[Sandwich]

I currently have a decent, albiet old, computer. Athlon XP 3000+, 1Gb Dual-Channel DDR-400 RAM, and a Radeon 9800 Pro 128Mb (AGP). Since I'm running on a 24" Dell UltraSharp 2405FPW widescreen LCD, my video card has been challenged at running anything beyond HL2, for example, at the monitor's native resolution of 1920x1200 - and don't even think about any anti-aliasing. So, I've wanted to upgrade my graphics card for a while now, but because of the whole AGP -> PCI-X change, which would require a new motherboard (and new CPU to go along with it) and new RAM (DDR2 vs. DDR), it's potentially been a very expensive step to take all at once. So I've been biding my time.

Meanwhile, Intel dropped their Core 2 Duo bomb, and - as much as I hated to admit it - vaulted clear past AMD's top-of-the-line processors... processors which I had been considering upgrading to (specifically, I had my eye on the dual-core Athlon X2 3800). While reading various reviews around the web, I came across the Anandtech Core 2 Duo review, where - among the big motherboard names like Gigabyte, Asus, and DFI, they mention a niche motherboard manufacturer called ASRock. ASRock's Core 2 Duo motherboard is quite unique in that it is geared precisely for people like myself - people stuck in front of an expensive cascade of upgrades.

Aside from supporting all Intel socket 775 processors (including Core 2 Duo w/ a BIOS update), the ASRock 775Dual-VSTA motherboard supports both AGP and PCI-X graphics card slots, as well as DDR and DDR2 memory modules, for a fraction of the price other motherboards generally run. This meant that I could upgrade my CPU and MB, and still use my AGP GFX card and DDR RAM for the time being, upgrading them in stages as time went on. The only disadvantage of the ASRock motherboard is that it was consistently at the bottom of the performance charts when compared to the other motherboards (which cost 3-5 times as much - $55 vs. $135-270). But considering that I'm upgrading from an Athlon XP 3000+ to a Core 2 Duo E6600, I wouldn't feel the relative slowness, and would even get a quirky bonus of a second speed upgrade when I finally upgrade all my components and then upgrade to a mainstream motherboard underneath them all.

So now, I've finally begun the process. Laying behind me on my bed are the ASRock motherboard and an Intel Core 2 Duo E6600, waiting to be installed. I thought that since I'd have such an incremental upgrade process, I could document it, running a few benchmarks along the way to see how the speed is affected by certain upgraded components. All my benchmarks will be run at two resolutions, 800x600 (640x480 is just too unbearable) and 1920x1200, both of them with a forced 4x anti-aliasing and 8x anisotropic. Why? I dunno, just seems interesting. So, what would you suggest to use for benchmarking? I plan on using 3DMark 2003 (my Radeon 9800 Pro can't handle anything more; it can barely cope with 2003 as it is) and Half-Life 2 (can anyone point me in the direction of a benchmarking tutorial for HL2?). I don't really have much else.

[Ghostavo]

I hate you. 

Use FEAR to benchmark. It's fun (and CPU hungry).

[Fury]

Good for you, but I am a bit worried about your motherboard of choice. AFAIK Asrock doesn't have particularly stellar track record as far as performance and stability goes. But as long as it works, I guess it should be ok motherboard as a stopgap motherboard until you buy more RAM (likely DDR2) and PCI Express video card.

I planned to upgrade my PC last summer, but I canceled my order because I felt I didn't have a good enough reason to upgrade or buy a new rig. At the moment I am eyeing on quad-core CPU's, R600 and G80 which should all hit the shelves sometime around december-january I think. When that happens I think I'll buy a new computer and buy a new widescreen display too.

[Sandwich]

Free and not multiple gigabytes of download are preferable - I don't want to wait all day for benchmarks to complete before I upgrade.

[Fury]

Synthetic benchmarks are pointless anyway, just play the games and do the stuff you usually do. If you notice a difference, then upgrades were worth it.

