Is it worth upgrading?

Zen · 22 May 2007 at 18:21

Harlo!

Anyways let me begin, is it worth upgrading my processor as this is my current spec:

AMD Athlon64 3500+ AM2
MSI K9N SLi Platinum
Corsair 2GB
XFX 7600GT XXX

Well I have been looking around a dual core processor.. I was wondering to upgrade to AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4600 or perhaps something lower.. My question is is it worth doing so?

Cuz currently I feel there is a slight lag in multitasking and gaming too. Is this lag caused by my gfx or is it due to the small bottleneck caused by the processor? So will upgrading my processor will temporary solve the bottleneck.. I dont mind in spending a lil bit more on getting a new gfx too, maybe a 8800 GTS?

Bloodust · 22 May 2007 at 18:29

Since you started this I might ask the same question

I have stuff on my sig:

939 socket cpu 3500+ amd 64
Asus 6600 GT 128Mb

They both suck balls and I was thinking of getting 8800 gts 320Mb and Opteron cpu. The question is, what opteron model would keep up with 8800 gts ? 175 x2 perhaps?

steve258 · 22 May 2007 at 18:52

Zen said:
Harlo!

Anyways let me begin, is it worth upgrading my processor as this is my current spec:

AMD Athlon64 3500+ AM2
MSI K9N SLi Platinum
Corsair 2GB
XFX 7600GT XXX

Well I have been looking around a dual core processor.. I was wondering to upgrade to AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4600 or perhaps something lower.. My question is is it worth doing so?

Cuz currently I feel there is a slight lag in multitasking and gaming too. Is this lag caused by my gfx or is it due to the small bottleneck caused by the processor? So will upgrading my processor will temporary solve the bottleneck.. I dont mind in spending a lil bit more on getting a new gfx too, maybe a 8800 GTS?

Are you going to overclock?

If not just go for the best X2 you can afford really, the 5200+ with 2Mb L2 has a pretty decent price, but for a little more you can get a cheap C2D E2140 with a half descent mobo which will perform similarly or slightly poorer at stock but when overclocked it will out perform the X2 5200+ easily, hence my first question are you going to overclock? If you don't want to go through all this hassle then a decent X2 can still handle pretty much anything.

With regards to GFX the 8800GTS 320Mb for £170 ish seems to be the best one to go atm unless you game at ridiculous resolutions.

Zen · 22 May 2007 at 19:03

steve258 said:
Are you going to overclock?

If not just go for the best X2 you can afford really, the 5200+ with 2Mb L2 has a pretty decent price, but for a little more you can get a cheap C2D E2140 with a half descent mobo which will perform similarly or slightly poorer at stock but when overclocked it will out perform the X2 5200+ easily, hence my first question are you going to overclock? If you don't want to go through all this hassle then a decent X2 can still handle pretty much anything.

With regards to GFX the 8800GTS 320Mb for £170 ish seems to be the best one to go atm unless you game at ridiculous resolutions.

Well I do overclock but occassionally

I only overclock during the winter

Due to poor ventilation where I live atm. I cant afford to go burn my hardware where I guess some would understand due to my tight budget :/ I am merely a poor student. Well, I would put myself as an occasion overclocker.

As to the gfx, I dont play games at crazy resolution, but I play at the max of 1280x1024, but with the highest possible playable settings. Is there a way for me to achieve these results with the current specs I have or do I really need to opt for a real upgrade on my gfx?

steve258 · 22 May 2007 at 19:04

Bloodust said:
Since you started this I might ask the same question

I have stuff on my sig:

939 socket cpu 3500+ amd 64
Asus 6600 GT 128Mb

They both suck balls and I was thinking of getting 8800 gts 320Mb and Opteron cpu. The question is, what opteron model would keep up with 8800 gts ? 175 x2 perhaps?

You have a pretty good mobo so I'd say get a 2nd hand 165 or 170 and overclock that or look for a X2 4400+.

With a bit of OC it will keep up with the 8800 just fine IMO.

Bloodust · 22 May 2007 at 19:10

I have Asus a8n-e which I sent to RMA last friday

I had some overclocking problems and other stuff back then and I hope I can get my overclocking going on with my 3500+ first

steve258 · 22 May 2007 at 19:14

Zen said:
Well I do overclock but occassionally

I only overclock during the winter Due to poor ventilation where I live atm. I cant afford to go burn my hardware where I guess some would understand due to my tight budget :/ I am merely a poor student. Well, I would put myself as an occasion overclocker.

As to the gfx, I dont play games at crazy resolution, but I play at the max of 1280x1024, but with the highest possible playable settings. Is there a way for me to achieve these results with the current specs I have or do I really need to opt for a real upgrade on my gfx?

Depends on what game you play really, 7600GT is probably only good for low to medium details at that res on the latest games.

If you are on limited budget and just want to game I'd probably hang onto your 3500+ for a little longer and just get a 8800GTS.

Try oc it a little to say 2.5 or even better 2.6Ghz if you can go that far without increasing your voltage too much.

Zen · 22 May 2007 at 19:22

Hrrm seemed like I did have pretty much the same thinking in the end. I will see how it goes, in the end I might not even upgrade at all

I might just get a better cooling for my CPU and push the limit a lil bit more.

Zen · 23 May 2007 at 15:21

w00tz

here is my new dilemma, I returned my XFX 7600GT XXX for RMA, and they told me that this card is now discontinued, they have given me 2 choices...

a) Alternative card

b) Refund

I was thinking of getting an alternative card, BFG 8800GTS 320MB maybe? But here is the real dilemma.

Will my current Tagan 480W run this card along with 4 SATA HDD, 1 IDE HDD and 1 DVD/RW drive with ofc, other peripherals such as USB keyboard and mouse and others...

Do I need a new PSU?

steve258 · 23 May 2007 at 15:26

I'll see it as a sign from above telling you to upgrade your GPU!

Yes the 8800GTS 320mb is your only choice at the moment. Your PSU should be able to handle it just fine as you have a low power consuming CPU, as long as you don't do massive overclocks you should be fine.

Zen · 23 May 2007 at 15:36

Hehe, thx for the advice, I think I might just gonna commit to that. Lets hope I dont go break another gfx soon

*Chris · 23 May 2007 at 17:27

The CPU still might be a bit of a bottlenecker though, i have a 3800+ and saw very little performance increase when i upgraded from an x850 to a higher spec geforce.