Personal computing discussed

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dagenhammark
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Performance increases

Wed Aug 03, 2005 7:40 am

I'm wondering if anybody can tell me how much performance gain I'll get moving from my current system to say, a new S939 AMD system with a new end graphics card, PC3200 RAM etc.

Currently:

AMD 2000XP+ (overclocked to 2100 ratings)
SIS745 chipset mobo from MSI
512Mb Samsung RAM
Gf4Ti4200 graphics

Thanks
 
steelcity_ballin
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Wed Aug 03, 2005 7:43 am

A metric assload.

Id be willing to bet that even if you moved to a new socket a you'd see a decent jump but from what you have to a 939 solution will be huge. You'll notice everything faster, I'd stake my job on it.

Your *everything* is outdated and would be considered low end or even obsolete for gaming. I wouldn't want to game on anything less than what I have, and I have the itch to upgrade myself.
 
LicketySplit
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Wed Aug 03, 2005 7:46 am

A new generation system with a new card will make that older system look like the antiquated relic it really is :lol:
Just an old sheepdog waiting for some nasty wolves to show...ive got more than enough teeth left.
 
dagenhammark
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Wed Aug 03, 2005 7:50 am

Hehehe I'm fully aware of its age, don't hurt its feelings! Us students don't have all that much cash, especially when we have to finance our alcohol bills and trips to expensive holiday islands.

Its mainly a gaming rig although I don't tend to play cutting-edge FPS or the like.
 
LicketySplit
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Wed Aug 03, 2005 7:53 am

Even a 754 "Budget" system will amaze you. Depending on your needs of course..id foregoe a couple nights of partying for a new system...*gasp* :lol:
Just an old sheepdog waiting for some nasty wolves to show...ive got more than enough teeth left.
 
dagenhammark
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Wed Aug 03, 2005 7:57 am

There's so many graphics cards around, which do people think is the best for your money? I dont want to break the bank on the system but I want something relatively good.
 
LicketySplit
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Wed Aug 03, 2005 8:01 am

With any newer system anything less than a 6600 variant will disappoint you.
Just an old sheepdog waiting for some nasty wolves to show...ive got more than enough teeth left.
 
liquidsquid
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Wed Aug 03, 2005 8:04 am

dagenhammark wrote:
Hehehe I'm fully aware of its age, don't hurt its feelings! Us students don't have all that much cash, especially when we have to finance our alcohol bills and trips to expensive holiday islands.

Its mainly a gaming rig although I don't tend to play cutting-edge FPS or the like.


lol, those were the days 8)

Have to choose a priority and I would choose a pickled liver partying with the girls, but that is just me.

All I know is these 939 systems are silly fast. I've never seen Windows XP boot so fast, or the entire Microsoft Developers Help system install in under 5 minutes. Last I checked it was 15-20. I was getting a kick out of the XP install where it starts off saying estimated time of 39 minutes, and it is ticking off minutes every 5 seconds or so. Wow!

With latest UT:
Oh went from averaging 45fps on a Ti4200 and P4-2.4G (old style, no HT) with all settings conservative or low at 800x600.
Now at all settings at MAX at 1280x1024 and averaging 75fps with the 6600GTOC and barely loading 1/2 of the X2 CPU. I need to find how to crank the eye candy up more, haven't tried AA yet.

Even though this is the X2 4200+ system, you should see similar improvements going to a low-cost 3000+ in a 939, but perhaps not so dramatic because you may still be stuck with older drives.

-LS
 
JustAnEngineer
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Wed Aug 03, 2005 7:57 pm

dagenhammark wrote:
Tell me how much performance gain I'll get moving from my current system to say, a new S939 AMD system with a new end graphics card.
pete_roth wrote:
A metric assload.... Your *everything* is outdated and would be considered low end or even obsolete for gaming. I wouldn't want to game on anything less than what I have, and I have the itch to upgrade myself.
Perhaps our excitable friend Pete has exagerrated a bit. You might only see a 6 to 8 deci-assload of performance gain in some applications. If PC gaming isn't a huge deal to you, there might be more important priorities.
pete_roth wrote:
A 939 solution will be huge. You'll notice everything faster. I'd stake my job on it.
I agree, without even knowing whether or not Pete hates his job. Generally, it takes a 25% increase in processor performance or video card performance for it to be noticeable to me. You should be able to get a 100% improvement on CPU gaming performance and a 300% performance boost on 3D gaming graphics without breaking the bank. The difference will be quite apparent.