[Sandwich]

Muhahaha! Benchmarks: http://www.hocbench.com/

[Colonol Dekker]

http://www.passmark.com/products/pt_adv3d.htm

I use this when i'm a bit curious, It used to come with UK PC gamer.
But as King Fury or Admintopia said above, Use the game as a benchmark too.  

[Backslash]

Holy frak!  I have the same wanting-to-upgrade woes with very similar system specs... thus, that motherboard find is awesome!  I will be watching your results with considerable interest, and may well do the same purchase in a month or two.

[Sandwich]

Backslash (can I just say \ for short? ), I'd recommend reading that article I linked to, as well as all their numerous follow-up articles on the ASRock MB, since apparently it generated a TON of interest. They cover it in plenty depth. I doubt there's any need to wait.

[Backslash]

Indeed, already been reading em, thanks mate.  The wait is for the cash

Heh, never thought I'd be switching back to Intel...

[Fury]

Heh, never thought I'd be switching back to Intel...

Even though Intel is holding the performance crown right now, things may chance when AMD and Intel bring out their quad- and octal-core CPU's. AMD's CPU architechture is technically better than Intel's, the biggest hurdle Intel's got is lack of HyperTransport equivalent solution. FSB will not scale too well anymore and Intel is late with their Common Systems Interconnect (CSI) which has been rumoured to have been scrapped.

A year from now (even I have probably upgraded or bought a new rig by that time) we will probably see the first GPU, APU and PPU units that can be plugged into motherboards into similar slots like CPU is today, thanks to AMD licensing their HTX slots. When plugged into HTX slot, chips can get direct access into HyperTransport links which is way faster than even x16 PCI Express.

As far as technical solutions and designs goes, I will keep rooting for AMD. Intel is still far from getting itself straight, the delayed CSI interconnect is a prime example of that.

[Sandwich]

The thing is, current graphics cards don't even push the envelope of AGP 8x that much, let alone PCIe.

[Fury]

Latency is important even if bandwidth is not used to its full potential.

[Sandwich]

Granted.

Well, I've run initial (baseline; still on my Athlon XP) benchmarks and have the results recorded. I've also assembled the CPU, motherboard, and Zalman CNPS 7000B-AlCu heatsink+fan. Now to begin the most annoying process - disassembling my computer so I can replace the motherboard.

One note to those that may happen to have the exact same products in mind: the Zalman socket 775 (add-on) clip for the 7000B was a few millimeters too high, so the heatsink didn't press firmly enough against the CPU die to not slide around slightly. This was fairly easily fixed by filing a few millimeters off each of the 4 legs of the plastic add-on clip Zalman provided, so it sat closer to the motherboard. I would assume that the retail heatsink+fan Intel provides with the boxed CPU doesn't have that issue, although I cannot be completely sure it's not an issue with the ASRock motherboard's CPU socket sitting down lower than others. I doubt that's the case, however, since none of the reviews of the motherboard mention it.

EDIT: Whoops, one more hitch. Lasagne. Back in a few hours.

EDIT 2: I just had a thought... to avoid driver problems in Windows when I switch chipsets underneath it, should I install the ASRock driver CD before I switch motherboards?

[Sandwich]

Ok, an update. The upgrade was a major pain in the ass, but all of it was Windows-related issues - the hardware is wonderful. First off, I'd probably switched around which SATA channel my boot drive was on, thus making Windows freak out and refuse to boot. Supposedly, repairable with the repair console. However, the repair console wouldn't actually repair the dang thing, since it kept on running into a disk error (but it wouldn't get any more specific or helpful than that). I tried to get the Windows XP setup to repair the install automatically, overwriting all the core files, fixing settings, etc, but for some reason, it wouldn't recognize that I had Windows installed anywhere on the computer. So I decided to install XP over the Vista RC1 I'd been toying with here and there, but the installer said it recognized a previous installation of Windows (no duh!) and would delete all the user files before installing. I had some stuff I needed there, unfortunately, so I had to copy them elsewhere. Somehow.

