRO (Retail, Sound, HDMI, Gb-LAN, FW, SATAII-RAID)
1 x AMD Phenom II X4 940
733,66EUR
 
I would go for premium, just for aero... Vista basic looks like crap. Unless you want to go for windows classic and forgo live preview or whatever it is... IMO one of the best, most useful features of Vista. It's only like a $50 difference for the non-upgrade, non-OEM version anyway...
 


Keep in mind that you will not get the new features on an AM2 socket. It has to be AM2+ for the new AMD rigs. Most of the new performance is lost unless you are on the new socket.

Avoid any and all Asus MBs at all costs imo. They recently went 100% Chinese production. Asus has put there hands in everything from MBs, GPUs, Laptops ect. It shows and especially in the MB section. They use poor caps and have pretty bad bios, driver and utility support these days. Even there graphics cards are slipping with support a bit more then usual. I put Asus MBs at the bottom of the list with Foxcon and EVGA(all EVGA products). I recomend Gigabyte for ease of use, great tech support(factory advanced support) and they are built like a brick. The Bios is also very easy to use and has both the simple version and an advanced verison with the flick of a key. Gigabyte has some pretty decent desktop apps for OCing, bios updates, and fully featured control over your MB.

When it comes to your GPU its really up to you. Again I advise against any and all current Nvidia products as they are still on last years features. It sounds like you are fit for a 4850 512-1gb. You should get better color and have no problems running that gpu for 3 years on your display. I recomend again the 1gb model as more and more engines are eating more and more vram with every passing year. Inside of 2 years I firmly believe 1gb will be standard. There is just no point in buying last years GPU when this years models are that much better. If you are going to run 2 displays I recomend you do so on the 4870 as it yeilds better returns. Oh and that 8600 is pretty much good for propping up your desk at this point.

The new P2s are very viable gaming builds. If you decide to cut out xfire/sli options you can save alot of money on the MB. DDR2 1066 is plenty for any gaming rig as benchmarks on DDR3 make it a non factor for a must have atm. Chances are you will never see the difference. Socket is a non factor. Its about price vs performance. It doesnt matter if you build AM2+ or an Intel system. The next time you are ready to upgrade your CPU you will need to buy a new MB and Ram anyways.

I can not recomend any single x16 MBs as I only build xfire rigs. I can recomend you do some reading on what 790fx MBs are out there if you decide to go that route.
 
hey jerseygamer

thanks for the big comment!! so i should go looking for gigabyte! i didn't pick that brand because of the strange colors they use to paint the mobo's and components.

i'm only looking to buy next month, and things change really fast these days!! maybe i'll pick up amd3 socket.

about the old nvidia: maybe you're right about the old tech that nvidia is using. that's why i'm very interesting what ATI has to offer.
i'm not planning to use xfire or sli, because i don't need to use 2 gpu's. if i need a new gpu, i'll get a better one than i already have...

thanks alot, you all made me doubt more about getting a system now 😛, intel prices went up, amd prices went down!
 
I wouldnt hold out for the am3 mobos. Supposedly the am3 phenom 2's are delayed because amd hasnt worked out all the bugs with the DDR3 memory controller.
 


That's a BS rumor that was started by Fudzilla.
http://www.pcper.com/news.php?page=2

Going straight to the source, I got a pretty enlightening answer. It seems that when the first batches of 45 nm processors were coming off the line, to get them validated they focused on DDR-2 and only ran the northbridge portion of the chip at 1800 GHz instead of the full 2 GHz that many were expecting (remember, the "uncore" parts of the 45 nm Phenom II run at 1.8 GHz while the processor cores run at 2.8 and 3.0 GHz). This allowed AMD to get these AM2+ parts out in relatively short order, and once those products were in the pipeline AMD concentrated on getting the DDR-3 parts out at full spec. So, the DDR-3 portion of the memory controller is still being officially validated, but from all indications it is working perfectly fine.

So far I am not under any NDA information, but from all indications it appears as though the DDR-3/AM3 launch is going to be sometime next month. Final products are ready to be sent out for review, and certainly motherboard guys like Asus and Gigabyte have put out big press releases about their upcoming AM3 based motherboads (and in Asus' case, they have pre-announced for NVIDIA the existance of the nForce 980a chipset).
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