[Dark RevenantX]

I recently took my motherboard out of my computer case (accidentally killing it) and put in a new one with better parts.
My old specs:
AMD Athlon XP 2400+ clocked at 2ghz
Sapphire Radeon 9600 Atlantis (128mb of ram)
1024 mb of ram

My new specs:
AMD Athlon 64 3500+ underclocked because my RAM isn't fast enough
nVidia GeForce 7600 GS (250mb of ram) (a GT with a heatsink instead of a fan, slower core speed, much faster memory speed)
carried over ram (1024 mb)

everything else is carried over...
I can't get BattleField 2 to get choppy, no matter how hard I (a.k.a. my computer) try.  The F.E.A.R. demo runs smoothly at a rather high graphical setting.  If I had Oblivion, that would be running similarly, too.

My question is:  How long will this remain good?  When will this system become obsolete and require an upgrade?
I don't like spending money unneccisarly...

[IceFire]

Probably 3-4 years depending on the games you play, how good you are at reformating Windows or keeping it clean, and how clean your system is in terms of dust and so forth.

[CP5670]

It really depends on what kind of performance you're expecting and your tolerance to lower framerates. And in any case it's hard to predict how demanding future games will be.

I can't get BattleField 2 to get choppy, no matter how hard I (a.k.a. my computer) try.

I don't think you're trying hard enough. I can easily make it struggle on a much faster computer if I really crank up everything.

[Ace Pace]

I recently took my motherboard out of my computer case (accidentally killing it) and put in a new one with better parts.
My old specs:
AMD Athlon XP 2400+ clocked at 2ghz
Sapphire Radeon 9600 Atlantis (128mb of ram)
1024 mb of ram

My new specs:
AMD Athlon 64 3500+ underclocked because my RAM isn't fast enough
nVidia GeForce 7600 GS (250mb of ram) (a GT with a heatsink instead of a fan, slower core speed, much faster memory speed)
carried over ram (1024 mb)

everything else is carried over...
I can't get BattleField 2 to get choppy, no matter how hard I (a.k.a. my computer) try.  The F.E.A.R. demo runs smoothly at a rather high graphical setting.  If I had Oblivion, that would be running similarly, too.

My question is:  How long will this remain good?  When will this system become obsolete and require an upgrade?
I don't like spending money unneccisarly...

I very heavily suggest not underclocking your CPU regardless of matching it 1:1 with your RAM. With athlon 64 CPUs the largest boost to preformance is not from matching to RAM but rather sheer clock speed.

[Scuddie]

What is your memory speed?

[Dark RevenantX]

DDR 333.  The underclocking is automatic due to my motherboard drivers.  If I had the money, I'd replace the ram with the much faster DDR2 4-something-something.  Apparently, I have two sets of RAM slots.

[IceFire]

You've got to explain this underclocking thing to me. Why are you doing that?  Hypertransport is quite a bit different when dealing with RAM than your typical Intel setup. Matching the RAM isn't all that important.  DDR 333 (PC3200) is typical for Socket 939 which I assume yours is.  DDR2 is only available on Socket AM2...which is a completely different board and a different configuration.

So why are you doing that or why is your motherboard doing that?  Its not making any logical sense to me...and sounds rather bad.

[CP5670]

DDR 333.  The underclocking is automatic due to my motherboard drivers.  If I had the money, I'd replace the ram with the much faster DDR2 4-something-something.  Apparently, I have two sets of RAM slots.

You need to use a memory divider. 7:6 should do what you want for stock speeds, if your motherboard supports that one. I don't know what you're referring to with DDR2 though.

[Scuddie]

Icefire, DDR333 is PC2700 .

Anyway, because of this issue, you have some OC potential, as well as a nasty limitation on the memory speed.  If it were DDR400, there'd be a way to get an extra 200MHz (or perhaps 300MHz) evenly out of this.  However, your memory speed is holding you back.  If you dont mind sacrificing a few memory clock cycles to get things in sync and able to handle things, check this out.  Linkage.  If you want to OC to 2.4 which your cpu can handle on air, put 2400MHz there.  Otherwise, you'll use the stock speed of 2200MHz, which is very detrimental given the circumstances.  Your max memory speed is 166MHz, leave HT and HTT as they are, and set multiplier to 11.  Hit GO and you will see a list, the top item being the most optimal.  From that, I suggest my findings here, which is the best I can find for your needs.

HTT: 240   CPU: 10 x 240 = 2400   MEM DIVIDER: 2:3, 133, DDR266 = 160 (DDR320)   HT:  4 x 240 = 960

EDIT:  What Motherboard are you doing this on?

[Dark RevenantX]

An ECS motherboard with a VIA chipset plus the Radeon XPress thing.

By the way, I don't know how to manually overclock my cpu.  Software-wise.

[Scuddie]

You do all hardware overclocking thru the BIOS...  And an ECS board with a VIA chipset and Radeon XPress?  I never knew that was possible.

[Ford Prefect]

I don't think you're trying hard enough.  I can easily make it struggle on a much faster computer if I really crank up everything.

It runs quite smoothly with the settings maxed on my machine.

[CP5670]

If you want to keep your stuff at stock speeds, you can either keep the CPU at 11x200 and use the 183 divider (which only a few boards support) or set the CPU to 10x220 and use the more common 166 divider. The memory will be at 169.2mhz either way. Of course, a much better solution is to just overclock everything. The ECS board won't let you get far but you should still be able to get 2.4-2.6ghz on the CPU without much trouble and the memory can likely go close to 200mhz.

It runs quite smoothly with the settings maxed on my machine.

You must either have dual video cards or are tolerant of lower framerates. If I run it at the highest settings I can use (2048x1536 with 6x AA and AAA), the framerate falls into the low 40s quite often, which is far too choppy for a multiplayer game IMO. Although I can come down a bit (1600x1200 with 4x AA and no AAA) and the performance is excellent, staying above 80fps at all times.

[Ford Prefect]

The framerate's fine. I have a Pentium 4, a GeForce 6600 GT, and 2 gigs of RAM. Maybe it's the hard drive with that newer type of data cable, I dunno. My computer was just overhauled a couple weeks ago.

[Dark RevenantX]

I'm very tolerant of 40fps, even 30fps.  But lower than that gets me mad.

[CP5670]

Is that average or minimum? 40fps average usually implies periodic drops to 15-20fps.

[Dark RevenantX]

The framerate is pretty solid.

[Descenterace]

Last I checked, there's no reason for the mainboard to 'automatically' reduce CPU clock speed to match memory. If it's underclocked, it's because someone's set it as such in the CMOS settings.

Athlon64 systems do not have an FSB. At least, the 'FSB frequency' is not the frequency of any data buses in the machine. The frequency is used as a reference for the numerous bus types, with multipliers between it and them. The frequency given in the CMOS settings screen should be 200MHz. Memory is usually 2:1, but the board will select a memory multiplier to give the correct speed as determined by SPD (333MHz in this case) for the RAM bus.

Unless it's a cheap-ass board, of course.