Kroney Posted September 30, 2006 Share Posted September 30, 2006 (edited) So, I am currently running: Athlon 64 3200+ Socket 939 MSI K8N Neo 2 939, AGP mobo 1 gig DDR RAM 160 gig Seagate Barracuda IDE drive Geforce 6600GT AGP GPU Here's the thing. I want to migrate to PCI-E but I can't afford to completely rebuild my system. Suggestions, please. Obviously the motherboard and GPU are going to go. All the PCI-E motherboards I've looked at don't list IDE ports in their specs, they're all SATA/SATA2. Does this mean that I@m so far out of the loop that they've stopped building IDE ports into mobos or are they still so commonplace that manufacturers just don't bother listing them? Secondly, as far as I can see, my CPU is more than capable of keeping up with most things still running. However, is 939 a dying format and should I just bite the bullet and go to AM2? I'd really rather not fork out more cash for a CPU and SATA drive if I don't have to, particularly as I want to get a copy of XP 64 bit edition. Oh, I should mention that I need this upgrade to last another two years. Edited September 30, 2006 by Kroney Dirty deeds done cheap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pidesco Posted September 30, 2006 Share Posted September 30, 2006 SATA boards still support IDE. Also, with that system, all I would change would be the mobo and the GPU. I'd wait for DX10 before replacing the whole machine. "My hovercraft is full of eels!" - Hungarian touristI am Dan Quayle of the Romans.I want to tattoo a map of the Netherlands on my nether lands.Heja Sverige!!Everyone should cuffawkle more.The wrench is your friend. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
angshuman Posted September 30, 2006 Share Posted September 30, 2006 ... are they still so commonplace that manufacturers just don't bother listing them? Yup. However, is 939 a dying format and should I just bite the bullet and go to AM2? Given that you're looking at a 2-year timeframe: If you're planning to upgrade your processor after 1 year, then go for AM2. If you want to buy a processor now and use it for 2 years, then an AM2 motherboard (+DDR2 memory) would be a worthless investment. Just buy the best 939 CPU you can afford. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kroney Posted September 30, 2006 Author Share Posted September 30, 2006 (edited) t a 2-year timeframe: If you're planning to upgrade your processor after 1 year, then go for AM2. If you want to buy a processor now and use it for 2 years, then an AM2 motherboard (+DDR2 memory) would be a worthless investment. Just buy the best 939 CPU you can afford. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I'm rather hoping to not have to upgrade my CPU at all for the two years. Edited September 30, 2006 by Kroney Dirty deeds done cheap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kroney Posted October 1, 2006 Author Share Posted October 1, 2006 So what are the current crop of PCI-E cards like? I am willing to spend about 200 quid. I was thinking of maybe a Geforce 7900GT or a Radeon X1900GT. I've lost track of which cards are good. It's been two years since I last really researched this stuff. Help me Dirty deeds done cheap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sargallath Abraxium Posted October 1, 2006 Share Posted October 1, 2006 ...ya could grab an ASUS A8N-E mobo an' a 7900GT(O) or a X1900GT(XT) fer 'bout what ya wants ta spend, but it's gonna be yer cpu that'll be yer bottleneck, not ta mention that 2 gigs o' RAM is almost becomin' the standard wit' new games...I wouldn't go AM2 if ya do decide to upgrade the cpu, though; go wit' an Intel Core Duo Conroe... ...WHO LUVS YA, BABY!!... A long, long time ago, but I can still remember, How the Trolling used to make me smile. And I knew if I had my chance, I could egg on a few Trolls to "dance", And maybe we'd be happy for a while. But then Krackhead left and so did Klown; Volo and Turnip were banned, Mystake got run out o' town. Bad news on the Front Page, BIOweenia said goodbye in a heated rage. I can't remember if I cried When I heard that TORN was recently fried, But sadness touched me deep inside, The day...Black Isle died. For tarna, Visc, an' the rest o' the ol' Islanders that fell along the way Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kroney Posted October 1, 2006 Author Share Posted October 1, 2006 Psh. Intel. Never. Dirty deeds done cheap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fionavar Posted