pc2700 vs 3200 for a64 3500+

R

Rev. Night

[H]ard|Gawd
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Mar 30, 2004
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i am asking the parents for a cpu/mobo/ram upgrade for xmas. currently i have:

amd athlonxp 2800+
abit nf7
6800gt
2x512 Crucial pc2700

And I plan to ask for:

amd64 3500+ socket 939 (90nm)
abit AV8
2x512 Corsair Value Select PC3200


My question here is if the pc3200 is really necessary. How much of a noticable difference is there between the two? To me, noticable is is 10-20+ fps at 1024 res with 4aa/8af on. I do not overclock at all, so any potential i may lose i don't care about. Is the pc3200 truely better then my current pc2700 to warrant the $150 price?
 
depends on the game, it'll be noticeable in some, not in others
the biggest difference will be in general computing though, the faster (hence lower latency) ram will be much more resposive when loading and switching programs

and one note.. get a board with a nf3 chipset, not via. k8n neo2 is a very nice board if you ignore the few people who seem to have neverending problems with it
 
it's a nice board, but most things i read about gigabyte pertain to memory issues.. and not being able to run 4 dimms and stuff. keep that in mind.
 
As for the memory if you plan on running the system at something close to stock speeds. Corsair memory should do 3200 speeds without a problem and I would test it before you get the new stuff.

As for what could happen. Well class, as most of us found out running our memory at a 1:1 ratio usually perduses a more stable platform as the memory is never having to wait for the possessor and vise versa. Such as using a 4:5 or a 5:4 (Or if you use an ASUS or just care for the math 83% memory FSB to System Bus for a 4:5 ratio, sorry if I got them confused on order that are support to be listed in.)



As for in an A64 vs and P4 or XP chip no difference. It's all the same concept. I don't know how well you know your computer for performance but try taking your memory down to 133 fsb and see what happens. It will be about the same effect.

Produce
 
meaning that if i go with my current pc2700 memmory, the computer and board will be slightly slowed since it will be waiting for the ram to catch up and it might lose some stablity. ok, i knew that. i was just wondering how much speed i would lose, whether it would be noticable, and it is worth the $152 to get the new ram.
 
Very noticable. I would spend the money on a gig of even a half gig of memory.
 
BTW, go A8V. Best mobo available. I think your first choice is best. MSI is not even in the same area code of quality as Asus and Abit. memory. Go 3200 and go with as low a latency as possible. If you can get Samsung TCCD Chips. Absolutely awesome.
 
ok, after looking at the prices, features, and performances of various boards, i made my decision. My reasons:

Performance

After looking at a few online benchies (most noticably Anandtech), i noticed that a majority of the boards (from asus to abit to gigabyte to epox) performed about the same in gaming. The delta was no more then 5 fps from the lowest to the highest. Once that aa/af levels got cranked up, the delta dropped to 1.5 fps. Defiantly not anything i would notice, thus not anything to pay extra for. So out of the top 70% of boards, i then sorted them by price and features i will use and thus be willing to pay for


Price and Features

They ranged from being $111 to $170. Since I do not need dual lan or SATA raid of 50,000 different hdds and other like featuers, i chose the cheapest mobo with the least features. i have a discrete soundcard and video card, so the only features i needed were dual memory (all), integrated lan (all), and socket 939.


Perceivable brand quality

Out of the few boards that were left over from the first two cuts, i then looked at the brand names that i trusted for quality and not have known issues (or perhaps, as some of them did, entire threads STICKIED that have pages of problems with them). The two brands that came out of this were Asus and Abit. I currently have an abit board, but before this current setup i had an asus board, and both are rock solid and i know have equally solid quality.


And the grand winner is: ABIT AV8 at $118.



oh, and operaman, i see that in your sig we will have the same cpu, video card, and our mobos will peformance wise be statistically signficantly equal. The only difference is that your computer will be pc4000 and mine will be pc2700. Once you get that 3500+, can you pm me some of your benchies? Maybe an aquamark3 score, 3dmark2001 and '05, and maybe a cs:s VST one. I am curious how much of a performance increase your ddr500 ram is. Once i have that, i will extrapolate down to guess how much of an increase would pc3200 ram do me. Thanks!
 
(cf)Eclipse said:
it's a nice board, but most things i read about gigabyte pertain to memory issues.. and not being able to run 4 dimms and stuff. keep that in mind.
Click to expand...
You mean not being able to run 2 dimms.
 
iddqd said:
You mean not being able to run 2 dimms.
Click to expand...


well, that is for the gig so it doesn't really pertain to me right now.. Curious tho, with that board i could only use 1 stick?
 
No; it has trouble running four banks filled (2x512 / 4x256) at DDR400, which is unacceptable. And it's still being advertised as it can, in fact do those speeds. If you complain about it on the forums / contact tech support, they will blame it on AMD...
( I'm talking about the Gigabyte board, by the way.. )
 
ah, well, that is good to know in case someone i know is asking what boards to get and whatnot. thanks.
 
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