upgrading (XP-> AM2?)

[mercyground]

first of all... please dont laugh.

AMD barton mobile 2500 @2.5ghz
Abit NF7-S
****ty ATI 9600 XT (256mb ddr) insurance company ripped me when they replaced my 9600xt 128mb DDR2 card. (you opened it tough crap)
1gb crucial (2x512mb ballistix) 2-2-2-11

i know C2D kicks ass. Dont want one.
I'd like a decent AM2 (or AM2+) board and a X2 dualie. Aim is to possibly upgrade to a quad later next year.

I know later X2's will be dual plane and hence require am2+ or am3 split voltage boards. Basically i want something that will
1) replace this very long in the tooth machine
2) give me a few years useage.

Having seen the insane nutters on ebay thread i'm pondering if i could ebay my little bits and hence cover the cost... i have a backup machine i could use for a while. ati9550 (spit) and a 1800xp in it i think... its buried in the corner atm.

So hit me up folks.

:edit: dont need SLI btw. bit pointless buying dual cards anyway.
:edit2: Biostar TF560 A2+ is a possibility. Anand covered it in august.

[Andaho]

why are you anti-C2D? - I wouldn't let company loyalty get in the way of getting the best

[EtheAv8r]

I went from NF7v2, Athlon 3200+, AMD 9800 Pro to C2D and wow what a difference. I have built recent AMD AM2 systems for people who insist they want that.... and they simply do not match the performance of C2D systems, sadly.

I use CPC benchmarks to determine relative perpormace, not synthetic benchmarks, as the CPC ones give a good indication of performance in real-world terms.

[mercyground]

Dont like the way intel is taking the platform. I much prefer the way AMD Fusion and the slot in a dedicated processor of which ever type u need. Plus from what i read Intel are changing sockets soon?

its a wierd step back almost to the SX/DX era but its making sense with how programming is at present.
Multithread/multicore isnt making the impact it could as alot of programs are still really single thread planned.

Until Intel comes up with a better plan/motherboard its wasting effort. c2d on an amd bus would be interesting. Netburst is just a brute force method and it bottlenecks. The old P3's killed the P4 when it came out. The Banias p3/p4 hybrid was a much better idea. Then the teaming up with rambus and the extortion that Rambus tryed on.

The Alpha bus was a genius idea for AMD.

Anyway. short version is this. Amd dual core on a reasonable Mb is cheaper atm. Yes i wont get the insane c2d clocks but DDR3 is too expensive atm.

From what i read last night this biostar board is quite nice and if i can drop my XP gear on ebay it might even pay for it all. I dont need a monster rig. I'm not playing bioshock or cyrsis. I want a reasonably powerful rig that will last. I'm thinking of a 7900 series or maybe a low end 8800. I'm not sure on dx10. I will not run vista until they either fix the issues or go back and redo it. (and hearing that you can backport DX10 to XP doesnt exactly make me want to go vista either. MS really screwed up with vista)

2 years down the line i'll have another look and see where we are.

[scrandman]

If you don't need a lot of PCI slots, the abit AN-M2 looks like a nice board, and is uATX, so you can squeeze it into a smaller box too. There is also the HD version which adds an HDMI port. They also have the AN-52 if you need full size ATX - not the greatest overclocker, but that doesn't sound like a major priority to you.

I'm guessing you must be in the US, as Biostar are difficult/impossible to find in the UK. If not, let me know where you are finding those Biostar boards.

As for CPUs, I'd recommend you get one of the 65nm Brisbane cores, which are very low power consumption (i.e. run very cool and therefore make a quiet rig easy). The fastest one is the x2 5000 IIRC.

BTW - I'm fairly sceptical of the benefits of C2D over AM2 TBH. IMO, all CPUs are now being bottlenecked by the same thing - Hard Disks. Real world performance is going to be severely limited until solid state drives with high capacity and an affordable price tag become a reality. No point in having a CPU that can jump through hoops if it is always waiting on a 7200 spindle to churn out the next bit of info for it process. Fine if you are running highly CPU intensive tasks (folding, etc) but lets be honest most folks mainly use their PCs for internet & gaming.

[mercyground]

http://www.cclonline.com/product-inf...0&tid=tf560a2+

i think komplet has them too?
I'm in uk.

however. i have just found some previews of DFI's new 790 boards.... and i think i like alot... so guess couple more months wait. Full control of all slots. dont want to power it. turn it off.

http://www.tweaktown.com/news/8145/n...eek/index.html

AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 6400+ Socket AM2 Black Edition 3.20GHz http://www.ebuyer.com/product/132142

not grabbing that one thou. Might get the 5000 black. thou ppl say the 3800 will clock to 3ghz? 333x9? looking at a 4k or a 4200 i think then just clock it up.