A64 90nm Prices

[Gnoad]

Originally posted by: Zebo

Originally posted by: Gnoad
God, listen. Socket 939 for who can afford it, socket 754 for those that want to save a couple bucks. Whats it matter to other people if they buy something different than you do because they have a different financial situation? It's neither a waste of money nor lack of intelligence.

Duh. However obviously price is a concern for the OP or he would'nt be whineing about thier expense. Did you even read the orginal post?

I was addressing his concern, pointing out 939's price to performance ratio sucks right now and he'd be better off with an affordable 754 solution.

How do you know what he would be better off with? Let him decide that. Im not taking any sides here, Im just saying you shouldn't try to think for other people. Just let it all go, and buy what YOU want.

 

[christoph83]

Originally posted by: Zebo

Originally posted by: Gnoad
God, listen. Socket 939 for who can afford it, socket 754 for those that want to save a couple bucks. Whats it matter to other people if they buy something different than you do because they have a different financial situation? It's neither a waste of money nor lack of intelligence.

Duh. However obviously price is a concern for the OP or he would'nt be whineing about thier expense. Did you even read the orginal post?

I was addressing his concern, pointing out 939's price to performance ratio sucks right now and he'd be better off with an affordable 754 solution.

Yes everyone please be aware that the 70 extra bucks it takes to have a 939 system will all go to waste. Especially when you have a chance of hitting 2.6ghz much more easily than a socket 754. No to mentions all that 70 extra bucks is going to waste on more motherboard features like dual gigabit lan, nforce firewall, extra sata, and firewire. Not to mention socket 939 is the future socket.

If that 70 bucks scares you and you want to go pci express you can even wait 3 weeks and buy a sub 100 dollar nforce 4 motherboard and make this whole socket 754 vs 939 not even an issue. Now Zebo obviously has an emotional grudge against the 939 socket, but if anyone else disagrees that 70 extra bucks isn't worth it to an overclocker then speak up. If your going stock speeds grab a 2800 + vnf3-250.

As for the OP, mwave did have retail 3000 64's for 168 bucks. Zipzoomfly has them now for 185. The prices of these chips should continue to drop over the next few weeks as more chip supply comes in. So if price is an issue but you want the 939 socket features, wait till nforce 4. As right now there are not sub 100 dollar 939 offerings.

So to summarize:
Socket 939: Offers a decent chance to hit 2.6ghz(fx55 performance) according to anandtech with the 3000 .09 chip and costs 70 dollars more than a 3000 .13 setup with vnf3-250 mobo.
Socket 754: The cheapest entry into the athlon 64 chip. Around 200 dollars for a 2800 64 setup, but dont expect to hit 2.6ghz.
Nforce 4: Go with this if you need pci express, are planning a video card upgrade soon, or want 939 features with a cheaper motherboard.

Either way none of these setups are the wrong decision. Like Gnoad said go with what you want =P

 

[Lithan]

chaintech board is inferior to MSI, and you are paying too much for the 939 msi.
ZZF has cheapest retail 2800+ for $140.
Argueably the best 754 board is the DFI for $125

retail 3000+ 939 sells for $175.
Arguably the best 939 board right now is the MSI for $130


Difference is $40.

And 754 boards have just as many problems if not more than 939 boards.

 

[AnnoyedGrunt]

Well, the 3200+ 90nm is back in stock @ Monarch, and is only $215

They are selling the 754 3200+ for $208, which is only a $7 difference

If you step down to the 3000+, the 939 90nm is $184 and the 754 is $163, so the difference is a bit more pronounced.

However, @ these prices it certainly seems that getting a lower powered, highly overclockable, 939 CPU is not a poor choice by any means.

It looks like the biggest difference in price is due to the Mobo choices, but you can get a 939 mobo for $115, so it's not like you are only limited to very expensive ones or anything like that. Furthermore, its not as if everyone buying a 754 Mobo is getting the cheapest ones ones available (the $75 chaintech mentioned above, is not THE cheapest, but is definitely close to the least expensive), so in many cases the Mobo cost would be similar between the two versions.

At this point, I would rather get a 939 90nm with PCIe (when the NF4 arrives) then a 754 counterpart, even though I may spend more up front. I'd be more comfortable knowing that I would have a good upgrade path for future use (both in the CPU area as well as the video area).

Anyhow, I think the 90nm 939 chips can be a good value, if you can find the right time (and place) to buy.

-D'oh!

 

[tc17]

Personally I'm really getting sick of memory and cpu prices that fluctuate so much. No other piece of hardware changes prices like memory does.

