New CPU Advice Required

[strocky]

At the moment I have the following -:

Asus A8N-SLI Motherboard (Socket 939)
AMD 64 Bit 3500+ CPU (Single Core)
2 x 1GB PC3200U DDR-200 RAM


Looking to upgrade the processor. A couple of questions.

Is it worth spending approx £50 on a AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4200+ or spending approx £110 on an AMD Opteron 64 185, Socket 939, Venus Core, 2.6GHz, 2x 1MB Cache?

Or am I better binning the MB/CPU/RAM and buying a new setup, and if so, what do you recommend?

 

[Murzo]

Is it worth spending approx £50 on a AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4200+ or spending approx £110 on an AMD Opteron 64 185, Socket 939, Venus Core, 2.6GHz, 2x 1MB Cache?

Depends, what will you be using your system for, games, browsing net/downloading, graphics work, encoding etc etc.??

EDIT: How much have you got to spend on new components and do you overclock??

 

[melbourne720]

Sell (don't bin!) your current kit (2GB of DDR has held its value tbh) and get some new:-

Thermalright Ultra-120 Extreme Heatsink (Socket AM2/LGA775)
(£32.89)

Intel Core 2 Duo E2160 "LGA775 Conroe" 1.80GHz (800FSB) - Retail
(£58.74)

Leadtek GeForce 8800 GTS 640MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail
(£217.36)

OcUK 2GB (2x1GB) DDR2 PC2-8500C5 1066MHz Dual Channel Kit
(£82.24)

Abit IP35 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
(£88.11)

Total : £489.86

I've included a stoking graphics card in there, and OC to 3GHz and you have a top system.

 

[Neo4]

Just my opinion but throwing new money at 939 is a waste.For a very reasonable price you could get into the C2D action,more so if you sold your current MB/RAM/CPU.

 

[strocky]

Depends, what will you be using your system for, games, browsing net/downloading, graphics work, encoding etc etc.??

EDIT: How much have you got to spend on new components and do you overclock??

mainly for downloading & games with the odd bit of encoding now & again.

Budget is prob about £300

 

[strocky]

Sell (don't bin!) your current kit (2GB of DDR has held its value tbh) and get some new:-

Thermalright Ultra-120 Extreme Heatsink (Socket AM2/LGA775)
(£32.89)

Intel Core 2 Duo E2160 "LGA775 Conroe" 1.80GHz (800FSB) - Retail
(£58.74)

Leadtek GeForce 8800 GTS 640MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail
(£217.36)

OcUK 2GB (2x1GB) DDR2 PC2-8500C5 1066MHz Dual Channel Kit
(£82.24)

Abit IP35 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
(£88.11)

Total : £489.86

I've included a stoking graphics card in there, and OC to 3GHz and you have a top system.

Cheers for the heads up, should have mentioned I've got an ATI 512Mb RX1950 card already, not that bothered about DX10 at the moment

 

[strocky]

Just my opinion but throwing new money at 939 is a waste.For a very reasonable price you could get into the C2D action,more so if you sold your current MB/RAM/CPU.

how much do you reckon you would be talking if I punted my system including 2 x 250Gb Maxtor HDD, Nvdia GT6600 Video Card, 1 x 16x DVD Recorder, 1 x 48x CD Recorder/DVD Player + 20" Viewsonic LCD monitor?

 

[melbourne720]

sell them all individually, you should be able to get something decent for the gfx card, the monitor, and the hard drives.

 

[Neo4]

I would keep the Hdds as the resale value is peanuts due to the new pricing. CPU £30,80-£100 for the RAM and maybe £30 for the mobo.That would pay for a nice starter system.

 

[strocky]

probably going to hold at the moment, so back to my orginal question -:


Is it worth spending approx £50 on a AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4200+ or spending approx £110 on an AMD Opteron 64 185, Socket 939, Venus Core, 2.6GHz, 2x 1MB Cache?

What's the performance difference between the 2 chips?

 

[clocka]

sell your bits, buy a e2140 cpu, 650i board, 2gb cheap ddr2 and you are done

not worth putting money into that, its like putting money into an old skoda, just not worth it.

 

[strocky]

sell your bits, buy a e2140 cpu, 650i board, 2gb cheap ddr2 and you are done

not worth putting money into that, its like putting money into an old skoda, just not worth it.

I know what your saying, but it's a hassle to break up the kit.

Are there any benchmarks for the E2140 vs AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4200+ vs AMD Opteron 64 185 Venus Core, 2.6GHz?

 

[Phil2008]

Im only guessing cos never had a dual core myself, but I reacon it will be quite abit faster. Im building a 4200+ x2 for my m8 in a few days times, and it will be intreasting to see how much faster it is then my fx55 cpu.

 

[strocky]

http://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html

beginning to think about new kit