Socket-939 with PCI-express is definitely the way to go. Start out thinking about Athlon64 X2 3800+ and a GeForce 6800GT. If that looks too expensive, consider the Athlon64 3000+. If it's still too much, consider a GeForce 6600GT. The lowly GeForce 6600 is only about 20% faster than your GeForce4Ti at the things that they both can do, but the 6600 can do DirectX 9.0c shaders, while the GeForce4Ti is a DX 8.0 part. You'll be amazed at how shiny water can look as you splash through it in a 3D shooter.


How excited can we get about these possible configurations?

$464 Motherboard+CPU+Heatsink bundle:
$ 87 MSI K8N Neo4-F NForce4 PCI-Express ATX motherboard
$369 AMD Athlon64 X2 3800+ Manchester 2.0GHz 2x512KB L2 cache dual-core 64-bit socket-939 processor *1
$ 8 No-name AMD-approved heatink & fan
$ 0 Far Cry
$ 0 Half-Life2
$ 0 Four months of Napster
$ 87½ 2x512MB Corsair Value Select PC3200 CAS2½ unbuffered DDR SDRAM
$314 eVGA GeForce 6800GT 256MB dual-DVI PCI-express graphics card *2
$175 74GB Western Digital WD740GD Raptor SATA hard-drive *3
$124 250GB Seagate Barracuda 7200.8 SATA2 hard-drive *3
$ 43 NEC ND-3540A dual-layer DVD burner, silver
$ 23½ Mitsumi 3½" floppy and card reader, black
$ 26½ Chaintech AV-710S sound card
$115 Antec SonataII mid-tower ATX case with 450W ATX 12V 2.0 power supply, black *4
$112 -$20MIR Logitech MX3100 cordless keyboard & MX1000 wireless mouse, black & silver *5
$ 56 -$20MIR Logitech Z-3e 2.1-channel speaker system, black *6
$ 60 Sennheiser PC150 stereo headset with retractable microphone *6
$261 Dell UltraSharp 1905FP high-quality 19" 1280x1024 LCD monitor, black *7
This is a butt-kicking system for about $1825 - a lot less than you'd pay to get bleeding-edge components, but probably too much for a college student's budget.

However, if the prices above make your head spin, do consider these less expensive alternatives to bring the system down to under $800:
*1: $135 AMD Athlon64 3000+ Venice 1.8GHz 512KB L2 cache 64-bit socket-939 processor
*2: $165 XFX GeForce 6600GT 128MB dual-DVI PCI-Express graphics card
*3: $ 84 160GB Western Digital WD1600JS Caviar SE SATA2 hard-drive
*4: $ 41 Linkworld 435-10 C2228 ATX mid-tower case with 430W ATX 12V 2.0 power supply, black & silver
*5,6: $22 PowMax keyboard + optical wheelmouse + crappy speakers, black
*7: $180 - $110MIR KDS XF-9B 19" flat CRT monitor
· R7-5800X, Liquid Freezer II 280, RoG Strix X570-E, 64GiB PC4-28800, Suprim Liquid RTX4090, 2TB SX8200Pro +4TB S860 +NAS, Define 7 Compact, Super Flower SF-1000F14TP, S3220DGF +32UD99, FC900R OE, DeathAdder2
 
dagenhammark
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Thu Aug 04, 2005 9:03 am

Parts I'll reuse from this system are:

Antec1030AMG case
Antec 430W TruePower PSU
Western Digital 7200.8 IDE HD (if I used this for storage and a Western Digital WD740GD Raptor SATA hard-drive for installs would that be decent or does the 2nd SATA drive for storage give big perf increases?)
DVD reader
Optical wireless mouse
Keyboard
Floppy drive
17" monitor
old speakers (for now)

So basically I'm looking at CPU/Mobo/SATA HD/Graphics card/RAM.

Cheers for the build ideas JAE.

Whats the deal with RAM for AMD's these days? I hear the PC3200 is about optimal at the current time?
 
JustAnEngineer
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Thu Aug 04, 2005 6:54 pm

dagenhammark wrote:
Western Digital 7200.8 IDE HD (if I used this for storage... would that be decent or does the SATA drive for storage give big perf increases?)
There is almost no performance benefit for SATA150 over ATA133. However, if you are purchasing a new drive, the slimmer cables are nice.
 
dagenhammark
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Mon Aug 08, 2005 7:29 am

How about the smaller 74GB Western Digital WD740GD Raptorr? I take it judging by the price thats its the fastest drive on the market for this application?

I think I'm close to what I want, now I'll have to decide about paying for it!
 
LicketySplit
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Mon Aug 08, 2005 7:34 am

The 74g Raptors are the fastest of their series..and are very quick drives..good idea to use one of those as a boot drive and your other for storage :wink:
Just an old sheepdog waiting for some nasty wolves to show...ive got more than enough teeth left.

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