Should I wait for Socket 940?

suzukii

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Should I wait for Socket 940? Is it coming soon or should I splurge now with my IRS refund on Socket 939 with a Athlon 64-X2 4800+ CPU? Quick!!! The money is burning a whole in my pocket!!!!!! Aaaaaahhhh!!!!

...Ahh-hem...

Thanks. :?
 

DD_Jay_AZ

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S940 for Athlon64 will be DDR2 and that ZRAM whatever crap they just licensed.

Not much else is changing. There will be a performance gain, how much is anyone's guess.

If I recall, by Q4 2006, S939 is going to be retired. I recall them wanting to do it sooner rather then later.

I'm guessing the S940 A64 will be based on 65nm wafers, that's just a guess though. It makes sense however.

Linkage:
http://www.amdcompare.com/prodoutlook/
http://www.amdboard.com/amdroadmap.html

I didn't research it indepth again, just going from memory, feel free to call me a twit and prove me wrong.

Enjoy!
 

parlee

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if ur going to go with 940 u should wait at least a month or 2 after its release to upgrade, so that the socket has time to mature, amd is going from ddr to ddr2 which will have issues most likely, socket 939 is supposed to be supported until early 2007, there wont be a big perforamnce gain when comparing 939 and 940, itll be similar to comparing socket 754 and 939, theres a bit of a difference but not a really huge one, if heats an issue for u, then waiting could prove to be better since 65nm chips run cooler than 90nm... i suggest u upgrade now since 939 will be supported until 2007...
 

someguyy

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i bought myself a socket 939 system about 3 monts ago (my bro took my 754 for WOW) and a 3700 i fell confident in that i can wait and use this cpu for the next year or 2 and then as this cpu hits the end of the road i can probly pickup a killer 939 dual core for cheap.
 

suzukii

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The question is how long can you wait. New motherboard most likely will be out late spring.

Well, to make this impatient fool angrier :x I went to a local (the last remaining remnants) computer vending show yesterday & found that none (eight vendors total) of these vendors were carrying the AMD 64-X2 4800+ on hand. The excuses ranged from "there isn't that much demand for it" to "it costs too much to stock cuz prices change too fast". They all gave me crazy looks when I said "Do you carry any Mobos that have both AGP & PCI-E slots?". They were all quick to point me to the ASUS boards on their tables, when I was all excited & then, realized they were all only for the Pentium CPU's.
I guess my english wasn't good enough to speak it with a practiced broken Taiwanese accent. " :roll: I be gotta goes to a place where I can be learned gooder Engrish".
I was soooo ready & willing to drop my money. What a dissapointment. I guess it's a sign for me to try to hold out a bit longer. To make it worse, 7 out of the 8 vendors said "there is no such Mobo for AMD CPU's" or they'd be too slow if they existed. I walked away in disgust saying to myself, You ID-10-TS!!!" DAMMIT!!!! :x
 

suzukii

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Apache_lives wrote:
If you are patient, perhaps wait to see how Intel's conroe turns out?
One of my local peers just told me something along those lines, or more like "screw AMD they're buggy!, Wait for the Conroe." Seems like the techies I meet online praise AMD's, but the local shops that are installing workstations & servers in corporate environments don't agree. I personally have done some consulting prior to the last 2-3yrs for local PC shops & they, too, say "Go Intel they are much more stable than AMD has been under Windows when you're not playing video games. So I made a few personal phone calls & got more of the same attitude & negative news towards the AMD CPU's & positive news on the Intels. Sheeesh!!! Am I ever more confused about switching over to AMD & droping Intel cold Turkey. All I know is that I hate my Intel & Mobo due to the overheating I've experienced, freezing & lockups. My two other pals have the exact same setups & they have the same issues. This is the second CPU & Mobo Intel sent me under warranty replacements & it was more of the same. They (@ Intel Tech Supp) went as far as blaming my case not having enough ventilation. So I went out & bought an ANTEC case $130. Still there was no change. I gave up & I just don't keep my system on as long as I normally would. :?
 

linux_0

Splendid
Unless AMD has some tricks up their sleeve we're not aware of socket AM2 shouldn't make that much of a difference except for the fact that socket 939 prices should go down when AM2 comes out.

Just so you know socket 940 has been out for years. Socket AM2 also 940pin but NOT compatible with socket 940 ( for 2xx and 8xx Opterons ) so watch out!

DDR2 will probably not make that much of a difference ( I hope to be pleasantly amazed when it's released tho ).