I've noticed pretty much ALL of the AMD cpu prices have been going up lately. I believe Newegg jacked the Sempron 3100 price up $30.... now the AMD64 2800 cpu was raised $5 today....

I though AMD had dropped prices? Or was that just some marketing gimmick? At this rate, I'll have to start looking at the Intel CPU's. Or more likely, I'll just forget buying any.

 

[Lithan]

Since I'm buying a MSI and a 3000+ I posted the question on Xtreme and asked users here. So far 3/3 say it either worked out of box or using one stick of ram got it working out of box.

 

[suave3747]

Originally posted by: tc17
Personally I'm really getting sick of memory and cpu prices that fluctuate so much. No other piece of hardware changes prices like memory does.

I've noticed pretty much ALL of the AMD cpu prices have been going up lately. I believe Newegg jacked the Sempron 3100 price up $30.... now the AMD64 2800 cpu was raised $5 today....

I though AMD had dropped prices? Or was that just some marketing gimmick? At this rate, I'll have to start looking at the Intel CPU's. Or more likely, I'll just forget buying any.

I think that it is more likely Newegg recognizing strong demand for AMD parts right now, so they're milking it for profit. The 90nm processors are selling like hotcakes because of their overclocking ability.

Much like Thermalright heat sinks are suddenly out of stock everywhere.

 

[gobucks]

The point is, prices are not THAT much different for the different sockets. If you don't plan to upgrade, then 754 will give you better performance. If you plan to upgrade, or overclock, then the extra money is probably well spent on a 939 system, preferably one with PCI-express. Personally, my last computer was a 700MHz Athlon, Slot A, and I didn't look into it, so I got stuck with a platform with little upgrade potential. I wish I had had the advantage of the Socket A platform, but I didn't, and there is little point in buying into it now. If I'm going to pour money into a new system, I don't like to see a max upgrade path of 600MHz (2800 -> 3700). What I like about 939 is that it will support 3000-> dual core, probably up to ratings of about 5000+. Also, on the issue of overclocking, I'd like to see you get a 2800+ to speeds of 2.6GHz on AIR. That's what the reviewers have been using on the 939 chips. 130nm chips usually have an overclocking potential of about 200MHz. Even if the 2800+ could overclock like the 754 3000+, that would still top out at about 2.2GHz. And if you use Liquid Cooling or something else extreme, then you can't really talk about the price of the system if you have to spend hundreds to cool it.

 

[stelleg151]

I agree with gobucks, but I dont want to have to sit here and wait for the stupid NForce 4's to come out. First it was November, but now its looking like December is probably how long we will have to wait. GRRRR, might just have to go with AGP......

 

[bitsbucket]

NEVER buy a computer (or MOBO)for "upgrade ability" How many times have you seen them change something, that YOUR new board does not support? I have had that happen to me too many times to count. However if I were buying a new AMD board I would certinally go for the 939 socket, just because it MIGHT allow me to upgrade the proc. sometime in the NEAR future.........
Everytime I have bought a board, thinking that I would upgrade the proc. later, the new procs would have something my board wouldn't support, example, baton cores running 333MHz FSB. My EXPENSIVE Gigabyte board only went to 266FSB........time for a new board!! It'll get you every time!
Bitsbucket
Oh, last price check I did Newegg was cheaper than Monarch on the 939 procs.....
just my 2 cents worth.....

 

[cbehnken]

Originally posted by: gobucks
The point is, prices are not THAT much different for the different sockets. If you don't plan to upgrade, then 754 will give you better performance. If you plan to upgrade, or overclock, then the extra money is probably well spent on a 939 system, preferably one with PCI-express. Personally, my last computer was a 700MHz Athlon, Slot A, and I didn't look into it, so I got stuck with a platform with little upgrade potential. I wish I had had the advantage of the Socket A platform, but I didn't, and there is little point in buying into it now. If I'm going to pour money into a new system, I don't like to see a max upgrade path of 600MHz (2800 -> 3700). What I like about 939 is that it will support 3000-> dual core, probably up to ratings of about 5000+. Also, on the issue of overclocking, I'd like to see you get a 2800+ to speeds of 2.6GHz on AIR. That's what the reviewers have been using on the 939 chips. 130nm chips usually have an overclocking potential of about 200MHz. Even if the 2800+ could overclock like the 754 3000+, that would still top out at about 2.2GHz. And if you use Liquid Cooling or something else extreme, then you can't really talk about the price of the system if you have to spend hundreds to cool it.

LOL do some research on Athlon 64 overclocking.

Running 2.5 on a 3200 (Same core as both 2800 and 3000)

The 90nm chips haven't shown consistently that they overclock any better than 130nm ones.