card update or total upgrade?

[Davidh373]

Nice build 373, though I'd ditch the 8gb of 1066 for 4gb's of 2000 @ 7-10-8-24

It was in his budget, and unless he's overclocking the ram is just going to get underclocked to 1333 anyway.

EDIT: You won't be able to game on a quad for a couple years. I'd say quads have another year, maybe a year and a half. Hexicores will last a little longer, more "futureproof" if you will, even though that word should never be on any builder's tongue...

 

[bryanW1995]

WHAT????

how many games out today even tax 100% on all 4 cores? civ5 is supposedly great, new updated, etc and it doesn't even completely use up all 4 cores. In fact, how many games use MORE THAN 4 cores today? what about even 4 cores 100% loaded? If the number is not zero then it is extremely close to it.

A good quad core with a nice OC will last a LONG time. We are looking at a year or so before we can even buy a bulldozer/sb skt 2011, and then it will be another year or two after that before crytek or somebody else actually releases an 8 core capable game. and even then, an 8 core capable game will probably still run very well on a quadcore clocked at, say, 3.5, which should be a slam dunk on a BE cpu.

 

[Davidh373]

I would either go with the full AMD X6 or get an i5. I would not want to be gaming on a 940. It'll work, but I don't think that $95 will last you 6 months with your current setup...

 

[VirtualLarry]

It was in his budget, and unless he's overclocking the ram is just going to get underclocked to 1333 anyway.

EDIT: You won't be able to game on a quad for a couple years. I'd say quads have another year, maybe a year and a half. Hexicores will last a little longer, more "futureproof" if you will, even though that word should never be on any builder's tongue...

Only recently have some games shown up that really "need" a quad, and now you are saying quads will soon be obsolete for gaming? You've got to be kidding me.

 

[crisium]

Phenom II 940, if it works on your mobo, is the smartest choice. Gets you quad core and is a much faster 3Ghz than an X2 6000 is.

 

[Davidh373]

Only recently have some games shown up that really "need" a quad, and now you are saying quads will soon be obsolete for gaming? You've got to be kidding me.

Look at how fast games needed dual cores. Within the next few months we'll see more games like FFXIV which will use more of all four cores. Plus, that Phenom is old. It may be cheap, but in 6 months there are going to be all new procs out, and the $95 upgrade will turn into junk which just sits there. He also seems to have the money for an upgrade he does need eventually anyway, whether he gets it now, or in 6 months, there is always something new or better to outdate it. I always hear "Wait a few months, there's going to be new stuff and the price will drop", meanwhile, the person is waiting, playing games on turd mode with 640 x 480 resolution. Then the day finally arrives, the launch of new processors from... let us say Intel. These processors come at the low introductory price of $600, then people start saying "Well just wait a few more weeks, AMD is launching their new line", the OP waits 2 weeks, AMD processors launch and people are saying "Oh, wait a few months, Intels new offering is 2X as fast as AMD's latest".

Just get a new computer when you want/ need one. No matter when things are coming out there's always something twice as fast around the corner that's going to drop prices, but realistically it's all the same. We PC people always get the itch for the best, but the best now is always going to be the second best later, or the second best the third, ect.

 

[crisium]

^I don't know, that 940 is actually a good deal. It's faster than socket AM3 Quad Core Athlon II's that sell for the same price. If you have an AM3 mobo with DDR3 it's incompatible, but if you have AM2+ it's actually perhaps the single best bang for the buck for ANY cpu on newegg (assuming you don't need to spend extra cash on a CPU cooler). Nothing else offers that performance for under $96 in any socket, period.

 

[Davidh373]

But he'll be upgrading his whole machine in 6 months, so instead of investing that $96 in a 3 year part, he's investing it in ~ a 1 year part. He still has to address his Graphics card and Ram, MoBo. It's a $100 paperweight in 6 months... if it was heavy enough... which it isn't.... so he isn't even getting that value.

If he already had the part I'd tell him to wait a little while, maybe pick up a graphics card like the 460 1GB, but he would be buying a $100 filler part, which I will never recommend...

 

[Arkaign]

Look at how fast games needed dual cores. Within the next few months we'll see more games like FFXIV which will use more of all four cores. Plus, that Phenom is old. It may be cheap, but in 6 months there are going to be all new procs out, and the $95 upgrade will turn into junk which just sits there. He also seems to have the money for an upgrade he does need eventually anyway, whether he gets it now, or in 6 months, there is always something new or better to outdate it. I always hear "Wait a few months, there's going to be new stuff and the price will drop", meanwhile, the person is waiting, playing games on turd mode with 640 x 480 resolution. Then the day finally arrives, the launch of new processors from... let us say Intel. These processors come at the low introductory price of $600, then people start saying "Well just wait a few more weeks, AMD is launching their new line", the OP waits 2 weeks, AMD processors launch and people are saying "Oh, wait a few months, Intels new offering is 2X as fast as AMD's latest".

