gaming setup?

my system at the moment is..
p4 2.4c@3.4
asustek p4p800 mobo
2*256mb geil pc4000 dual
radeon 9800pro with xt bios


i was think of changing to a athlon 64 3200 setup
which is best 4 gaming and benching?

A helluva of a nice system you have there. In my opinion, getting yourself an A64 3200+ setup would be a waste of money. That system of yours could easily last for another year (tops), with minor upgrades to your CPU (Prescott, maybe??) and video card (R420 or NV40 when they come out).

By next year, hopefully things have settled down a bit in the PCI express, 64-bit (OS and CPUs), sockets (either T if you're Intel or 939 for AMD), etc... arena so that's when you should in looking at doing a major overhaul.

i agree, im thinking of getting a new system, but if you compare my current system to ur current, urs rules, you overclocked it well and got a nice graphics card

if you really want to waste money, i would get 3.0ghz northwood or prescott £200 & overclock the thing

:)

I would say go for an A64 but not yet coz:

a) You have a pretty good setup at the moment (shame about it being a P4 though :P)
b) They are going to change standards soon, so you'll have to change again to keep up!

Also, thought about getting more RAM? What display have you got?

Since both AMD and Intel are about to intro new sockets, atx is changing to BTX, DDR2 is replacing ddr, agp and pci are gettig replaced by pci express and optical drives are going to go SATA .....it's not a good time to upgrade. Unless you want to go from a sucky system to a cheap athlon xp system. Advise to any normal person not running a 486 - wait a year till 90nm athlons 64 come out and the above standards have been introduced.

IF you still want to change to an amd 64 system, then at least wait till the new socket 939 comes out end of march. It will be faster, cheaper and have much longer shelf life.(letting you upgrade to a 90nm cpu later). Athlon 64 3700 and fx-53 come out then too....Though by the sound of your post longetivity isn't something you care about......

www.overclockers.com is the best source for this type of info..Here's one particular post..

http://www.overclockers.com/tips00511/