[redsniper]

So, I'm considering upgrading my CPU from an Athlon 64 3000 to an Athlon X2 4600 (socket 939). I'm also planning on buying some more RAM, bringing me up to 2GB.

The question: Someday I'm going to upgrade to an AM2 mobo (or maybe even whatever post-AM2 standard they have) and at that time I will have to buy a new CPU anyways. Would I be better off just biting the bullet, spending more time and money, and doing a full mobo/cpu upgrade now rather than later? I like to think that the X2 4600 and more RAM will future-proof me enough for a year or so since my video card (X1900XT) I believe is powerful enough.

What does HLP think?

[Shade]

A 4600+ with 2GB ram will last you more than a year when coupled with a video card like that, as long as you don't expect to play the very newest games smoothly at the very highest settings. So in my opinion, it's really a matter of whether you can scrounge up a socket 939 CPU relatively cheaply. I know I had a hard time finding them last time I needed one, and that one cost more than it should have due to scarcity.

[CP5670]

Would I be better off just biting the bullet, spending more time and money, and doing a full mobo/cpu upgrade now rather than later?

Yes, although you should get a 775 Core 2 setup and not AM2. 939 processors and DDR1 are relatively expensive these days due to their scarcity. If it was only the processor or memory, it may have been worth it, but you don't want to be buying both at this point.

[redsniper]

Ugh. Well, like an idiot, I didn't jump on any of the good deals I saw for 4600s back when I posted this. Now I can't find one online for less than $250.

But it's just as well because the chipset fan on my a8n-e, which periodically comes loose and makes horrible noises, is coming loose more quickly and more often. I've heard that the chipset fans were an issue on this particular mobo and that Asus offers replacement fans, but if I'm going to go to all the trouble of replacing that (screws are on the other side of the mobo ) then I might as well just get a whole new cpu/mobo.

What's the best dual core cpu motherboard combo I can get for ~$250? I would like to see a noticeable performance increase over my current athlon 64 3000. All I need on the mobo is pci-e and SATA, no need for onboard sound or SLI or anything silly like that.

Also, I've had bad experiences with power supplies screwing over my whole system and I just want to make sure that 430W Truepower 2 will be able to handle whatever is recommended.

Thanks.

[redsniper]

[Hades]

That is not much of a bump.Bump:3-10 days.

[redsniper]

Well, I'd kinda like to do this before I go back to school and it'll take a while to get the hardware if I order it online, so I'd like to get this done as soon as possible. In my experience, threads around here will usually get responses after ~24 hours, so that's why I bumped.

[CP5670]

What's the best dual core cpu motherboard combo I can get for ~$250? I would like to see a noticeable performance increase over my current athlon 64 3000. All I need on the mobo is pci-e and SATA, no need for onboard sound or SLI or anything silly like that.

Also, I've had bad experiences with power supplies screwing over my whole system and I just want to make sure that 430W Truepower 2 will be able to handle whatever is recommended.

I think your best combination for $250 is the Core 2 E4400 and Abit IP35-E. If you can spend a bit more, the E6320 is also worth a look. You can hit at least 3ghz on either one easily. I'm guessing you got some DDR2 memory already.

At 3ghz, each core will be about twice as fast as your 3000 if it's at stock speeds, although actual performance improvements in programs will be more modest. (but still fairly significant in most cases)

[Bob-san]

What's the best dual core cpu motherboard combo I can get for ~$250? I would like to see a noticeable performance increase over my current athlon 64 3000. All I need on the mobo is pci-e and SATA, no need for onboard sound or SLI or anything silly like that.

Also, I've had bad experiences with power supplies screwing over my whole system and I just want to make sure that 430W Truepower 2 will be able to handle whatever is recommended.

I think your best combination for $250 is the Core 2 E4400 and Abit IP35-E. If you can spend a bit more, the E6320 is also worth a look. You can hit at least 3ghz on either one easily. I'm guessing you got some DDR2 memory already.

At 3ghz, each core will be about twice as fast as your 3000 if it's at stock speeds, although actual performance improvements in programs will be more modest. (but still fairly significant in most cases)

S939 (iirc) is DDR1 only--he'd need new RAM. Your best bet would probably be more like a Pentium E2160 and Abit IP35-E--that should bring you to 3GHz at ~$210.

