Is this a worth while upgrade?

Guru

Guru

Guru

Soldato
Joined
8 Jun 2005
Posts
5,275
I've been offered the following for £50 from a mate at work:

Intel Core 2 Duo E2160 (stock speed, but can hit 2.6Ghz easily)
ASRock SATA-Quad PCI-E Slot
AGP Slot
DDR and DDR2 Memory Support
Quad Core / Dual Core Support
SATA and IDE Support

The Processor is already fitted to the mobo with the stock heatsink.

I'm coming from an amd san diego 4000+

So for £50 will I see a good improvement? (mainlin in COD4)

Cheers,

G
 
a similar mb and cpu setup new will cost at least £70+ so, even the cpu itself is about £45 new so just give your friend the £50 and if the MB isnt up to what you want flog it and get a better one
 
Guru said:
What do you mean by this?

I thought PCIE was the best thing at the moment?

I've got an x1950xtx will that work?

Cheers,

G
Click to expand...

PCIE is the best thing but there are different revision of the slots. There is PCI-E 1.0, PCI-E 1.1 (or 1.a) and then you have PCI-E 2.0. The AsRock board I think uses 1.0 which your X1950XTX card should be fine with. If you were to upgrade then you'd have trouble with the newer cards as they are 1.1(1.a) and 2.0 compatible so you would need to take the card to a friends house. Flash a Gen1 BIOS onto it and then take it home to be able to use it which is a bit of a hassle.

As someone has suggested above. Buy both of them off the friend at work. Sell the motherboard and invest in a cheap but much better motherboard that you will be able to build on rather than using a limited board. That is my suggestion. Also the e2160 CPU will most likely to be able to hit 3Ghz minimum and most likely 3.2Ghz (maybe higher as I can hit 3.5Ghz with mine just never stabilized it). The Asrock motherboard doesn't have great options for overclocking and I've seen a few reports of certain boards to have a 290-300FSB wall so then the CPU is held back.

If you don't want to spend the extra money then just go for it. Even at 2.6Ghz it will destroy your San Diego 4000+. With Intel doing more work per cycle the E2160 even at 2.6Ghz is the equivalent to two of your San Diego CPU's at 3Ghz :). This is taken from the CPU score on 3dmark06 to show the differences in clocks and it might not be 100% accurate but at least it gives you a little insight of the potential.
 
cool :)

I need to buy some more ram as this mobo won't take the 4 sticks of 3200 DDR I've got.

This mobo only supports up to 667, would it be worth getting something better for when I get a different mobo or is 667 good enough?

If I bough something better I'm assuming it would work but just run at 667?

Cheers,

G
 
doh!! I got my new kit and it's a bit of a disaster.

My GFX card is far too big for this mobo, the IDE sockets get in the way of my arctic accelero :(

My mate has offered me a 7900gt which he said defo fit in the mobo, but I dont know if that is as good and my x1950xtx.

Not sure what to do now? Could by a new mobo?

Any recommendations?
 
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