What to upgrade ?

  • Thread starter Thread starter bp
  • Start date Start date
B

bp

Well I was thinking of upgrading my system from an xp3000+ AMD system
to a newer 64 bit version but with the new x800's coming soon I'm
wonder which is the best upgrade path.

TO upgrade the MB and processor to a AMD 64 3200 or get a x800 pro

Both upgrades would cost exactly the same so which do you think will
show the most improvement?

decision decision.
 
Well I was thinking of upgrading my system from an xp3000+ AMD system
to a newer 64 bit version
Click to expand...

Which will give you only a really small incremental difference.
Understanding that the 250b and KT800pro chipsets just now appearing in new
boards the 939 pin socket CPU's are due at the end of the month. So *if* I
was going to build, and not "upgrade" a system I would wait for either a
250b or KT800pro chipset board and maybe a 939 socket / CPU.
TO upgrade the MB and processor to a AMD 64 3200 or get a x800 pro
Click to expand...

You do not mention what video card you have now and so it's impossible to
suggest that there will be a difference worth having for the cost. For me
the 9800pro must represent the best value performance / cost cards on the
market at this moment in time.

With either the X800 or 6800 let the pioneers, who insist on having the
latest regardless of cost, be the early adopters and testers. Remember some
of the early adopters of the NVidia 5800 must have felt a little
disappointed, to say the least.

--
Regards


Morgan

Hard Drive noise a problem....?

www.flyinglizard.freeserve.co.uk
 
bp said:
Well I was thinking of upgrading my system from an xp3000+ AMD system
to a newer 64 bit version but with the new x800's coming soon I'm
wonder which is the best upgrade path.

TO upgrade the MB and processor to a AMD 64 3200 or get a x800 pro

Both upgrades would cost exactly the same so which do you think will
show the most improvement?
Click to expand...


What video card and RAM do you have?

An AMD64 3200 isn't going to be THAT much quicker for most games,

According to:
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=2038&p=5
For DX9 games, you will go from 38.7fps in Aquamark3 to 43.7fps, an
improvement of 13%.

If you had a 9800XT, and went to the X800 Pro:
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.html?i=2044&p=10
You'd go from 47fps to 54.1, an improvement of 15%

The dilemna is gonna be that socket 939 is on the horizon (maybe only a
month or two), and might be the best route to go for upgradablilty. Also,
the nForce3 250 might be worth waiting for, that should be out soon too -
hopefully around the time 939 starts to appear. Again, by that time we
might start to see PCI-X or PCI-E (or whatever) - there's a lot of things
about to happen in the 64bit motherboard stakes.

Also the R500 is somewhere on the horizon too. And it might be silly to
spend $500 on a new card if your current card is ok. The R500 is likely not
going to be out for some time though, but when it does, it might just blow
everybody way. Nobody really knows yet.

So if you have a 9800XT, the choice is difficult as the gains are similar,
anything less than a 9800XT (or overclocked Pro) and it starts to become a
bit more obvious that the graphics card will get you more.

I would be tempted to stick with what you have (or possibly upgrade the RAM
for now, depending on what you have), and wait to see what happens with
socket 939 / nForce3 250 / PCI-X/E

Ben
 
Which will give you only a really small incremental difference.
Understanding that the 250b and KT800pro chipsets just now appearing in new
boards the 939 pin socket CPU's are due at the end of the month. So *if* I
was going to build, and not "upgrade" a system I would wait for either a
250b or KT800pro chipset board and maybe a 939 socket / CPU.
Click to expand...

What's a 250b
You do not mention what video card you have now and so it's impossible to
suggest that there will be a difference worth having for the cost. For me
the 9800pro must represent the best value performance / cost cards on the
market at this moment in time.
Click to expand...

Opps
I have a 9800 pro
With either the X800 or 6800 let the pioneers, who insist on having the
latest regardless of cost, be the early adopters and testers. Remember some
of the early adopters of the NVidia 5800 must have felt a little
disappointed, to say the least.
Click to expand...