Finally I had to boot with an Ubuntu Live 6.0 disc and copy over everything I wanted to keep to my 2Gb USB key. That done, I just told the Windows setup to format the friggin drive (an older, 60Gb drive) and install a nice fresh installation. Once that was up and running, I was able to access the NTFS-formatted partition my main Windows XP was on, edit the boot.ini file with guesses as to which disk and rdisk Windows saw itself as existing on,  and reboot into my main Windows.

But that wasn't sufficient problems for Windows to dish out! While it was booting up, I even had Windows XP saying that my hardware has changed significantly and I need to reactivate, then not allowing me to reactivate since I'd already activated my serial too many times. I called the MS activation center here, and after explaining the situation, they gave me the code I needed. Finally able to get back into my main Windows, I installed the MB drivers, and lo and behold - everything works like a charm!

Ok, so, on to the benchmarking. The big picture is that the new processor is about twice as fast doing 2 tasks as my previous one was doing only one. The memory is slightly faster as well (5-10%). Games, well.... heh. I'm still running a Radeon 9800 Pro, so with the exception of 640x480 (which went from 54.2fps to 109.1fps... ), there's no significant difference. Granted, I tested HL2 with max details, 2xAA and 8xAF, at 640x480, 1024x768, 1600x1200, 1280x768, and 1920x1200, so it's not all that surprising.

My next upgrade, probably (hopefully?) before the end of the year, will be a GFX card. THEN we'll see a nice speed boost.

[Sandwich]

Ahh, interesting times....

When Nvidia released their hawt 8800 series cards, I wanted one (didn't we all?). Alas, the prohibitive initial pricing here (+4000 shekels, ~$900 USD) put the 8800 GTX slightly out of sanity's reach. The 8800 GTS was somewhat better, around a thousand shekels cheaper, but still pretty expensive. Plus, with my monitor's native resolution (1920x1200), I wasn't sure that the GTS would future-proof me the way I wanted it to. In all the benchmarks, the performance difference between the GTS and GTX was truly on a par with the price difference - the GTS was 3/4ths the GTX's speed, but also 3/4ths the price. In other words, you truly did get what you paid for in getting a GTX. But since initial prices here were prohibitive, a GFX card upgrade was out of the picture - for the time being.

So I waited for both a price drop as well as a bolstering of my bank account. Meantime, I read up on the cards, and at one point in October, I realized that my current PSU - an excellent 480W Thermaltake Silent Purepower model from a couple of years ago, had none of those 6-pin PCI-E power cables that newer graphics cards need. So I started keeping watch on the various PSU's reviewed on SPCR; I was wanting my new PC to be relatively quiet, but I wasn't going to be fanatic about it. Besides, they seem to be more comprehensive in their reviews than most other places.

When I finally saw the reviews for the Corsair HX520W, I knew I had found the PSU I wanted to get. 120mm fan, modular cabling, and great efficiency - what wasn't to like? And when SPCR held a lab clearance at the end of November, offering the 520W Corsair PSU for less than half what it cost here, I jumped at the chance.

It took its sweet time in arriving, since it wasn't shipped airmail, but I wasn't in any rush to get it - there wasn't any point until I got a GFX card to go along with it.

Then, on February 21st, I saw a relatively massive price drop on the XFX GeForce 8800 GTX - a drop that put it at 3000 shekels instead of the 4k+ other 8800 cards still were running. This put the card at a price locally (with all the warranty advantages that come with that) that it would have cost me to buy one from overseas and have it shipped, so I jumped at the chance. It arrived within 2 days, and my eyes bugged out at the size of the beast. It's one thing to read about it being 12 inches long, or even to take a ruler and measure the length out, but having it there in front of you... I wasn't sure it'd fit nicely in my case, but a test positioning showed me that even if it didn't fit, it would be by a few millimeters conflict with the HDD cage, and I was sure I could file some of the metal away with a (surprise!) metal file. No problemo there.

