64bit Upgrade Imminent! - Any Final Advice?

[poindextermatic]

Have been planning this upgrade for a good few months now - but the time has finally arrived...yes I'm going 64bit!
Will be ordering Tuesday 15th March the following:

http://www.lowestonweb.com/Products/...2-DB91BC21728E


http://www.lowestonweb.com/Products/...2-CDC2FB647E5D


http://www.lowestonweb.com/Products/...E-B9F1B234DC95


Any of you have any helpful advice or comments/things I may need to know/ look out for about this purchase? I understand it will all work very well together no probs! Just want to make sure my £200 is well spent! I want this to last a few years too...

One question: Will the 'pre-applied' thermal paste on the heatsink be ok? Or should I take this off and put on some quality stuff? i.e:

http://www.lowestonweb.com/Products/...0-F33F6CF41AA4

Not too sure myself?

Thanks in advance, will let u know how it works! (if I don't fry it )

[Clstrphbc_donut]

I've just upgraded from a P4 2.4c @ 3.2GHz to a STOCK 3500+, A8N SLI, kept the same ram, hard drives etc. Got it built yesterday and it is still blowing me away.

Its one hell of a lot faster, around XP, not ran any CPU benchmarks yet so i can't say yey or nay if the CPU is infact a lot faster, but it feels it. I see XP load a lot faster, everything is more instantanious, AMD64's are amazing CPU's, something i would not have said before yesterday.

Also, in response to your question on TIM, i got rid of the thermal pad and put TIM on myself. The pads are ok, but i'd suggest putting your own TIM on.

Enjoy it mate.

EDIT; Just found an old benchmark from my 2.4. It got 8,549 CPU marks on Aquamark, this gets 10,157

[StormPC]

Wait until you start running Win XP64! The difference is crazy! Much faster still.

Also, AM3 favors the P4. So it's quite a bit faster.

[Stigggeh]

i get mixed comments about the 'around windows' difference, a lot of people on othe forums i vist say P4 is better around windows, pity there isnt any benchmarks to show one way or the other,

i have been trying to put off moving to amd for the last 3 month, but my year old P4 still feels fast, compared to my back up (XP-m @2.65)

i am so tempted to go the dothan route at the moment though


yea tim will need to be cleaned, something to do with airbubbles get trapped between, the surfaces

[poindextermatic]

Sorry I'm being thick.. TIM is thermal paste, yeah? Whats the best way to get the sticky pad off?? - scrape it off after dampening with soapy water and then rub with a towel or somthing?
Thanks.

[Stigggeh]

i use nail varnish remover

[Xaneden]

Use an old credit card to scrape it across when applying the paste, and use a bit of alcohol or nail varnish remover to get rid of it (as Stigger said.).

[Hans Voralberg]

Akasa TIM remover, or just alcohol will do.

[Xaneden]

.... or just alcohol will do.

And no, that isn't an excuse to buy a 6 pack of Heineken....



Because that doesn't need an excuse.

[StormPC]

i get mixed comments about the 'around windows' difference, a lot of people on othe forums i vist say P4 is better around windows, pity there isnt any benchmarks to show one way or the other,

Oh there are many many benchmarks that show the AMD64 CPUs to be faster than a P4 at everything. They should be because they are much newer technology. You're right though, your P4 is plenty fast provided your other components are good.

[Xaneden]

The P4 is good, but it is old tbh. The Athlon 64 is designed for what it is meant for, whereas I can't help but feel the P4 is more of an Intel mod project.

Roll on Pentium 5 if you ask me.

[poindextermatic]

Great, nailvarnish remover eh?
Yeah, I thought those pads looked pretty naff when I put my heatsink on my XP2200 with a MSI kt3 Ulta 2 - I'm hoping to see a HUGE performance differance with the 64 3200!