Just get a new computer when you want/ need one. No matter when things are coming out there's always something twice as fast around the corner that's going to drop prices, but realistically it's all the same. We PC people always get the itch for the best, but the best now is always going to be the second best later, or the second best the third, ect.

Eh, this whole line of thought is full of massive fail. Judging from your sig, you don't mind spending heaps of cash (eg : ~$300ish video card, Velociraptors, etc) on good stuff. That's great. But :

Not everybody has a lot of extra cash available, or if they do, they may prefer to spend it on other things (cars, vacations, whatever).

A $95 PhII 940 is not going to be worthless in 6 months. Please. At current time with a leading GPU like a GTX480 or 5870, it can run pretty much anything at high settings without being bottlenecked to unplayable results. When you drop the video card down to a more common 5770/GTX460/etc midrange card, you'll be GPU limited in almost every situation in gaming anyway.

The 940BE is an unlocked CPU that easily runs in the 3.4-3.6ghz range and has 8MB of total cache (2MB L2/6MB L3).

As a matter of fact, a system with a ~3.5ghz X4 Phenom II and a GTX480 would be a better gaming setup than say a 980X with a GTX460. And general desktop use is fine even on dual cores so long as the HDD isn't terrible and there's enough ram.

At $100ish, the 940 will max out any GPU setup he is remotely likely to pair it with at acceptable settings, and as such it's a great deal. The roadmap of upcoming titles over the next year isn't magically going to make all current CPUs obsolete, and the PhII-X4-940BE is still better than quite a lot of CPUs being sold today.

 

[Arkaign]

Just checked Ebay closed auctions for PhII 940s. They sell consistently from $90-$110, with a few bizarrely selling for higher. I'd be shocked if he couldn't get at least $75 from it 6 months from now.

A GTX260 would come alive a lot more with a 940BE, but an even better matchup would be with a GTX460, particularly if the person doesn't have a 1920x1200 24" or 2560x1536 30" screen. GTX460 seems fine for up to 1920x1080p in pretty much everything with either max or very high details.

 

[crisium]

Yeah, I really did NOT use hyperbole when I said the 940 is the best bang for the buck CPU in the world right now. I didn't even think about it being a Black Edition and capable of hanging with stock 965's and even 975s. It would give his GTX 260 new life and it would last quite a while.

 

[Davidh373]

I spent very little on this rig actually, and unlike most, I was actually intelligent about picking out the 9xx series. This was also a $240 graphics card on sale, the RAM was on sale, and the Velociraptor was Open Box for 50% off. I spent a total of $1249.98 on my workstation a year and a half ago, I recently upped my graphics because of CUDA. By no means am I telling him to spend over 1k. I know he doesn't need that. He said he has $800 to spend. I was one of the first to post a great build for $790. Don't lecture me about how I live in decadence, I got this for WORK, I would never dream of spending over $1000 just to play games.

 

[Arkaign]

Heh, fair enough, it just sounded as if you were talking down to the little man with a lowly 940BE cpu. Which, of course, will not be worthless in 6 months. As your post pointed out correctly before, you can always get more by spending more. The point is that for gaming, unless someone can afford a godly video card and huge monitor, the difference between say a 940BE @ ~3.5Ghz and a $1000 980X setup is pretty much nil.

Now HDD performance, that's noticeable in a hurry on pretty much any system for almost any purpose (unless you're running terminal services or something to that effect).

GPU performance is also really noticeable to the user provided they game or use something like CUDA (SETI/Folding/etc)

Memory size more than memory speed is also more noticeable. In a similar example, a hypothetical i7-860 with 2GB of DDR3-2000 would get absolutely smoked most of the time compared to a hypothetical i5-750 with 8GB of DDR3-1333, just due to not having to hit the swap file so hard (this is regarding gaming of course).

My apologies if I misread your intent, and indeed the build list posted was worthy.

 

[Davidh373]

Yeah man, it's fine. Sorry if I seemed like I was talking down. I just don't like to let good money go to waste. The OP has posted that he doesn't like the idea of a processor only upgrade. Either that or I'm thinking of a different thread. The 940 won't be a complete waste, but he will start to get the chugs if he likes to crank things.


