How much would performance increase?

[tris-]

• AMD Athlon 64 3500 venice Retail
• Asus A8N-SLi nForce4 SLi
• 1GB GeIL Value PC3200 Dual Channel Kit MY-005-GL GeIL 1GB CAS2.5
• GX-102-SP Sapphire ATI Radeon X1800 XL 256MB GDDR3 AVIVO TV-Out/Dual DVI (PCI-Express)

£509.72

currently i am on

• athlon 64 3000+
• asus a8n deluxe jobby
• 1GB DDR
• radeon 9800 pro

should i be expecting a MAJOR, major or only a little bit of performance increase? i will probably sell my current setup to fund the new one. anyone got an idea of a good price? i thought 300ish.

 

[TdC]

considering the gfx card I'd say major. though tbh your sli rig is a bit moot unless you get a crossfire ati card. I have sli and tbh I think it's not worth it atm.

What you could do is get the sli mobo with an nvidia card like the 7800GT and then wait a year or so and then get another 7800GT. it will be (much) cheaper and you will get a decent performance gain.

having said that it's not worth it I must say that I've not compared the performance to one card. I play games at 1200x1024 with AA and AF maxed out, gamma correct AA, transparency correct AA et al and everything runs like a charm. in the latest version of 3dmark (the 06 one you can dl now) I get something like 5540 points iirc, but that really tells you how well you can run the test. not how your set performs in the real world.

 

[tris-]

but its nvidia, and they smell like poo . and its another £30 on the startup cost, but what the hell is 30 when your spending 500 right?!
can just increase the sale price of my pc by 30.

hey im a student, gotta take what ever i can

 

[SheepCow]

I'd say the CPU won't make much difference but the gfx card will do a major games-related boost.

 

[Embattle]

Just as an example of what the gfx card alone can do I just dropped in a X850XT to replace a 9800XT and my 3dmark nearly doubled as did a number of my games fps rates.

Depending on configuration I wouldn't worry about upgrading either the ram or cpu because of a new socket being round the corner.

 

[tris-]

I'd say the CPU won't make much difference but the gfx card will do a major games-related boost.

is it really worth doing anything then? i really just want to boost game performance, get the fancy graphics etc.
i thought my self that my pc is pretty cool and then rememberd cool only lasts 6 months

 

[TdC]

hmm imo you could get pretty much of an upgrade by getting an extra gig of ram and the gfx card you propose. spend the rest on beer and get a new cpu in 10 months or so. they'll prolly be nice and cheap then.

 

[tris-]

i dont think there is many more 754 cpu coming out. the only one i can find is the one i already have. so a cpu upgrade in10 months wouldnt be possible without upgrading mobo, then i need a new g-card .

 

[Embattle]

Aha so having a 754 processor also makes my post useless.

 

[inactionman]

I'd say hold off for a few months, until the new socket comes out, when socket 939 becomes cheap, then upgrade to a cheap dual core system.

BTW, you can get socket 754 mobos with PCI-Express, if you want to do a staged upgrade (i.e. mobo + graphics + maybe more ram now, then a new mobo + cpu later).

 

[tris-]

i think im gonna go the whole shebang but just a few things first -

with this crossfire dealy -
i am gonna buy the sapphire pure advangate mobo - xfire ready
i seen a decent x1800xl card, which says crossfire enabled (requires master card)

so am i right thinking this card can be used on its own, then if you want to go crossfire route, you buy the master card ?

 

[tris-]

actually forget my last post, im going with inaction mans idea.

new g-card, new ddr400 ram, psu and a cheapish mobo that is good quality still.

i think my cpu is fast enough for now.

 

[inactionman]

Just make sure to buy ram in a pair (i.e. 2x512Mb or 2x1Gb), that way when you you upgrade to socket 939 you'll be able to run it in dual channel, and get (almost) double the memory bandwidth.

For PSU's go for name brand, I recommend Seasonic, you should be fine with 500W+, even when you go SLI, crossfire, or whatever (as long as you're not looking at overclocking).