Well from what's been reported the ATI looks good to me and it is
still only running beta drivers.

I don't mind being an early adopter since video cards don't seem to
drop in price very fast, (At least not the top end cards) so getting
in early isn't bad if you do enough research first.
 
What video card and RAM do you have?
Click to expand...
9800 pro
Do you mean the RAM on the Vid card or normal RAM ?
If it's normal RAM I have a gig of some high end crap I can't remember
right now ;( if it's the vid you want I don't know ;)
An AMD64 3200 isn't going to be THAT much quicker for most games,

According to:
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=2038&p=5
For DX9 games, you will go from 38.7fps in Aquamark3 to 43.7fps, an
improvement of 13%.

If you had a 9800XT, and went to the X800 Pro:
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.html?i=2044&p=10
You'd go from 47fps to 54.1, an improvement of 15%
Click to expand...
Well for Aquamark 3 that's not that good but the other bench marks
show a bigger increase in most games
The dilemna is gonna be that socket 939 is on the horizon (maybe only a
month or two), and might be the best route to go for upgradablilty. Also,
the nForce3 250 might be worth waiting for, that should be out soon too -
hopefully around the time 939 starts to appear. Again, by that time we
might start to see PCI-X or PCI-E (or whatever) - there's a lot of things
about to happen in the 64bit motherboard stakes.

Also the R500 is somewhere on the horizon too. And it might be silly to
spend $500 on a new card if your current card is ok. The R500 is likely not
going to be out for some time though, but when it does, it might just blow
everybody way. Nobody really knows yet.

So if you have a 9800XT, the choice is difficult as the gains are similar,
anything less than a 9800XT (or overclocked Pro) and it starts to become a
bit more obvious that the graphics card will get you more.

I would be tempted to stick with what you have (or possibly upgrade the RAM
for now, depending on what you have), and wait to see what happens with
socket 939 / nForce3 250 / PCI-X/E
Click to expand...

hmmmmmm There's always something better coming but waiting may be a
good idea on the MB CPU upgrade (they only seem to come down anyways)
 
bp said:
9800 pro
Do you mean the RAM on the Vid card or normal RAM ?
If it's normal RAM I have a gig of some high end crap I can't remember
right now ;( if it's the vid you want I don't know ;)
Click to expand...


I meant system RAM. A gig of PC3200 is fine.
hmmmmmm There's always something better coming but waiting may be a
good idea on the MB CPU upgrade (they only seem to come down anyways)
Click to expand...


Yep, but it just seems that a nForce 3 250 / socket 939 might be worth the
wait, socket 754 might be a dying breed in a years time, which means ANOTHER
new motherboard when you come to upgrade. For the sake of a few weeks of
waiting...

Having said that, I dunno if the FSB of the Athlon64s is gonna increase...
it seems that they are capable of running at up to 300MHz, so provided JEDEC
approve the standard for PC4000 or whatever and we start moving in that
direction, we could be looking at some serious bandwidth with socket 939.
Which of course, would likely require another motherboard :-p It seems the
MSI K8N Neo manages 250MHz, and even 300MHz "FSB", so you might get away
with it. Hopefully we'll know in a few weeks.

Ben
 
The question cant be answered without knowing what graphics card you
currently have but in general as long as your CPU is acceptable (which yours
is) then the graphics card upgrade will always yield better results.

If you have anything less than a 9700 pro at the moment then I would
definately go for the x800
 
He did answer, he said he had a 9800 pro.

By the way i have a similiar setup,

Abit nf7-s
Athlonxp 2700+ @ 200x11 (2200mhz)
1gig Corsair XMS 3200 c2 ddr
ATI radeon 9700 pro



Do you think it would be worth it to get the x800 xt when it comes out?
I dont think i want to do a really big upgrade until, maybe pci-express has
matured. Maybe not until the end of this year or early of next year

Bean.
 
Back
Top