[CP5670]

Well, he only said CPU and motherboard, so I assumed he already got some memory. If the memory needs to be included, it would be difficult to get everything in with $250. Should be possible with $300 though (the 2GB 800mhz Ballistix pack on Newegg is easily the best choice at $80).

There are actually one or two Asrock PT880 boards that support DDR1, but they don't overclock well and I think their PCIE slots are limited to 4x, which may hurt performance slightly.

[redsniper]

I didn't know that my memory would be incompatible. In that case I'd be willing to spend ~$100 on 2GB of RAM and it looks like what CP suggested will fit the bill nicely.

EDIT: Okay, after looking around a bit, both the IP35-E and E6320 seem a little more expensive than I'd like. I'm looking at $160 for the cpu and $115 for the mobo, if you've seen better deals feel free to show me where.

A few things:

1. If I get a cheaper Core 2 Duo, will I be kicking myself later for not getting the e6320? Would I miss those 2MB of cache that much if I got the e4400 instead?

2. Will the stock heatsink handle overclocking to 3Ghz like you're suggesting?

3. If I want to look at alternative motherboards, is the P35 chipset the best for these CPUs? Are there others that would be worth looking into?

4. Is 430W enough? I've got several hard drives, but I can get rid of a couple of them, and a Radeon X1900XT.

[CP5670]

The motherboard is about as cheap as you can go and still get a good FSB clocker, but you can certainly save on the processor. The extra cache does make a bit of difference but is not worth worrying about if you're on budget. The E4400 seems to be the sweet spot right now. The E2160 is pretty nice for the price too, but the cache reduction starts having a more significant impact at that point.

The P35 is indeed the best Core 2 chipset unless you want SLI. It runs much cooler and gets better overclocks than the Nvidia ones. The stock cooler should be good to about 2.8-3ghz as long as you don't increase the voltage, which is typically not necessary on the 4xxx and 6xxx models.

At stock speeds, the new setup will actually use less power than what you currently have, but that increases quickly when you pump the speed up. It should be fine with the video card, but you may run into trouble depending on how many hard drives you have.

[redsniper]

I actually have four hard drives right now, but I could easily get rid of two of them.

[BloodEagle]

Get a 550+ watt power supply, and make sure it comes with a PCI-e power connector.

By the way, get an AMD processor.

If you can read this without resizing the text, you have eye cancer.

[Davros]

So, I'm considering upgrading my CPU from an Athlon 64 3000 to an Athlon X2 4600 (socket 939).
What does HLP think?

Your upgrading your cpu to one that is less than 50% faster (more like 35%)?
(remember most programs are only single core aware)

waste of time either stay where you are or go faster

[redsniper]

*disregarding dumb posts*
Okay, I ordered the IP35-E, E6320, and 2GB DDR2 800 yesterday. I managed to get a $20 rebate on the mobo.
Now I wait on the mail.

[Bob-san]

Nice--sounds like a good rebate. Tell me how the IP35-E works for ya, 'kay?

[redsniper]

Alright, the hardware is all working fine. The IP35-E does a weird thing: when I turn it on, it runs for a few seconds, turns off, then turns back on and runs normally. Pretty much all the user reviews I read reported the same thing, so I think it's normal.

So now it's on the the joy of re-installing Windows.

What would be the best way to partition my HD, if at all? I have an 80GB main drive and a 200GB backup/storage drive. The last time I did this, I made a 10GB partition for Windows and a 70GB partition for everything else on the main drive (and didn't own the 200GB drive yet). I realized after the fact that this was mainly pointless, since if I reinstall Windows on the first partition that takes the registry with it and then all the programs on the second partition won't work. Also, I don't want to go and make five different partitions for games and music and video and so on, just one or two is fine. What do you guys recommend?

[CP5670]

Yes, that is a known issue on the IP35 boards. It's more of an odd quirk than an actual problem though, and is better than the cold boot bugs that occur on some other boards (particularly Asus ones).

I personally don't bother with partitions and keep it at one per drive. It's only worth doing if you will be running more than one OS. As you said, if Windows gets deleted, you will have to reinstall most of your programs anyway.

In any case, you might not actually have to reinstall Windows, especially if you got rid of your motherboard drivers on the old setup. My current XP install is from 2004 and works perfectly fine even after going through something like four upgrades.

[redsniper]

Well, I think I could just keep going with this install if I wanted to, but it's good to format and reinstall every once in a while. Gets rid of all the residual crap that builds up.