Oh God, that i7 980X is overpriced!... I drool over it for my 3D rendering but it's SOOO expensive... :/

He wouldn't see much benefit right now for a 6-core, but he would start seeing benefit a year or so down the road as games become more multi-threaded.

EDIT: Referring to AMD, not the $700 intel offering...

 

[Arkaign]

Hmm yeah. It's a tough situation. I wish Intel would lower prices on the Hex-cores, but it looks like it might be a while.

The PhII X4 and PhII X6 are using effectively identical cores, both are on the 45nm process, though the Thubans seem to hit 3.8ghz+ more reliably. With the OP's somewhat ancient mobo, I think hitting 3.4ghz would be a pretty safe bet. Another thing to consider (I would guess this is due to using the same 45nm tech) is that the current X6 CPUs still have the same 6MB L3 instead of a proportional increase to 8MB.

I do think games will start to get more effective at using more than 4 cores, but it will probably be spotty for a while yet, and of course the differences will primarily be seen when combo'd with very high price video cards. For a situation at the same clock speed to chug an X4 and not chug an X6, it assumes a lot of things in the realm of gaming. All of the following must be true :

(1)- The GPU must be fast enough to keep up with what the CPU is capable of processing. If the GPU is the bottleneck at the desired settings (eg; 1920x1080p with max textures and 4XAA/AF) and is running at 65fps average, then all the CPU power in the world won't take it past that limit.

(2)- The game must be capable of addressing and loading more than 4 cores. I do think the lag time between games using quads and quad+ will be less than it was between duals and quads, but it won't be an overnight proposition. Fundamentally new game engines and techniques must be pioneered, and this is a slow process. Some game engines take years to come to the surface, while others never get commercial acceptance or use. What is somewhat likely is that a currently-in-development or testing/sampling engine has been optimized for quad core in an effective way, and from there less severe modifications will be necessary to utilize hex/octocore designs.

Hard to go wrong with either. The X6 is a very nice beast, and the X4 is a helluva bargain. I would lean towards the X4 + put savings towards a 460 1GB / SSD kind of setup, but both would be a TREMENDOUS improvement over the ancient X2-6000+. IPC really went through the roof with PhII compared to PhI and original X2.

 

[Bill Brasky]

This time next year AMD and Intel will have new sockets with new motherboards,and Bulldozer and Sanybridge CPU's,why not spend 95$ now and grab a real upgrade next year. A Phenom II 940 will be great for at least the next year.

Again.. this. Plus you would be able to upgrade your graphics card this holiday season when the refreshes arrive.

 

[Skurge]

civ5 is supposedly great, new updated, etc and it doesn't even completely use up all 4 cores. In fact, how many games use MORE THAN 4 cores today?

Civ5 would make better use of 4 cores if AMD and nVidia would release multithreaded drivers.

 

[Davidh373]

Civ5 would make better use of 4 cores if AMD and nVidia would release multithreaded drivers.

uhh... how are graphics drivers going to help with CPU issues...?

 

[ronopp]

Gents......... a quad setup with a better vid card(in short time) is looking like they way to go if I interpret everything i have read....... which is a lot..LOL this will keep me gamming at good, not cutting edge levels for a couple of years i hope. I usually upgrade every couple of years so......that being said I am feeling a I7-950 set up . also I am running Vista so I think i need to get Win7 64bit Thoughts?

 

[Arkaign]

uhh... how are graphics drivers going to help with CPU issues...?

Well, at present, think of it this way :

The CPU can only send the GPU instructions from one core at a time, making efficient utilization of multi-core CPUs difficult at best. DirectX 11 fundamentally supports multithreaded GPU drivers to efficiently bridge this gap, but as yet no beta or final drivers exist for either ATI or Nvidia GPUs, leaving DX11 and quad/hex/etc cores sort of unfulfilled.

Coding a game AFAIK for dual-core isn't too bad, as you can code it efficiently to use one CPU core for feeding graphics data and syncing data locations in 3d space for the engine, and the other core to load AI/game logic/etc. When you go beyond 2 cores, it gets trickier to make decent use of the available CPU cores due to the lack of scalability. Obviously some games/engines do this better than others.

Theoretically, well-written multithreaded GPU drivers would be a great leap forward, and would see almost immediate benefits from all DX11 titles in terms of more cores = the merrier.

