New 'puter

Alex UK · 20 Jun 2007 at 10:56

Ignore the fact that the 8800GTS is branded OcUK. It will be just as high quality as an EVGA or BFG card, as they all come off the same production line, and are all made by Nvidia. Reducing the price of the other components is definitely worth it to get a 8800GTS. The CPU, RAM and Mobo are all premium brand quality stuff, and should overclock well together.

steve258 · 20 Jun 2007 at 10:57

melbourne720 said:
They aren't making any more CPUs with the AM2 socket, the new AMDs will be incompatible with your motherboard.

Not true. IIRC the upcoming AM2+ chips will work on all current AM2 mobos just without the support for HT3.0 and split power planes, so it's far from a "dead platform" as you will be able to upgrade to Phenom X2/X4 very easily.

Whereas with Intel you will need to get the newest P35 chipset to have support for penryn. It maybe the same LGA775 but each new generation of Intel chips almost certainly means that you'll need to get a new mobo as well.

But I do agree that your spec is better, it performs well, overclocks very easily with lots of futrue upgradability and because we don't know how well the next-gen AMD chips will perform yet.

@OP - It's best if you can stretch for a P35C-DS3R otherwise your future upgrade path is limited to current quad-core offering.

Nebzor · 20 Jun 2007 at 11:00

Well, my delivery just arrived. I'm going to ring up the support team and see how much hassle it will be to send things back and switch components etc. Depending on that, I'll see whether I will switch to intel and change for EITHER a 512mb X1950 Pro, or a 8800GTS (am not sure about the 8800, the X1950 will work fine for everything I want it to do, saves me money, and the only time I'll need the 8800 is when I get unaddicted from my DX9 games and become addicted to a DX10 game). We'll see how it goes.

Thanks for your help, everyone.

Nebzor · 20 Jun 2007 at 11:31

Apparantly I can just send things back within 7 days with no fee, so I am now deciding whether or not to send things back.

Is the system originally posted of an acceptable standard for £570? Not worrying about 'dead platforms' or DX10, is the system good enough? All I'll be doing is playing BF2142/CoD2/WoW at 1024x768 or 1280x1024. There's really no need for the performance I think the 8800GTS is intended for, and I don't know whether I would see a big difference with the X1950, either. So two simple questions.

Is my AMD chipset/mobo acceptable for now? As has been said it is apparantly not a 'dead' system, and I don't think I'm planning on overclocking it or putting it under too much strain whatsoever.

Secondly, will the 7950GT perform well enough to play at 1024x768 and 1280x1024? Or should I really send it back and buy an X1950?

8800GTS is now out of the question, my usage of a GPU really doesn't justify the extra money right now.

Shimmy · 20 Jun 2007 at 11:46

Got it just under budget, but try and spend a few more pennies to get a better psu maybe. Maybe sub the 8800 for a X1950XT 256mb, to save more get dx10 later.

steve258 · 20 Jun 2007 at 11:53

The 7950GT is slightly faster than the 1950pro just that for the price you could have gone for the 1950XT for a tiny bit extra which performs a lot better. But now you've got it I'll just stick with it and be happy, not worth all the hassle and extra postage costs.

If you don't overclock then the AMD X2 4200+ @ 2.2Ghz is fine, performs similarly IMO to E2140 in the same price range at stock. Besides you can also have lots of fun and extra performance overclocking the X2 if you decide to do it.

Nebzor · 20 Jun 2007 at 11:53

Thanks Steve, that really helped. I'll just stick with what I've got sitting behind me. I couldn't afford any more, so the X1950XT was just a teeny bit out of reach. I'll make sure to check what's out when the time for upgrades come.

Final question: how much better will the Intel perform over the similarly priced AMD when overclocked?

Shimmy · 20 Jun 2007 at 11:58

Lots, with good cooling. 3Ghz is usually very attainable.

melbourne720 · 20 Jun 2007 at 12:00

A 7950 should handle those games at that resolution, just it is going to struggle at newer games such as Stalker that's all.

steve258 · 20 Jun 2007 at 12:09

Benjarghmin said:
how much better will the Intel perform over the similarly priced AMD when overclocked?

A LOT better, a C2D at just 2.4Ghz will have similar/better performance to 2.8Ghz X2, and a lot of people have achieved 3Ghz+ OC on a core 2 duo with ease.

milkinc13 · 20 Jun 2007 at 15:53

melbourne720 said:
They aren't making any more CPUs with the AM2 socket, the new AMDs will be incompatible with your motherboard.

Intel Core 2 Duo are clocking really well (I managed a 30% clock on a e6600 [not finished], and a 72% overclock on a e2160), and are faster than a similarly clocked AMD.

how will the new chips AM2+, and AM3 be incompatable? when AMD has said that the new chips will fit, and work in into AM2 boards, thou without the advances these chips will use.