Upgrade: will i see much of a change????

[Ali195]

- Current Spec:
AMD Athlon Dual Core FX60 (S939) @ 2.9Mhz
Asus A8R32 Delux Crossfire (S939)
2x 1GB DDR1 XMS3500LL Pro |TwinX @ 550Mhz
2x ATI X3870
2x WD Raptor (RAID-0)
Vista 64-bit


- Now in Januaryi upgraded from from 2x ATI X1900 (crossfire) to the cards you see above and Crysis did run better but FSX gained only 10FPS, thats it.
Also constant stuttering in Crysis from lack of RAM was doing my head in.

- Anyway im keeping the cards cos nothing wrong with them but here is the new build:

Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550 LGA775 'Yorkfield' 2.83GHz 12MB-cache (1333FSB)
Corsair 4GB DDR2 XMS2 Dominator PC2-8500C5 TwinX (2x2GB)
DFI Lan Party LP UTX48-T2R Intel X48 (Socket LGA 775)


Does anyone think the old build was a bottleneck for the ATI cards?
Been 4 years so wanted to upgrade anyway.

 

[ACESHIGH]

The quad will be better for multitasking / encoding but not a huge step up for gaming.
For gaming youd be better of with a faster dual core imo, like the E8500.

The FX 60 you have is comparable to an E6600 i would say.

 

[gt_junkie]

For gaming youd be better of with a fast dual core imo, like an E8500.

I'd agree with ACESHIGH to some level but the price of the q9550 is actually pretty good at the mo.

When i upgraded i got the e8500 in my sig and used the money i saved over the quad (extortionate prices at the time) to get another 4gb kit of ddr2 (IMO it does make a noticeable difference in vista 64) and a hdd.

Comes down to personal choice TBH - indeed with the 9550 price as it is i would have a hard time deciding.

gt

 

[flinco]

go for a fast dual core you can reach higher clocks than a quad on. seems weird to upgrade the other components so much without a gfx upgrade when thats what games use the most by far. youd be better off getting slightly cheaper components and a 4870

 

[Mav]

if ya getting vista 64 bit m8 , i`d upgrade ya ram to a 2x2gig kit as vista 64 sweet spot is 4gig of ram .
u might find 2gig will be a tad sluggish .

 

[Ali195]

I do play FSX a lot, with satellite imagery covering most of Britain, plus super HD 4000 res clouds. Quad core can work wonders for that game & considering i already had a dual core. But played COD4 and at times it was alittle choppy, same with Portal, Ep1, Ep1. Running 1920*1200

This is with two ATI 3870 cards & i saw people with an 8800 getting higher FPS which didnt make sense to me.

My only issue now is activating Vista with a new mobo, will have lots of fun speaking with Microsoft over the phone tomorrow morning.