In the meantime, my Corsair PSU arrived, but with one slight hitch - apparently the SPCR labs forgot to include one of the modular PCI-E cables (the PSU is supposed to come with 2, for running SLI - or a single 8800 GTX). I emailed them and was told that they'd send it via airmail pronto. But I didn't want to wait even that long, so I went hunting for a MOLEX -> PCI-E cable. I finally found one yesterday, and when I got home last night, I started upgrading my PSU and GFX card.

So, to remind you, so far I've upgraded to a (temporary) ASRock 775Dual-VSTA motherboard, an Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 CPU, a Corsair HX520W PSU, and an XFX GeForce 8800 GTX card.

The PSU switch went perfectly, aside from having to reposition a few drives internally to get the cabling to reach far enough; my Creative Labs X-Fi requires 2 of those mini-MOLEX connectors: one for the card itself, and one for the 5 1/4" front-panel drive bay thingy. The X-FI card was of necessity placed in the lowest PCI slot possible - out of the other 2 slots, one was blocked by the 8800's heatsink, and the other would have had the card nestled right up against the 8800's heatsink, blocking half of the fan intake. The only problem with this was that the Corsair's modular cabling only had 2 mini-MOLEX connectors, both on a splitter cable from a regular MOLEX plug, and the length assigned to each mini-MOLEX branch wasn't overly long. But with the card in the bottom slot and the front-panel in the bottom bay, it managed to stretch the distance.

Getting my 8800 GTX in was another matter. It did fit without having to file away any metal from the HDD cage, but it was just a wee bit too tight for my liking. So I took out the HDD cage and filed away about 4mm of metal where the card would be pressing against it, and viola! All fits.

Here's where things get interesting (but for the sake of brevity I'll get right to the point).

The ASRock 775Dual-VSTA motherboard does not support the Geforce 8800 line of graphics cards.

It's not listed on the list of supported PCI-E cards on their website. Oh, it works fine in 640x480 VGA mode (F8 before Windows starts booting, Force VGA mode) or in safe mode from 640x480 up to 1280x1024, but I suspect that none of those modes are being run through the Nvidia drivers, since I can't see the enhanced Nvidia control panel in the Display Properties anywhere. If I try booting normally, all I get is a black screen after the Windows XP logo / progress bar screen, and then a reboot after a minute of nothing.

So, now it appears that in order to get my 8800 to work, I need to get a proper motherboard (the ASRock did only cost like $60, and was always just going to be an interim solution that would allow me to progressively upgrade my CPU, GFX card, and RAM step-by-step instead of all at once). Am looking in the Nforce 680i direction currently, or perhaps the lesser 680 LT. But to do THAT, I'll also need to upgrade my RAM to DDR2...

*grr*

[Bob-san]

Well. Quite a bit of upgrading, ne?

Anyways; I would look at an nForce 650i motherboard; they're cheaper and PCI-e x16 runs fine. You can look at some less-expensive DDR2. I see dual-channel DDR2 800 kits for $125 USD or about $66/gig. Good deals for such fast stuff; even ValueRAM works fine if you don't push it as hard.

Another choice for your new motherboard could be a Intel P965 chipset... they're good too.

[CP5670]

It's the first time I've heard of such a problem. The Asrock board's 16x slot electrically only runs at 4x, but that should only result in a slight performance impact and not compatibility problems. If there is some sort of switch on that board (or in its BIOS) to switch between PCIE and AGP, make sure you've set it correctly.

The Asus P5B Deluxe and Gigabyte DS3 are probably still the best choices for the money. The Gigabyte DQ6 is also looking good but is too expensive to recommend over the DS3, which goes up almost as far. The top board is probably the DFI ICFX3200, which has now fallen below $200 around here, but you need to shell out $20-30 extra for a decent chipset cooler for it. Don't bother with the 680i boards unless you specifically want SLI support.

