My son's 3200+ runs at 2.3 on water. Assuming the opty oc's well how much faster should his system run? Thanks! I know I could search this but I need to act fast.

YES. The Opty On Water Cooling @ 2.7-2.8Ghz Should very well be able to Compete with a E6400 on stock Speeds. You will notice a Application speed increase. But if your son Is a Gamer a Opty + ATI Graphic Card Upgrade will give a good 40% to 60% speed up from what he currently has. The Opty 170@ 2.8Ghz over the 3200+ will show speed up in most Cases still.

http://www23.tomshardware.com/cpu. [...] &chart=192

about The difference from a 3200+ to a Opty 170 @ 2.6Ghz(check the Red bars)

Thanks yo! But why ATI and not Nvidia? I got him a 7950 gt oc

So I take it the opty should smoke the 3200+ on apps? But for games the gfx upgrade is key? Or what? I didn't quite get you. The comparison chart is great BTW. So the opty at 2.7 or so is roughly like a e6400 at stock speed? Thx again.

Is your son's 3200 a single core? The Opty is a Dual Core proc as well. Just make sure that your board and bios are up to date enough for a dual core proc. They probably are. You will find the Opty to be a pretty darn good proc. I have a 175 on water OCed to 2.65. My mobo is older and I know for a fact that is what is holding back my chip to only 2.65

Well, i was just giving an example with ATI, ATI Cards smoked Nvidia before the 7600 Series cards. So I'm just saying. Well yes, you will a major jump from 3200+ to FX-60 levels especially applications and your Set for The future With Dual GPU and Dual-Core.

Yes, single core, on an Asrock agp/pcie dual board.

Now he'll have opty and jump from old ati 9700 to NV 7950 gt oc.

Thank you both! I'm pretty sure the opty will be a noticible improvement.

What kind of board and ram are you using? You should have managed more than 2.3 with a 3200+ with water cooling. I managed 2.5 with an aftermarket cooler with a 3000+ on budget equipment. Anyway back to your question. Without a doubt an overclocked 170 will be a great deal faster than that 3200+.

Yea, the 2.3 was a bit of a lame OC. Might have been 2350, can't recall. Asrock board and fairly inexpensive Bigwater cooler. Sure hope the opty does well on it. What would be a good mobo to up to now that he no longer needs the AGP on the Asrock?

Go for a DFI! That opty will like to be overclocked on an ultra-d mobo. Plus you have a dual gpu card so there is no need for sli. What kind of memory do you have?

I Agree, the DFI over clocks to 2.9Ghz while the ASrock boards are infamous of almost no overclocking potential, the most I've seen it clocked to was 2.45-2.5Ghz on Asrock but very unstable. I would recommend a DFI board not the Asrock to reach 2.7-2.8Ghz, because it wouldn't reach that level with any stability at all.

I've got my 170 @ 2.5 on air, 34 C idle and 41C under load. I'd go for it.

update for those who helped us decide:

The Opteron actually likes the Asrock it seems. 2850 and stable after several hours of Oblivian - still in low to mid 40's. No post over 3g. But around 2.8 was my hope and it seems we got it! This is on water BTW. With the the new vid card and the opty my son can crank up all the settings in Oblivian and he's happy as a PIS! Thanks. Great advice!

WOW, that is a good board to hit that speed! I have an opty 165 running at 2.6 on a DFI board. I hit 2.8GHz, but slowed down a bit to run on stock voltages.

That's because the asrock doesn't suck as much as people who
don't own one thinks.I was a skeptic till i bought one.My 3700
sandy likes it @2.6 with just a volcano11.I will go higher with
a real HSF. It's best to listen to the people who actually own
the hardware in question.Too many people pass judgement
based on second hand info and heresay.
Hope your son enjoys the upgrade!

What model Asrock?

7950gt isnt a dual gpu card

WOOOOW! Your son't 3200+ is really a black sheep! My 3000+ gets to 2.3GHz on stock cooler without rising Vcore, but I have a terrible mombo sending me only to 2.0G; what about an exchange :?: :!:

Enjoy the Opty; they're real beasts, the best K8s ever, real beauties.

The 170 should run at 2.9GHz on water, so you will become rather jealous depending upon what you have.

WOOOOW! Your son't 3200+ is really a black sheep! My 3000+ gets to 2.3GHz on stock cooler without rising Vcore, but I have a terrible mombo sending me only to 2.0G; what about an exchange :?: :!:

Enjoy the Opty; they're real beasts, the best K8s ever, real beauties.

I was wrong about the 2.3 on the 3200+ it was actually up around 2.45 and he wasn't pushing the voltage - he had a bunch of air in his water too which we fixed - he wasn't too happy I dissed his chip on this board either!

The 170 should run at 2.9GHz on water, so you will become rather jealous depending upon what you have.

I was jealous for a couple days, I still had a 2500+ m (at 2.3) - then my c2d system came in with my 8800gts

but then I fried the mobo somehow

waiting for RMA

His opty and asrock make a killer rig for the $! I kinda wish I just went that route,

ASRock 939Dual-SATA2 Socket 939 ULi M1695 ATX

Has both PCIe and AGP slots.

My previous rig was an Opty 170 @ 3.0Ghz, Zalman 9500, MSI K8N Neo 4 Platinum, 2Gb Corsair TWINX PC3500LL (Low Latency) DDR 438 @ 2-3-2-6. Best AMD processor I ever had. I can't offer enough praise to the Opty 170. Absolutely amazing CPU! Worth the $190.00? Without question!!!