You could certainly grab a 3200+ +nForce4 to upgrade to now and wait for AM2 to be released and have the bugs worked out before you upgrade.
 
Go wherever your heat, power bill and wallet takes you.(You'll find you're heading toward AMD)

Waiting for Conroe is like waiting for snow in Africa.

Conroe is due out mid year and was brought foward - its only a couple of months after amd's refresh - it wouldnt be a bad idea IMO to wait for both amd and intel to bring there new stuff before buying a new system and besides, P4 is close enough to AMD now, conroe can only do better, and there targets are lower power/heat levels etc - im interested.

Im not expecting it to go as far as hammer an amd into the ground and put them out of buisness - i expect them to be quicker then a P4 ASWELL as having lower power/heat levels - thats worth a few months wait to see what its all about.

As for DDR2 for AMD - yeah, the higher latencies wont make it an overall faster deal but faster memory will, and lower heat (due to lower controller vcore) and lower power levels from the on die memory controller (DDR2 vcore compared to DDR1 vcore) will give some more headroom.
 

parlee

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so do u think well see some AMD cpu's clocked as high as p4's by the end of the year? thatd be sick :p (dont flame me for caring about clock speeds, it still is a factor and most normal users only know about clock speed so it may help to boost amd's profits if they can match p4's clock speeds... i wonder if any1 agrees with me)
 

parlee

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well then do u believe that amd will catch up to intels clock speeds by the end of the year? since intel has still yet to go higher than 3.4? there might be a 3.6 but ive never heard of it... and since amd will have even lower temps, i believe by the end of this year amd cpus might be able to hit 4.0 with good water cooling :) or at least i hope! thatd be fasttt and yes im aware that clockspeeds arnt that important... people i talk with dont know muc habout computers and believe that higher clocked computers are faster, my friend has a 2.8 p4 with a 9600se and thinks its faster than my amd 3700 at 2.4ghz with an x700pro... although my computer is by no meas blazing fast, compared to his 2.8
 

suzukii

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Well I went to a few local shops today & got shot down even more for inquiring about AMD's. Seems like I either live in an anti-AMD city (NY) or the negativity is based on their actual experiences.
I was ready to drop $700+ beans & they warned me about the AMD's & preferred that I go by way of Intel or even wait until June. I'm just so bumbed out about all this. :cry:
If CompUSA carried an Athlon X2 4800+ I'd walk in there & just purchase one right now to see for myself. But, they don't carry them, at least not the shops around these parts. They don't mention anything higher than 4400+ online either. I say CompUSA because if it doesn't workout for me they'll take it back, hassle-free. The local Asian/Korean shops don't want to here of it :x (my returning anything unless it's actually defective). These places just want the money & the hell with ya after you hit the sidewalk. Sheesh!!!!
 

linux_0

Splendid
Remember newegg is your friend!!!! :D

Your best bet is to pick up your system or parts online.

You will end up with a much nicer system if you build it yourself or have someone build it for you.

AMD is the way to go no matter what anyone might have told you locally.

The local shops will also usually rip you off.
 

TabrisDarkPeace

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Intel is based America

AMD is based in Germany / Europe

The efficiency and resourcefulness of the processors they design is representative of their countries of origin... economically speaking.

Intel is likely cheaper to get in America, like AMD is cheaper to get in Germany / Europe for shipping reasons.

Shop owners may want to push 'the local product' for their own economies, etc.

There is less AMD in the world, and people fear them because of that.... their loss, leave AMD to the techs who know better IMHO.

About half my PCs over the last 10 years have been Intel based, and about half AMD... a very small percentage where neither (IBM / Cyrix, etc). Both platforms are highly compatible with each other, only power consumption and performance tend to differ noticably. Each have similar problems aswell, although very minor as they are. (eg: Norton Ghost and platform IDE chipset support, minor bugs in the CPUs on both sides, etc). However because of my current system more of my processor cores have been AMD... but only just.

Go for whomever provides the most cost effective solution, they are each easy to build from parts... you may want to factor the power usage in (ongoing cost), or you may just look at initial purchase cost instead.

There are many people out there who have never installed a platform chipset driver, and because of this AMD 'appear buggy' to them, when it is actually the tech who is totally clueless to industry standard procedures and building dodgy systems by just slamming an OS + software on after building the box.

System building is as much of an art form as it is technical in nature, and there are many thousands, or even millions+ of 'ugly' configs / setups on PC rigs out there.