CPU and Motherboard Recommendations Wanted

  • Thread starter Thread starter Arthur Lipscomb
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Arthur Lipscomb

I'm building a system and am looking for some advice. I'm torn between a
system with an Athlon 64 3400 but with integrated video or one an Athlon 64
2800 processor and a ATI All in Wonder 9600 video card.



What's the performance difference between a 2800 and 3400? Is it
noticeable?

What's the performance difference between a 512 megs of ram and 1 gig? Is
it noticeable?

I've read something about better performance when using two sticks of ram
instead of one. Can someone please clarify this?



Any comments regarding on board video?

Any comments on the following motherboards:

PCChips M871G (it has 64 megs of integrated video)

MSI K8T Neo FSR

Biostar K8T80-A7



Thanks
 
I'm building a system and am looking for some advice. I'm torn between a
system with an Athlon 64 3400 but with integrated video or one an Athlon 64
2800 processor and a ATI All in Wonder 9600 video card.
Click to expand...
Integrated video isn't very good for gaming. For normal 2D stuff it should
be fine.
What's the performance difference between a 2800 and 3400? Is it
noticeable?
Click to expand...
If you raise the default cpu speed of the 2800 to that of the 3400, there
won't be a difference. Otherwise, the 2800 runs at 1.8GHz and the 3400
runs at 2.4GHz (assuming socket 754).
What's the performance difference between a 512megs of ram and 1 gig?
Is it noticeable?
Click to expand...
Depends on the app. Could be -some to maybe 10%. Overall, the cache won't
gain you much at all.
I've read something about better performance when using two sticks of
ram instead of one. Can someone please clarify this?
Click to expand...
only 939/940 cpu's support dual channel. 754's don't. Again, it depends on
the app, but overall it might give 5% performance increase. In test at
ANandtech.com, there was very littlle difference between single and dual,
and there was also very little difference between 512K and 1M cache. Clock
speed provides the majority of perfomance increase by a wide margin. due
to overhead required by these features is why the 754 3400+ (2.4GHz)
outperforms a 939 3800+ (2.4Ghz) in some apps.
Any comments regarding on board video?
Click to expand...
I don't even play games and I wouldn't buy one for myself.
Any comments on the following motherboards:

PCChips M871G (it has 64 megs of integrated video)

MSI K8T Neo FSR

Biostar K8T80-A7
Click to expand...
I'm not going to look these up, but if they don't have a newer chipset
with a working PCI lock then don't get them if you plan on overclocking by
more than 33Mhz on the system clock. Oh heck...

PCChips M871G- Don't know about PCI lock, but earlier versions may have
come with a 963L southbridge. Newer versions should have the 964 which
also gives you 2 channels SATA support. The 963L doesn't have SATA
support. So look or ask before you buy.

MSI K8T Neo FSR- No PCI lock on this old K8T800 chipset.

Biostar K8T80-A7- Ditto for this one.
 
Wes Newell said:
Integrated video isn't very good for gaming. For normal 2D stuff it should
be fine.
If you raise the default cpu speed of the 2800 to that of the 3400, there
won't be a difference. Otherwise, the 2800 runs at 1.8GHz and the 3400
runs at 2.4GHz (assuming socket 754).

Depends on the app. Could be -some to maybe 10%. Overall, the cache won't
gain you much at all.

only 939/940 cpu's support dual channel. 754's don't. Again, it depends on
the app, but overall it might give 5% performance increase. In test at
ANandtech.com, there was very littlle difference between single and dual,
and there was also very little difference between 512K and 1M cache. Clock
speed provides the majority of perfomance increase by a wide margin. due
to overhead required by these features is why the 754 3400+ (2.4GHz)
outperforms a 939 3800+ (2.4Ghz) in some apps.

I don't even play games and I wouldn't buy one for myself.

I'm not going to look these up, but if they don't have a newer chipset
with a working PCI lock then don't get them if you plan on overclocking by
more than 33Mhz on the system clock. Oh heck...

PCChips M871G- Don't know about PCI lock, but earlier versions may have
come with a 963L southbridge. Newer versions should have the 964 which
also gives you 2 channels SATA support. The 963L doesn't have SATA
support. So look or ask before you buy.

MSI K8T Neo FSR- No PCI lock on this old K8T800 chipset.

Biostar K8T80-A7- Ditto for this one.

--
Click to expand...



Thanks. I'm having a hard time deciding on a system. I'm not a gamer or
overclocker but I don't want a system that runs slow or takes 8 hours to
encode files for a DVD. The systems I'm looking at all have the 754
motherboards. Sorry I wasn't clear before but I was referring to 512 vs 1
gig of system RAM not CPU cache.
 
Wes Newell said:
Depends on the app. Could be -some to maybe 10%. Overall, the cache won't
gain you much at all.
Click to expand...

If you run alot of apps at once or have an app that loads a ton of stuff,
then goes back to it again, it could make a big difference.

When I load Trainz it takes about a minute but if I reload it it takes about
10 seconds. That's an extreme case, of course.

Another extreme case -- running the prime95 torture test, the one that uses
lots of memory. With a gig it was ponderous, but with 2 gigs I can run other
stuff as if it's not there. Apparently the test uses 1.5 gigs.

Whatever memory your apps aren't using is disk cache which keeps the files
you've opened in memory for instant reuse.

If you open alot of apps and don't have alot of memory, some of what would
be in memory goes to disk instead, so it's slow to reload later.

But if you're just doing regular office and internet things 512 should be
plenty.

When Win XP loads it seems to be using about 256.
--
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Thanks, robots.
 
Thanks. I'm having a hard time deciding on a system. I'm not a gamer or
overclocker but I don't want a system that runs slow or takes 8 hours to
encode files for a DVD. The systems I'm looking at all have the 754
motherboards. Sorry I wasn't clear before but I was referring to 512 vs 1
gig of system RAM not CPU cache.
Click to expand...

I'd suggest becoming an overclocker as that's the name of the game.
AMD locks their chips and charges big bucks for fast ones. You can
get a motherboard, DFI Lanparty NF3 designed expressly for
overclocking socket 754 cpu's, that will overclock an AMD2800 to at
least 3200 speeds fairly easily.

Check out the user reviews at www.newegg.com

cheap, stable, fast.
 
Fry's Electronic has been selling AMD 3000/333 (Barton core)
with an ECS KT-600A motherboard (Socket A) for $90.
The Barton core is a good overclocker.

Go for the 1 Gig.
At Fry's, I picked up 2 sticks of PNY 512MB PC3200 memory for $20 per stick,
after $30 mail in rebate (per stick).

Integrated video is SLOW video.
 
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