Been asked to put one together, current components are :
3800x2 (am2)
Corsair 400w
2GB ddr2 800
Gotta add a mobo, case, gfx card and hdd to that.
Keep it cheap guys !!
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Been asked to put one together, current components are :
3800x2 (am2)
Corsair 400w
2GB ddr2 800
Gotta add a mobo, case, gfx card and hdd to that.
Keep it cheap guys !!
but how cheap, we need something overall to aim for - price wise ?
Also..should probably mention..kinda dont want XFX due to the terrible returns policy scan are forced to enforce !
The old faithful 9800gt http://www.ebuyer.com/product/205449 still great at 12080x1024 or 1440x800
Still too much? then 4670 http://www.ebuyer.com/product/158546 not quite as good but still copes well.
(i'd not bother with the 5670 because while it's faster than the 4670, it's not quite up to the 9800gt but costs around the same new.
However 2nd hand would probably better a better bargin.
a 9800gtx, 9800gtx+, gts250, 8800gts 512mb or 4850 would be good, probably slightly over kill.
A 9800gt, 8800gt 512mb, 4770 or 4830 would be good for that resolution.
EDIT:Or thinking aout it, even the 3870 not quite as good as the 9800gt/4770/4830 but not far behind and faster than the 4670
You'll need a decent cooler to overclock that 3800+ too - it will bottleneck modern games at stock speed. I've linked to it a few times before, but there's an article kicking around for the AGP 4650 showing it being bottlenecked by a s939 X2 3800 (i.e. DDR rather than DDR2, but otherwise basically identical).
Personally, I wouldn't bother with anything higher than a HD3850 / HD4670 / 9600GT as you're not going to get the benefit from it when coupled with an X2 3800+...
I'm not so sure scaryjim - I went from a 1950xt to a 4870 on an X2 3800 and saw a huge boost in performance at actual gaming resolutions. In fact I'm still not CPU bound (albeit with a minor upgrade to a 4400)
Ahh but he's talking about the AM2 3800 not the 939 version, and pci-e not agp as it could be the agp+older chipset that's causing the bottle neck.
I would push up to 9800gt/8800gt/4770/4830 level but anything higher will probably end up bottle necked. (EDIT: or maybe not, still it's overkill for the resolution)
PS if you go for a 4670 make sure it's the ddr3 version not one of the frankly crappy 1gb ddr2 versions that are kicking about.
Here's the review: http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...-agp,2383.html, they tested PCIe and AGP 4650s against a HD3850. I'm willing to accept that there'll be a certain amount of sub-system bottleneck down to the 939 chipsets vs the AM2 ones, but that much? *shrug*
*shrug* it's kinda hard to get reviews of older sub-systems coupled with newer graphics cards though. The figures may be bunk, but with a decent air cooler I'd've though an X2 3800+ should be good for another few hundred MHz, which can only improve performance...?
Ahha! They did the second half of the review, using both the 3800+ and an AM2 4200+ clocked to 2.6GHz on the ASRock daughterboard. The increase in framerate, from 2.0GHz s939 to 2.6GHz AM2, is palpable (and can't be chipset related, as its the same motherboard). I guess some of that may well come from the increased memory bandwidth of the DDR2 platform, and some from the increased CPU clockspeed...
I hope it's a good overclocker, I've got one sitting downstairs about to go under a Scythe Mine and it'd be nice to get it to somewhere near 2.5GHz... ;)
Yeah, I noticed that while I was checking out the review!! Tempted to go AM2 / DDR2 now? ;)Quote:
ooh that's my motherboard :D
btw what kind of games will he be playing
I imagine games like Age of Empires, etc. Hes only 13, but wants to get into PC gaming :p