Computer Upgrade / Updates

[NevadaSTi]

http://compreviews.about.com/cs/desk...aprDellXPS.htm

this is essentually my computer. The only differences are as listed.

3.4ghz P4 Processor
1g Ram (DDR2)
180g Harddrive
ATI X800XL 256mb video card.

So, here is what I am thinking that I would like to start updating my PC a little. I got the PC in late 2005, so it is time to make some updates.

I am looking at either getting an Nvidia 8800gts or the ATI 2900, any recommendations?

Not so much looking forward to this upgrade, but should I look into upgrading / updating my processor? If so, what would you tech guys suggest?

I have room for 3 more 1g ram modules, so another gig of ram would help out also.

Do you guys have any other ideas that I might start to look at?

[Kevin M]

Moar RAM! Never a bad thing. Video cards aren't my thing, but as far as I know you've almost maxed out your processor unless you can go to a dual/quad core.

[NevadaSTi]

RAM is like $12 from Tigerdirect. Hmm.

[Dean]

Save your money for a new MB/system w/dual core, etc.

What you have isn't bad, and upgrades will only show small improvements given the architecture of the system.

I wouldn't even buy RAM unless you are running Vista.

[NevadaSTi]

I don't know anything about Motherboards, or what I should even be looking for. Some help would greatly be appreciated.

[Dean]

Originally Posted by NevadaSTi

I don't know anything about Motherboards, or what I should even be looking for. Some help would greatly be appreciated.

New MBs are likely going to have different power requirements, so assume you will need a new base system.

If you like Dells, the XPS line is probably worth looking at for at least a starting place.

[NevadaSTi]

It is an XPS!!!

It's on the link from the first post.

Dell XPS Gen 3

[Dean]

Originally Posted by NevadaSTi

It is an XPS!!!

It's on the link from the first post.

Dell XPS Gen 3

I know, that is why I said to go look at the new XPS systems.

XPS is a product line, not a specific model.

[cody]

You can't upgrade your CPU without upgrading your MB so yah, add another gig of RAM if you game or multi-task, or just buy new. I just bought one of these.

[ScottyS]

I am in the middle of redoing my desktop as well, finally.

In your case, the only real CPU upgrade would be to dual-core, and that means new MB and RAM too. It would also probably mean a new PSU, as Dell's suck. Especially if you went with a big video card.

Where are you experiencing slowdowns? Cause unless you do a LOT of multitasking, it's likely that you won't notice a difference worth the $400 the new stuff will cost (before video and HDD).

Games in the BF2 catagory will need over 1GB of RAM, so that will help.

Personally, I would simply:

--Get more RAM, at least 1 more GB module from Newegg or something $25
--New Hard Drive, get a new 32MB cache SATA drive, this will be the single biggest speed boost $80 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16822148309
--New Video Card, maybe a year-old second-hand one, there are a LOT of kickass cards (x1900xt, 7900GT, etc) priced in the $100 range on various forums and eBay right now

Check your Power Supply, Dell's usually are underpowered, make sure you have enough amps on the 12v side if you get a really big Video Card.

There, that way you will have an HDD and Video Card that will be good for another couple years when you eventually go with a new PSU, multi-core, MB, and RAM.

Originally Posted by cody

You can't upgrade your CPU without upgrading your MB so yah, add another gig of RAM if you game or multi-task, or just buy new. I just bought one of these.

Interestingly enough, I recently replaced my Sager 1.73 Centrino and x700 15.4" with an ASUS 15.4" AMD X2 1.9 with HD2600. It's a wonderfully-crafted laptop (after several years of Sagers), but ATI Mobility Driver support blows. After I chucked Vista and dropped XP Pro on, and found all the drivers, I finally had to go with a hacked ATI desktop driver to get the card's performance up. I had two choices: driver hack to run as FireGL v5600 Mobility (gaming sucked); or hacked desktop drivers for the HD2600. I'm staying with the HD2600 config, simply because it games. I get little weirdness every so often, but it's not a big deal. Considering the laptop was $800 on Newegg sale, I probably did OK. I run 2gb in that.

Oh, my new desktop setup is:

Lian-Li case (old, had it for years)
Enermax E651P PSU (old, had it for years)
ASUS P5K-E-AP MB (new, $150)
Intel C2D E8400 3.0ghz 6mb L2 1333fsb ($226)
OCZ 2x1gb Platinum blingywhatever very tight timings ($75)
eVGA Nvidia 7900GTO 512mb second-hand ($90)
Seagate 250gb SATA 3.0 32mb cache system drive ($80)

Needed the clock speed for video rendering in Premiere, or else I would have gotten in on all of the quad Q6600's that are floating around at $230....

Previous setup was disassembled a year ago, was a pair of Athlon XP2200's on a Tyan board with FireGL X1 and 66mhz PCI SATA RAID....I still have some peripheral stuff I might list for sale.

[cody]

If you'll excuse the hijack, what's the deal with dual core processors? Is a 1.7 core 2 duo the same in performance as a 3.4 ghz P4, for example?

[Nick Koan]

Originally Posted by cody

If you'll excuse the hijack, what's the deal with dual core processors? Is a 1.7 core 2 duo the same in performance as a 3.4 ghz P4, for example?

No, its more like having dual processors.

Meaning, unless the program is highly multithreaded and can take advantage of multiple processors, it'll be only a minor bump in performance. Its not like it doubles performance.

EDIT to add clarity: clock speeds don't equal performance. In a straight up comparo between the 1.7 core 2 duo versus a 3.4ghz p4, the core 2 duo will likely win most tests, so your question is kind of a weird one.

If the question is, will a 1.7 core 2 duo be equivalent to a 3.4 GHz single-core chip based off the same architecture and bus speeds? Well, that's all theoretical and at that point it'd depend on the application.