October 1, 2006 Share Posted October 1, 2006 Core 2 Duo currently holds the performance lead. AMD mobos may have a clearer upgrade route at the moment, but I do not thinks it is bravado to acknowledge the C2D performance crown. The universe is change; your life is what our thoughts make it - Marcus Aurelius (161) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mkreku Posted October 1, 2006 Share Posted October 1, 2006 Brand loyalty only hurts yourself. Intel is, right now, the king of the hill. The Conroe core is beating AMD's best CPU's on all accounts. I've ordered a Core 2 Duo E6600 (Conroe) myself. It will arrive here within a week or so. Swedes, go to: Spel2, for the latest game reviews in swedish! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kroney Posted October 1, 2006 Author Share Posted October 1, 2006 It's all moot anyway as I'm not looking to buy a much larger CPU, I'm not really looking to buy one at all, so I'd be getting a 939 mobo. If in the future I did then decide to upgrade, the path is clear. The high end stuff is out of my reach for the moment, so I'm happy plugging along with AMD. Dirty deeds done cheap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sargallath Abraxium Posted October 1, 2006 Share Posted October 1, 2006 ...if ya really jus' want a quick upgrade an' ta save a complete rebuild fer a few years, jus' grab a 7600GT AGP an' that'll do ya fer a bit until DX10 comes out an' ye has the dough ta do a complete upgrade... ...WHO LUVS YA, BABY!!... A long, long time ago, but I can still remember, How the Trolling used to make me smile. And I knew if I had my chance, I could egg on a few Trolls to "dance", And maybe we'd be happy for a while. But then Krackhead left and so did Klown; Volo and Turnip were banned, Mystake got run out o' town. Bad news on the Front Page, BIOweenia said goodbye in a heated rage. I can't remember if I cried When I heard that TORN was recently fried, But sadness touched me deep inside, The day...Black Isle died. For tarna, Visc, an' the rest o' the ol' Islanders that fell along the way Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kroney Posted October 2, 2006 Author Share Posted October 2, 2006 OK, so now I'm thinking about doing a mid-way full upgrade with enoguh expandibility to grow in later on. This is what I am considering. ASUS M2N4-SLI AM2 mobo. This has two PCI-E 16x slots for SLI should I want to go down that route in the future. For now I'll be relying on one GPU, but I like to have the options. Similarly, it supports SATA RAID drives, while I'll be making do with the old IDE drive for the moment. Radeon X1900XT 256mb GPU According to reviews, this offers the best performance in its bracket. Maybe I'll add another card in the future if that is way things go. AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200 Mid range dual core processor. I don't really think I need anything more powerful than this currently. Again, the mobo can support more hardcore processors should this become a bottleneck further down the line. 2GB DDR2 533 RAM Starting to become the standard. My only gripe is losing the GB I already have. It's only DDR. Suggestions? Dirty deeds done cheap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
angshuman Posted October 2, 2006 Share Posted October 2, 2006 It's all moot anyway as I'm not looking to buy a much larger CPU, I'm not really looking to buy one at all, so I'd be getting a 939 mobo. If in the future I did then decide to upgrade, the path is clear. The high end stuff is out of my reach for the moment, so I'm happy plugging along with AMD. What exactly do you define as high-end? A $300 Intel E6600 that beats the socks off a $700 AMD FX-62? Or a $180 Intel E6300 that shames a $280 AMD X2 4800+? Sorry to use a confrontationist tone, but from the specs you have just posted it looks like you are going for a full (mobo + CPU + RAM + graphics) upgrade. You've also mentioned that you do not care much about a long-lasting upgrade path. Given these facts there's absolutely no reason to go AMD at this point in time except for brand loyalty (which I do not understand but do respect). In fact, since it has been demonstrated that a quad-core Kentsfield will usually just snap into a 965 socket, you have a pretty darn nice upgrade path with Intel too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kroney Posted October 2, 2006 Author Share Posted October 2, 2006 (edited) It's all moot anyway as I'm not looking to buy