By the way, it doesn't matter if your power supply doesn't have the PCIE plugs built in. The cards all come with adapters to convert the molexes into PCIE plugs. The HX520W is an excellent PSU, but your old one would have been fine too.

Personally, I'm holding off on any upgrades until I see some games worth playing. For the last ten months, all the games I've been playing have been several years old. The only recent one that genuinely looks good to me is C&C3, but that runs fine on last gen systems like mine.

[Sandwich]

It's the first time I've heard of such a problem. The Asrock board's 16x slot electrically only runs at 4x, but that should only result in a slight performance impact and not compatibility problems. If there is some sort of switch on that board (or in its BIOS) to switch between PCIE and AGP, make sure you've set it correctly.

The Asus P5B Deluxe and Gigabyte DS3 are probably still the best choices for the money. The Gigabyte DQ6 is also looking good but is too expensive to recommend over the DS3, which goes up almost as far. The top board is probably the DFI ICFX3200, which has now fallen below $200 around here, but you need to shell out $20-30 extra for a decent chipset cooler for it. Don't bother with the 680i boards unless you specifically want SLI support.

By the way, it doesn't matter if your power supply doesn't have the PCIE plugs built in. The cards all come with adapters to convert the molexes into PCIE plugs. The HX520W is an excellent PSU, but your old one would have been fine too.

Personally, I'm holding off on any upgrades until I see some games worth playing. For the last ten months, all the games I've been playing have been several years old. The only recent one that genuinely looks good to me is C&C3, but that runs fine on last gen systems like mine.

Well, obviously the card works on the ASRock board since VGA mode and Safe Mode work, but the drivers aren't compatible for some reason. I'm also not the only one to have encountered this problem.

I just put in a purchase of an Asus P5N32-E SLI Plus motherboard (a 650i board... sort of) and (get this!) two "OCZ DDR2 2GB 1100MHz EL Gold Edition 5-6-5-15" DIMMs - at 800 shekels per DIMM. That works out to be around $170 USD for a 2GB stick of 1100Mhz DDR2 memory - a steal by any definition. Personally, I think it's a typo on the site I got it from, but here's hoping they'll honor it.

Finally, for whatever reason, the XFX 8800 GTX card doesn't come with molex->PCI-E adapters; they include a slip of paper that says that they specifically do not support such contrivances, and urge users to use dedicated PCI-E power lines from SLI-ready PSUs. Whatever.

[Bob-san]

It's the first time I've heard of such a problem. The Asrock board's 16x slot electrically only runs at 4x, but that should only result in a slight performance impact and not compatibility problems. If there is some sort of switch on that board (or in its BIOS) to switch between PCIE and AGP, make sure you've set it correctly.

The Asus P5B Deluxe and Gigabyte DS3 are probably still the best choices for the money. The Gigabyte DQ6 is also looking good but is too expensive to recommend over the DS3, which goes up almost as far. The top board is probably the DFI ICFX3200, which has now fallen below $200 around here, but you need to shell out $20-30 extra for a decent chipset cooler for it. Don't bother with the 680i boards unless you specifically want SLI support.

By the way, it doesn't matter if your power supply doesn't have the PCIE plugs built in. The cards all come with adapters to convert the molexes into PCIE plugs. The HX520W is an excellent PSU, but your old one would have been fine too.

Personally, I'm holding off on any upgrades until I see some games worth playing. For the last ten months, all the games I've been playing have been several years old. The only recent one that genuinely looks good to me is C&C3, but that runs fine on last gen systems like mine.

Slight preformance? Check the benchmarks:
PCI Express Scaling Analysis

It's a large hit between x4 and x8 to say the least. I would like to see a comparison SLI/xFire of dual x8 and x16/x4. You'd think the latter has better preformance, though the former should be better (as its barley a difference between x8 and x16).


EDIT: I was actually thinking of that board for you, I wasn't sure about your budget. The board is a hybrid; nForce 680i-esque northbridge (x16-x16-x8 for PCIe) with a more stable southbridge from nForce 590. I hear it's solid in Vista.