[Dean]

What Nick said mostly. There are a number of articles comparing them in gaming and non-gaming applications as well s comparing dual core to dual processor. Google: dual core performance single (Or something close)

What does best really depends on the application and the performance of the other system components.

Many games for example don't see any benefit unless you are running multiple high end video cards to eliminate that bottleneck.

For File/print servers, Dual Core is overkill. I'd rather have dual singles so if I lost a CPU I can run with 1, but try and find a non-Dual core server these days. non-Dual core anything is getting hard to find.

[NevadaSTi]

To answer some of the questions, my 3.4ghz P4 has HT or Hyper-thread technology. I am not sure if an actual dual core processor will be an upgrade for me. As the only dual cores that I see are at a lower speed then my processor. Typical ones seam to be 2.4 - 2.8 ghz.

As for the games that I play on it, I have COD4, which is optimized for Dual Core processors. I mostly play World of Warcraft. When I log off of WoW, I get an approximately 1 minute of computer lag before I can do anything. Such as shutting it down, or even clicking on Firefox.

[cody]

Weak.

[NevadaSTi]

Originally Posted by cody

Weak.

Wow, be a little more specific! What is weak, my pc lag, or the comparison between dual and single core?

Not to bust your butt, but I need answers and opinions. I don't know jack crap about this stuff. That is why I am asking. Confusing answers, confuse me.

[cody]

I posted that at the same time as you posted. It was in reference to learning that my new dual core 1.7 isn't going to be as fast as a P4 3.4.

[Dean]

What do you want to spend might be a better way to start.

Yes, most Dual core speeds are slower, but they are faster due to higher bus speeds (800 vs 1333+) to RAM and Peripherals as well as the ability to do 2 things at once.

Your old system may be Hyperthreading capable, but that just makes it Pseudo dual 1.7Ghz box at best.

Newer games are designed to take advantage of the multiple cores.

A mid range Dual Core with a pair of SLI video cards might be 2-4 times faster running modern multi-threaded games than your current system, though I am far from an expert.

[Nick Koan]

Also, early hyperthreading technologies didn't really do much (some people will even say it hurt performance a little).

But yeah, there is a lot more to a processor than just clock speed. Deans right on the money, so a core 2 duo at 1.7GHz will feel faster than your 3.4GHz P4, but it would be incorrect to say they are equivalent or "faster" or "slower" or whatever.

Its hard to difficult clock speeds of different families of processors. Perhaps you all remember the old Apple ads comparing their 400mhz G4 to a 1GHz Pentium 2? And even though the Core 2 duo and the Pentium 4 are both from Intel, their architecture is quite different and therefore comparing clock speeds is just plain weird.

Brian, you would definitely benefit going to a new dual core processor (and the associated new motherboard w/ faster bus speeds and whatnot).

[Kevin M]

The Dual Cores don't run especially fast, but they're great for serious multitasking. I typically have Civil 3D (major resource hog) plus IE, Excel, Pidgin, WMP, and whatever else running simultaneously. No system issues, but Civil 3D often takes time to complete tasks, which is when I switch over and browse the interent.

Regen's done, gotta go!

[NevadaSTi]

To answer Dean's question, $500-800 over a period of 10 months.

I think right now, I will just order at least one more 1g of Ram. And then do a possible video card update in the near future. I talked with the IT guy at my work, and that was his suggestion. And for the most part, that is what everyone on here seems to be suggesting also.

[NevadaSTi]

Originally Posted by BAN SUVS

The Dual Cores don't run especially fast, but they're great for serious multitasking. I typically have Civil 3D (major resource hog) plus IE, Excel, Pidgin, WMP, and whatever else running simultaneously. No system issues, but Civil 3D often takes time to complete tasks, which is when I switch over and browse the interent.

Regen's done, gotta go!

Yeah, I know that one. Revit is even more of a system hog then any of the AutoCad versions. That is why I have two screens at work, one for browsing the internet, and one for waiting on Revit to finish what I told it to do 5 minutes ago. LOL.

[Dean]

Originally Posted by NevadaSTi

To answer Dean's question, $500-800 over a period of 10 months.

I think right now, I will just order at least one more 1g of Ram. And then do a possible video card update in the near future. I talked with the IT guy at my work, and that was his suggestion. And for the most part, that is what everyone on here seems to be suggesting also.

Based on that budget and time frame, I'd clean up and defrag the current system and see what your real RAM utilization is before spending anything on anything.

10 months from now something better than this Alienware system will be in your price range and it will kick ass over just about anything you can do by adding RAM and 1 higher end video card to your existing box.

[Nick Koan]

Originally Posted by cody

I posted that at the same time as you posted. It was in reference to learning that my new dual core 1.7 isn't going to be as fast as a P4 3.4.

Don't worry, the Core 2 duo processor will be faster.

I had to edit one of my posts to add clarity. Comparing two families of processors based on clock speed alone is tough.

For the most part, your processor is idle 99% of the time. Clock speed only measures how fast the processor can calculate something, but has nothing to do with the efficiency of the system as a whole. Intel has started improving other areas to speed up the overall performance of the whole system.

Thankfully the mega/gigahertz war has finally gone away as it was really starting to overshadow development in other areas. But its one of those things where most consumers say "I don't know what that number means, but I definitely need more of it" and so Intel and AMD kept pushing out chips with higher and higher clock speeds.

[cody]

Actually I only mentioned Core 2 Duo as a hypothetical. My new dual core CPU is an AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual-Core Processor TK-53 (512KB L2 Cache 1.70GHz, 1600MHz).

http://www.everex.com/products/xt5300t/xt5300t.htm

Is the 1600MHz the FSB speed? That's pretty cool right?