a much larger CPU, I'm not really looking to buy one at all, so I'd be getting a 939 mobo. If in the future I did then decide to upgrade, the path is clear. The high end stuff is out of my reach for the moment, so I'm happy plugging along with AMD. What exactly do you define as high-end? A $300 Intel E6600 that beats the socks off a $700 AMD FX-62? Or a $180 Intel E6300 that shames a $280 AMD X2 4800+? Sorry to use a confrontationist tone, but from the specs you have just posted it looks like you are going for a full (mobo + CPU + RAM + graphics) upgrade. You've also mentioned that you do not care much about a long-lasting upgrade path. Given these facts there's absolutely no reason to go AMD at this point in time except for brand loyalty (which I do not understand but do respect). In fact, since it has been demonstrated that a quad-core Kentsfield will usually just snap into a 965 socket, you have a pretty darn nice upgrade path with Intel too. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> If you read the spec post again, you'll notice that the first sentence says "I'm *now* thinking". Meaning my aims have changed. You don't want to sound confrontational, but you'll use a confrontational tone anyway. Uh huh. If you respect brand loyalty, which you're assuming at this point (given that I've already stated that brand loyalty doesn't have much to do with anything in my judgement) why are you questioning it in a confrontational manner? Your post baffles me. Edit: I've also said I'm looking at future-proofing it for the two years. That is a fairly long-lasting upgrade. Edited October 2, 2006 by Kroney Dirty deeds done cheap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Surreptishus Posted October 2, 2006 Share Posted October 2, 2006 ASUS M2N4-SLI AM2 mobo. Radeon X1900XT 256mb GPU Maybe I'll add another card in the future if that is way things go. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Doesn't SLI require 2 Nvidia GPUs? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
angshuman Posted October 2, 2006 Share Posted October 2, 2006 *sigh* My bad. Okay, I'll try again. Forget my previous post. This one's completely factual, no innuendos. As of today, at all price points, Intel's solutions are overwhelmingly superior to AMD's offerings. Intel's current platform will remain viable as an upgrade path for at least 1 year, and it is likely that processors will be available for the platform even 2 years from now, although there will undoubtedly be better platform offerings by this time. Intel's processors (in quad form, oct form, whatever) will very likely continue to outperform AMD counterparts for desktop applications until AMD releases their new K8L microarchitecture sometime in 2007. It is impossible to predict if K8L will be superior or inferior to Conroe. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mkreku Posted October 2, 2006 Share Posted October 2, 2006 Doesn't SLI require 2 Nvidia GPUs? <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Yes. You need a Crossfire-enabled motherboard for two ATI Radeon X1900XT cards. But that's an awesome card for its price though. Swedes, go to: Spel2, for the latest game reviews in swedish! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alanschu Posted October 2, 2006 Share Posted October 2, 2006 I'm an AMD fanboy and I'll acknowledge Intel's performance advantage. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sargallath Abraxium Posted October 2, 2006 Share Posted October 2, 2006 ...I gotta agree, Kroney (an' I's a licensed AMD fanboy); if yer plannin' on a CPU, Mobo, & RAM update now, ye'd be foolish not ta go wit' a Conroe...an', imho, ye'd be foolish ta buy inta a SLI mobo right now; once DX10 starts rollin' along, ye'll be replacin' the gpu anyways an', as that's a year or more down the road 'afore it becomes "mainstream", why waste the cash for two nVidia gpus now when one will tide ya o'er???... ...WHO LUVS YA, BABY!!... A long, long time ago, but I can still remember, How the Trolling used to make me smile. And I knew if I had my chance, I could egg on a few Trolls to "dance", And maybe we'd be happy for a while. But then Krackhead left and so did Klown; Volo and Turnip were banned, Mystake got run out o' town. Bad news on the Front Page, BIOweenia said goodbye in a heated rage. I can't remember if I cried When I heard that TORN was recently fried, But sadness touched me deep inside, The day...Black Isle died. For tarna, Visc, an' the rest o' the ol' Islanders that fell along the way Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kroney Posted October 3, 2006 Author Share Posted October 3, 2006 (edited) ASUS M2N4-SLI AM2 mobo. Radeon X1900XT 256mb GPU Maybe I'll add another card in the future if that is way things go. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Doesn't SLI require 2 Nvidia GPUs? <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Does it? So Crossfire is for Radeon? Ahhh, I wondered what the difference was. Edited October 3, 2006 by Kroney Dirty deeds done cheap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kroney Posted October 3, 2006 Author Share Posted October 3, 2006 (edited) I'm an AMD fanboy and I'll acknowledge Intel's performance advantage. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I only looked at AMD because I understand their upgrade path, it's really got nothing to do with brand loyalty at all. If someone could post some specs or times or something I'd be happy to consider Intel. once DX10 starts rollin' along, ye'll be replacin' the gpu anyways an', as that's a year or more down the road 'afore it becomes "mainstream", why waste the cash for two nVidia gpus now when one will tide ya o'er???... ...WHO LUVS YA, BABY!!... <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Wait a minute, once DX10 comes along, I'd have to upgrade the motherboard again to be able to install a DX10 GPU? I'm not going to buy two GPUs now, I wanted to have the slots for *future* use. [*]As of today, at all price points, Intel's solutions are overwhelmingly superior to AMD's offerings.[*]Intel's current platform will remain viable as an upgrade path for at least 1 year, and it is likely that processors will be available for the platform even 2 years from now, although there will undoubtedly be better platform offerings by this time. [*]Intel's processors (in quad form, oct form, whatever) will very likely continue to outperform AMD counterparts for desktop applications until AMD releases their new K8L microarchitecture sometime in 2007. It is impossible to predict if K8L will be superior or inferior to Conroe. <{POST_SNAPBACK}> That's cool, so what would be the rough equivalent to the 4200 from AMD? I lost track of the comparisons between the two after the Pentium 4. Does the 4200 still refer to the equivalent Intel processor it claims to beat or is that not the case anymore? Edited October 3, 2006 by Kroney Dirty deeds done cheap. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mkreku Posted October 3, 2006 Share Posted October 3, 2006 I'm not sure what the equivalent would be, but the Core 2 Duo E6600 (middle range for Intel) is about equal to the Athlon FX-62, which is AMD's top-of-the-line CPU. So I guess the little Conroe, the E6300, is somewhat equivalent to the AMD X2 4200 (if there is such a CPU). Swedes, go to: Spel2, for the latest game reviews in swedish! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Atreides Posted October 3, 2006 Share Posted October 3, 2006 Lol I'd be happy to upgrade to your current system. Spreading beauty with my katana. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
angshuman Posted October 3, 2006 Share Posted October 3, 2006 That's cool, so what would be the rough equivalent to the 4200 from AMD? I lost track of the comparisons between the two after the Pentium 4. Does the 4200 still refer to the equivalent Intel processor it claims to beat or is that not the case anymore? Nah, with dual cores the numbering scheme has gone haywire. Intel's also given up on the gigahurtz race and switched to their own numbering scheme, so the numbers just don't make any sense anymore . The "little Conroe" as mkreku said is the E6300 and costs about the same as an X2 4200 but performs better. You can't go wrong with this baby, but Conroes start showing their true scary potential only with 4MB L2 caches, which start with the E6600 (about $300). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
metadigital Posted October 3, 2006 Share Posted October 3, 2006 Intel C2D draw a lot less power than the top-end AMDs, too ... so if you pay for your electricity you might want to factor that in ... though 270W for a X1950XTX is ludicrous, as well. These figures quoted from this month's PC Format: Processor [*]Core 2 Duo OBSCVRVM PER OBSCVRIVS ET IGNOTVM PER IGNOTIVS OPVS ARTIFICEM PROBAT Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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