Playing the upgrade game...

[jdogg707]

I am currently looking to upgrade/change the following components from my current system:

AMD Athlon XP 2500+ @ 2404MHZ (2V, FSB 200MHZ)
Abit NF7-S Rev. 2
512MB OCZ Platinum PC3200 Dual Channel Kit (256MB x 2)
Sound Blaster Audigy 2
Leadtek WinFast TV2000XP Deluxe
Creative Inspire 6600 6.1 Speakers
Koolance PC2-601BLW Mid-Tower Case w/ Built-In Exos System (1 x CPU-200G Water Block, 2 x CHC-A05 Chipset Coolers, 1 x CHC-A09 Video Card Cooler)

I will be keeping:

120GB Western Digital 1200JD SATA Hard Drive
36GB Western Digital Raptor
ATI Radeon 9800NP @ XT Speeds
Plextor PX708-A DVD+/-RW
Lite-On 16x DVD-ROM
Antec TrueBlue 480W PSU
Floppy Drive
MX Duo
Samsung 181T
Windows XP Professional

That being said I am looking for a system that will run a bit quieter than my current system, and a processor that doesn't require 2V to perform. I play a lot of games (Sports, FPS, Strategy, etc.), do MPEG and Divx Encoding as I will be using this as a Semi-Home Theater PC, DVD Burning and Authoring, Programming, Distributed Computing, I also use the X2VGA adapter to play Xbox on my Monitor, etc. I have come up with components for two systems, and am wondering which one you would pick if it were your choice? Thanks a lot for the help...

System Path A:

AMD Athlon64 3000+ Retail Processor
Asus K8V Deluxe Motherboard
1GB Kingston PC3500 DDR RAM
Sound Blaster Audigy ZS Platinum
Hauppauge WinTV-PVR250 Hardware TV Tuner w/Beyond TV 3 (Previously Snapstream PVS)
Logitech Z-5300 5.1 Speakers
Antec P160WF Mid-Tower Case
Zalman CNPS7000A-Cu Cooler

System Path B:

Intel Pentium 4 2.6GHZ Retail Processor
Abit IC7-Max3 Motherboard
1GB Geil Golden Dragon PC3500 DDR RAM
Sound Blaster Audigy ZS Platinum
Hauppauge WinTV-PVR250 Hardware TV Tuner w/Beyond TV 3 (Previously Snapstream PVS)
Logitech Z-5300 5.1 Speakers
Antec P160WF Mid-Tower Case
Zalman CNPS7000A-Cu Cooler

Ok, both systems are within $50 bucks of each other and I am looking for a system that is going to work well and offer the best performance at least for a few months until my next upgrade. I was hoping to OC the P4 to at least 3.35-3.4GHZ as I have had success doing so in the past with a 2.6C chip. The Athlon I know is limited in overclockability due to the lack of a PCI/AGP lock and the onboard memory controller. I also thought about going with the higher end 3400+ chip with the AMD solutionsince it's a little less than $200 more. Any help will be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

 

[Ionizer86]

If both systems are within $50, wouldnt system A be much better? It'd be a lot faster for about the same money.

 

[Leonsteward]

personally i prefer AMD so A also sounds good however its worth paying that 200$ extra and getting the 3400+ its cheaper to get what u can now rather than upgrade for a while then sometime later pay the 200 or so dollars later anyway when u want to upgrade again.

But if you want to overclock i think the intel would be better i dont know much about them but my XP 2600+ doesnt like being overclocked so i run it at the straight 2.06ghz.

 

[wetcat007]

Your CPU is at least as fast as those two setups right there...

 

[Markfw]

Originally posted by: wetcat007
Your CPU is at least as fast as those two setups right there...

I wouldn't say that. But to make it interesting, jdogg707, why don;t you do a bunch of benchmarks before you get rid of the old system parts, then bench once more when you have the new system stable at whatever OC you end up with. I also vote for the 3000 Athlon (I little biased as you can see)

 

[jdogg707]

I did some benches currently with my system:

3D Mark 2001 SE: 18,451

3D Mark 2003: 6112, CPU Score: 668

PC Mark 2004: 4,221

AquaMark 2003: 44,191 Overall/8,035 CPU Score/6,093 GPU Score

SiSoft Sandra 2004:
Memory (Unbuffered): 3044/2890

CPU Arithmetic: 9115/3760

CPU Multimedia: 21900/22180

 

[niwi7]

those are good scores

why do you wanna upgrade to gain such little performance?


keep your proccesor and mobo and upgrade everything else

 

[xSkyDrAx]

well the only reason your running at 2V is cause your cpu is clocked to 2.4 gighertz! By all means that is a nice overclock, but if you were to lower it to 3200+(2.2gighertz) you probably wouldn't need to run it at 2V. And i agree with niwi7 about the cost for the litle gain in performance.

