Worth upgrading from an opteron 146? Suggest some specs?

Noopz

Noopz

Noopz

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Joined
27 Sep 2003
Posts
79
Hi there,

I currently have a opteron 146, DFI SLI Ultra D (I think), 2GB of ram and a x1800XT 512. I upgraded it for two reasons, oblivion and half life 2. Since finishing those games, I seldom use the Pc for much else.

I wouldn't mind playing some games that have come out (Crysis, Bioshock and gears of war namely) and was thinking about buying a 360 but thought the supposedly cutting edge Halo 3 looked like crap. So I thought I'd upgrade my PC.

Obviously an upgrade will mean a complete rebuild. I've been reading these forums in the last day or two and am completely confused by the amount of stuff out at the moment. I'm looking for a new system and have the following ideas:

CPU - Intel E2180 cpu
Motherboad- IP35? I know nothing about mobos and there are 4 different intel chipsets?? What gives with that?
RAM- 4GB of ram seems standard. What make should I buy?
Graphics- Not sure yet, but I game at no higher than 1280x 1024 -19" TFT and won't get a bigger one. A 8800GT/S or 3870XT?
PSU- something cheap but does a 'decent' 500W+?

Basically, I want something that will last me 2 years and is fairly cheap (less than £500 for everything above). If it could be future proofed for the next iteration of intel cpus, that would be a bonus.

Thanks in advance
 
Came up with the following, to go slightly over the £500 get an aftermarket cooler like the tuniq if you want to clock the 2200 to its limits :

Abit IP35 Pro (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard £99.99 (£117.49)

Intel Core 2 Duo E2200 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.20GHz (800FSB) - Retail £49.99
(£58.74)

Corsair HX 520W ATX2.2 Modular SLI Compliant PSU (CMPSU-520HXUK) £59.99 (£70.49)

Point of View GeForce 8800 GT 512MB GDDR3 HDTV/Dual DVI (PCI-Express) - Retail £131.99 (£155.09)

G.Skill 4GB DDR2 PQ PC2-6400C5 (2x2GB) CAS5 Dual Channel Kit (F2-6400CL5D-4GBPQ) £54.99 (£64.61)

Sub Total : £396.95
Shipping : £8.95
VAT : £71.03
Total : £476.93
 
You planning on using XP 32 bit? If so, 2GB is fine for now and it won't recognise the full 4GB anyway. 4GB definitely recommended for Vista x64. Something like MP260767's suggested spec should do you nicely.

A few months ago I would have just suggested adding a cheap 939 X2 or dual core opteron and better video card but it's just not worth it anymore. Trouble is the dual core 939s are like gold dust and just not worth the price. Same with DDR RAM.
 
Hmm. I'm sure I've seen Crysis benchmarks suggesting that it's not just the usual bottleneck situation. A better CPU and GPU both give a boost to framerates, even on higher settings.
 
melbourne720 said:
Just drop an 8800 GT - your sytem is hardly low specced, it's really only the graphics holding it back in 90% of case, IMHO.
Click to expand...

Really? That'd save me a lot of bother and money.

My X1800XT 512 was pretty cutting edge when I got it two or so years ago. Even so, with the Opteron overclocked (quite a bit I think) it fails to run Oblivion speedily at 1280x1024.... noticable slowdowns outside etc. I always thought it was the CPU.
 
You do get CPU bottlenecking in oblivion with the X1800XT (I used to have A64 3000+ / X1800XT combo). I found it particularly bad at Kvatch.

How about you try the 8800GT and see how it performs with your current rig? If you're finding CPU bottlenecks a problem you can always move it to the next build.

Edit: In Oblivion the outdoor sections are bottlenecked by the GPU. Towns and areas with heavy particle effects tend to be CPU bottlenecked.
 
Used to have it clocked to 2.9 I think.

I lost the settings about a year ago and forgot how to do all of it so it's sitting at stock at the moment.
 
Noopz said:
Used to have it clocked to 2.9 I think.

I lost the settings about a year ago and forgot how to do all of it so it's sitting at stock at the moment.
Click to expand...

be worth giving that a go again with the 8800GT to start with, see how it goes.
 
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