Some brief data :

http://blogs.amd.com/play/2009/09/09/directx-11-–-what-to-expect/

"Multithreaded Rendering is a feature which allows DirectX to be processed via multiple CPU threads. This means that a dual-, triple- or quad-core CPU can have a higher utilization across all cores than DirectX APIs in the past. Historically the OS would load up a single core for commands to the GPU, in essence creating an overload on the first core and under utilizing the additional cores. With only one core issuing commands to a GPU, we have seen CPUs hold back the potential performance of the GPU. With Multithreaded Rendering, DirectX will take better advantage of all the available cores. This should result in a better experience for the multi-core user because of a faster processing pipeline and increased scaling."

A bit confusing to comprehend at first, but once you get the concept, it's pretty exciting.

 

[Arkaign]

Gents......... a quad setup with a better vid card(in short time) is looking like they way to go if I interpret everything i have read....... which is a lot..LOL this will keep me gamming at good, not cutting edge levels for a couple of years i hope. I usually upgrade every couple of years so......that being said I am feeling a I7-950 set up . also I am running Vista so I think i need to get Win7 64bit Thoughts?

Yeah that sounds decent. It's ultimately up to you of course, and what makes you satisfied.

My advice :

Immediate term : Upgrade CPU (make sure bios is current before attempting install) to X4-940BE. This gets rid of your largest current bottleneck : the X2-6000+.

Near future (2-3 months) : Upgrade GPU to ~GTX460 1GB or whatever is best p/p at the time you are ready to buy. Ebay or FS/FT the GTX260 (plenty of people who would snatch it to SLI with an existing matching card).

Intermediate term (6 mos - 12 months : Buy new i7/Bulldozer/Sandy Bridge/whatever, complete with new DDR3 memory/mobo/etc, keep GPU above, sell all rest on ebay or AT:FS/FT. Even if you only recoup $100-$200 total for the old mobo/ram/cpu, that's better than wasting it.

^^ this is just my personal opinion and what I'd do if it were my cash. It's not, so take it for what you will. Best wishes.

 

[Bill Brasky]

Gents......... a quad setup with a better vid card(in short time) is looking like they way to go if I interpret everything i have read....... which is a lot..LOL this will keep me gaming at good, not cutting edge levels for a couple of years i hope. I usually upgrade every couple of years so......that being said I am feeling a I7-950 set up . also I am running Vista so I think i need to get Win7 64bit Thoughts?

I have Vista on my laptop and Win 7 64 on my desktop. Windows 7 is much more pleasant to use in my opinion, and worthy upgrade. I would really urge you to stay away from an i7 build right now because gaming is your primary reason for upgrading. With most games, the primary limiting spec is the graphics card. There are a few games like StarCraft 2, which have stupidly high cpu requirements. But for the most part, any quad core cpu will do just fine. I think your current idea the easily the best and cheapest way to go: take the cheapest route to quadcore, and update your graphics card this winter.

 

[RussianSensation]

I spent very little on this rig actually, and unlike most, I was actually intelligent about picking out the 9xx series.

That's great, but this isn't helping the OP. If you did any research at all, you'd know that even an X4 920 is a massive upgrade over a 6000+.

If you did even more research, you wouldl see that X4 920 overclocked to 3.7ghz can often keep up with a Core i7 940. For $95, that's one of the best bargains out there right now. X4 940 is still a Deneb just like a 955/965 IIRC.

Of course a full-fledged Core i5/i7 system @ 4.0ghz will be faster, but requires a new mobo and $170+ for the cheapest i5 quad.

 

[Davidh373]

That's great, but this isn't helping the OP. If you did any research at all, you'd know that even an X4 920 is a massive upgrade over a 6000+.

If you did even more research, you wouldl see that X4 920 overclocked to 3.7ghz can often keep up with a Core i7 940. For $95, that's one of the best bargains out there right now. X4 940 is still a Deneb just like a 955/965 IIRC.

Of course a full-fledged Core i5/i7 system @ 4.0ghz will be faster, but requires a new mobo and $170+ for the cheapest i5 quad.

That was my point. If you read my original response I was actually advising a very modest i5 build, you caught my reply to Arkaign. I know that a 940 is faster than a 6000+, but I tend to prefer a long lived system over temporary upgrades, and so does the OP it seems.

 

[Ruger22C]

I didn't read all the replies, but remember you can re-use your RAM too. You can get a DDR2 CF board that works with 1055, IF you have a CPU to flash the BIOS. Board $90, CPU $195 or $195 and $30 W7 combo discount = $265 w/ W7.