The only concern with ATI is the availability of crossfire master cards, I recommend you buy the master now, not later! As, unlike Nvidia's solution, you can't take any two cards of the same model and use them together, you need that master card, and if you can't get it, you're buggered!

 

[tris-]

well plans change yet again, my fellow fhers.

i found a site offering parts for a cheaper price, but for quality goods.
i have managed to cut prices enough to make a new system. well its aout 3 quid more

so i have gone for the 3700 athlon 939
1gb kingston ddr2 ram
gigabyte k8n mobo nf4 sli etc
7800GT 256mb
should do me proud.

 

[inactionman]

Don't get the DDR2 ram, athlons only support DDR!

 

[SheepCow]

DDR2 is actually slower for games than DDR orat least it used to be (higher bandwidth but high latency or something)

 

[tris-]

so shold i just stick with pc3200?

 

[inactionman]

Yup. AMD DDR2 support comes in the next socket, which is being released in march or so.

 

[Ch3tan]

Get the lowest latency ddr400 you can afford.

 

[tris-]

managed to buy this in the end. i think im starting to favour scan over oc'ers. used to buy everything at oc'ers but scan is so much cheaper. i think this worked out £40-£50 cheaper when i tryed to calculate it -

1Gb (2x512Mb) Corsair Value Select 1 £51.66
AMD Athlon 64 3700 32/64Bit CPU S93 1 £134.37
256Mb Gigabyte PCI-E GV-NX78T256V-B 1 £179.53
NB: Cheiftec Black Large Tower + 480w Xlcio PSU sli compliant 1 £59.95
Gigabyte K8N SLI 2000MHz, PCI-Ex16 1 £55.39

i could either buy a psu on its own for about £60, or buy this special deal and get the chieftec dragon case AND a psu for only a tenner extra.

bargain if you ask me.

 

[Ch3tan]

You should have got 2bg of RAM, and used the money you saved to get a lower latency.

Just been going through Scan's site and found these SFF systems http://www.scan.co.uk/shops/isotope/?_s_icmp=shiso look pretty funky.

 

[tris-]

the latency i got was CL2.5

 

[Ch3tan]

I know, but 2gig of cl2 would have given you noticable improvement.

 

[tris-]

after much slog, the beast has risen.

many hours were ponderd over why the ide cable didnt reach. untill i thought well maybe i need 2 ft long ide cable.
i would recommend this case.
comes with a mahoosive fan to cool the HDDs down. comes with 2 fans to suck the heat out. the space inside is unimaginable. if i ever leave home i will go live in it.

and to talk about the performance.

well i cranked cod 2 to the max settings it will let me and it runs like a dream. no slow downs, no nothing.

windows now takes aprox 10-15 seconds to be booted right up. compared to the 1 minute it used to take.

so if anyone is wondering the difference between 3000+ to 3700+, there is your answer.

does anyone know the program that allows you to unlock the pipes on the GT aswell? unless what i read was a rumour. the graphics card i got was the MSI 7800GT which i read is a good little number for OCing it with the stock cooler still on.

and to top it all off, i got paid £200 more than i thought i would.

ahh, can it get any better?

 

[SheepCow]

windows now takes aprox 10-15 seconds to be booted right up. compared to the 1 minute it used to take.

I'm assuming you've reformated, so a bootup speedup is expected and probably has nothing to do with the faster CPU. I have an Athlon XP 1600 here that boots up in 30 seconds

Near to hear it's all up and running

 

[tris-]

no i didnt reformat

all i did was uninstall the old s/w drivers before moving the HDs over.

 

[TdC]

glad you're pleased I may have my new cpu come the weekend...

*anticipate*

 

[tris-]

the only issue i seem to be having is this -

each time the pc is turned back on, the keyboard driver does not start. in device manager it says "device could not be started".

its using the standard PS/2 keyboard drivers. to make it work i just uninstall, refresh pnp devices and it works again.

anyone know what could cause this?

 

[inactionman]

Probably due to you not doing a complete reinstall. I'd recommend it, you'll probably get more odd problems down the line otherwise!