And to answer your question, I would choose option A :beer:

 

[Markfw]

Originally posted by: jdogg707
I did some benches currently with my system:

3D Mark 2001 SE: 18,451

3D Mark 2003: 6112, CPU Score: 668

PC Mark 2004: 4,221

AquaMark 2003: 44,191 Overall/8,035 CPU Score/6,093 GPU Score

SiSoft Sandra 2004:
Memory (Unbuffered): 3044/2890

CPU Arithmetic: 9115/3760

CPU Multimedia: 21900/22180

OK, just to compare, my video scores are lower, but I only have a 9700pro. Here are my Sandra scores at 2170 mhz:
3396 and 3398 on memory and 9200/3476 CPU Arithmetic
Doesn't look that much better. From my previous thread with all the benches I ran, the only one that seemed much better than many others was the UT2003 botmatch score of 106.9

I really like the 3000, but I would hate to see you disappointed since yours is OC'ed so much. If you don't go with the 3400, then maybe you shouldn;t even upgrade quite yet. Even then, the 3400+ would still not be groundshaking in the performance diff from your highly OC'ed rig.

 

[jdogg707]

Originally posted by: xSkyDrAx
well the only reason your running at 2V is cause your cpu is clocked to 2.4 gighertz! By all means that is a nice overclock, but if you were to lower it to 3200+(2.2gighertz) you probably wouldn't need to run it at 2V. And i agree with niwi7 about the cost for the litle gain in performance.

And to answer your question, I would choose option A :beer:

I have tried running at 3200+ but still have to give it 1.8V in order to get anywhere with it. I think I may keep the system components and just do a multimedia upgrade...speakers, sound card, and TV Tuner. Thanks for the input.

 

[50]

Originally posted by: jdogg707

Originally posted by: xSkyDrAx
well the only reason your running at 2V is cause your cpu is clocked to 2.4 gighertz! By all means that is a nice overclock, but if you were to lower it to 3200+(2.2gighertz) you probably wouldn't need to run it at 2V. And i agree with niwi7 about the cost for the litle gain in performance.

And to answer your question, I would choose option A :beer:

I have tried running at 3200+ but still have to give it 1.8V in order to get anywhere with it. I think I may keep the system components and just do a multimedia upgrade...speakers, sound card, and TV Tuner. Thanks for the input.

You really don't even need to upgrade your soundcard. I would keep the A2 and spend more money on speakers...BTW nice setup!

 

[Bovinicus]

My first suggestion to you is not to upgrade at all. You already have a very high-end machine. You aren't going to notice any massive performance increases in most applications. The only area I can see you really benefiting is media encoding. That is because the Athlon XP platform performs this type of operation slower than a similarly configured P4 or A64 based platform.

If you just have the extra money, and really want to upgrade, then I suggest you go with system A. You will have more upgradeability. Unless the setup B motherboard is able to support Prescott CPUs, then you aren't going to have much headroom left on that socket type. In addition to better upgradeability, your performance will be noticeably higher, except perhaps for media encoding. Although the Athlon 64 platform does much better in this arena relative to the Athlon XP, the P4 is still king.

Also, as a previous poster stated, I don't think that you will get your money's worth by purchasing the new Audigy. You should take that money and put it into the speakers. You will most likely notice more of a difference by getting better speakers.

 

[jdogg707]

Originally posted by: Bovinicus
My first suggestion to you is not to upgrade at all. You already have a very high-end machine. You aren't going to notice any massive performance increases in most applications. The only area I can see you really benefiting is media encoding. That is because the Athlon XP platform performs this type of operation slower than a similarly configured P4 or A64 based platform.

If you just have the extra money, and really want to upgrade, then I suggest you go with system A. You will have more upgradeability. Unless the setup B motherboard is able to support Prescott CPUs, then you aren't going to have much headroom left on that socket type. In addition to better upgradeability, your performance will be noticeably higher, except perhaps for media encoding. Although the Athlon 64 platform does much better in this arena relative to the Athlon XP, the P4 is still king.

Also, as a previous poster stated, I don't think that you will get your money's worth by purchasing the new Audigy. You should take that money and put it into the speakers. You will most likely notice more of a difference by getting better speakers.

I am looking for the new Audigy because I want the 5.25" Drive Attachment, because the extra connections in the front of the machine will prove very helpful with some of the Audio encoding I am looking to do....I can also use the Optical In with the X2VGA in order to take advantage of true DD5.1 in my Xbox Games. The speakers I am looking at are going to be fine for my mid-sized room, the only other set I was looking at would be the Creative MegaWorks 6.1 setup, as they are a little less than $100 more and offer a very nice range of features.