about to upgrade pc, considering a head full of crazy options!....(dont know what I'm doing really) would appreciate a bit of guidance.
Dont really understand all these MHz, GHz business but could someone tell me if buying a E6400 core 2 duo over and AMD x2 3800 significantly reduce the time taken to render home videos into dvds.
I currently run a celeron 1800 with only 512 ddr and it takes me ages (about 2.5hrs to render just a half hour video) embarrassing I know. Also, to what extent would using memory lower than ddr800 affect the 3800+
Appreciate the reply but I was looking at the bench mark using pinnacle studio 9 cos thats what I use andthat shows diff of only 13secs. The pricedifference between the two cpus is around £50. I render occasionally and dont have time for games.
What worries me is previous comments that the 3800 is no good without ddr2800. I'm a bit strapped for cash at the moment and was wondering if i used the lower spec of memory would the performance be drastically reduced. If so, i probably would go for the core 2 duo.
Appreciate the reply but I was looking at the bench mark using pinnacle studio 9 cos thats what I use andthat shows diff of only 13secs. The pricedifference between the two cpus is around £50. I render occasionally and dont have time for games.
What worries me is previous comments that the 3800 is no good without ddr2800. I'm a bit strapped for cash at the moment and was wondering if i used the lower spec of memory would the performance be drastically reduced. If so, i probably would go for the core 2 duo.
Yes, and those benches used the DDR2800 for both CPUs. The 3800 isnt "no good" without the PC6400 ram. Its still a fine low end CPU, but it does lose 15~20% performance, or about 1/5~1/6 vs 2~5% for the C2Ds
Personally, I would be more worried about the future of socket AM2. If you want to keep a viable upgradable mobo longer, 775 is a better choice right now. AM2+ chips are supposed (at this moment in time) plug into AM2 boards, but you wont get he full benefit of an AM2+ CPU in an AM2 board. 775 CPUs are going to be around for awhile
Here is the link to the tests showing the latency issues.
Link to Anands memory comparisons courtesy of Epsilon84 Also go to the end of the test. They compare a C2D and AM2 clocked at the same freq, using the same RAM, i.e. they "equalized" the systems. The C2D still outperforms the AM2 by a healthy margin.
With ram prices right now, less will get you more with C2D, unless you want to overclock, in which case you will have to buy one of the costlier mobos
what would be helpful to know is given that I dont play games but would be doing a lot of video rendering on pinnacle/adobe, would it be worthwhile forking out on an expensive graphics card. I guess what i'm asking is if video rendering is cpu intensive or gpu intensive. I'm not too bothered of how the video looks on my PC. Would it be better buying more memory?
I'm sorry if all this sounds a bit novice but I guess thats what I am.
Right now, rendering is CPU based (this may change in the future, as GPUs become more advanced and programmable - but for now, it's CPU based).
Here is the benchmark using Pinnacle, and you can see that the E6400 has about a one minute lead with only a tiny (41 MB) file.
Your best bet is the E6400 with as much RAM as you can afford. Or, you could get an E6300 and use the savings to buy faster RAM, and overclock it to beyond the E6400's performance.
Right now, rendering is CPU based (this may change in the future, as GPUs become more advanced and programmable - but for now, it's CPU based).
Here is the benchmark using Pinnacle, and you can see that the E6400 has about a one minute lead with only a tiny (41 MB) file.
Your best bet is the E6400 with as much RAM as you can afford. Or, you could get an E6300 and use the savings to buy faster RAM, and overclock it to beyond the E6400's performance.
That's a Single Core you tard
This is what a Dual-Core Performs like this
Stop giving wrong benchmarks, its only a 13 second Lead.
My bad. You're correct. The OP mentioned Pinnacle, and I knew Tom's used it in one of the benchmarks, and just brought up the chart using the chips as used earlier. I should've caught that, but I looked at the DDR2-800 rather than the X2 - forgot that AMD still made single cores that used DDR2.
OP -> Use YO_KID37's revised chart, as he is correct in this.
Here is the link to the tests showing the latency issues.
Link to Anands memory comparisons courtesy of Epsilon84 Also go to the end of the test. They compare a C2D and AM2 clocked at the same freq, using the same RAM, i.e. they "equalized" the systems. The C2D still outperforms the AM2 by a healthy margin.
With ram prices right now, less will get you more with C2D, unless you want to overclock, in which case you will have to buy one of the costlier mobos
I've decided on an c2d e6400 together with an MSI P965 plat mobo.
Now I'm stuck on memory. Bearing in mind that my aim is to overclock to around 3.1 ghz(when i've leant how!) and can afford only a gig of ram at the moment would it make sense to buy 2x 512ddr2 and run it dual rather than 1x 1gig. I can easily offload the two 512ddr2 when i can afford 2 gigs.
Furthermore, I've read somewhere tht turpit suggested that pc2 4200 would be better than pc2 5300 as the latter would slow the system down. Would this be the case for my scenario as the price for the two types of value ram are very similar, unless i'm mistaken.
Please feel free to correct my decision if I'm going astray. Many thanks
Here is the link to the tests showing the latency issues.
Link to Anands memory comparisons courtesy of Epsilon84 Also go to the end of the test. They compare a C2D and AM2 clocked at the same freq, using the same RAM, i.e. they "equalized" the systems. The C2D still outperforms the AM2 by a healthy margin.
With ram prices right now, less will get you more with C2D, unless you want to overclock, in which case you will have to buy one of the costlier mobos
I've decided on an c2d e6400 together with an MSI P965 plat mobo.
Now I'm stuck on memory. Bearing in mind that my aim is to overclock to around 3.1 ghz(when i've leant how!) and can afford only a gig of ram at the moment would it make sense to buy 2x 512ddr2 and run it dual rather than 1x 1gig. I can easily offload the two 512ddr2 when i can afford 2 gigs.
Furthermore, I've read somewhere tht turpit suggested that pc2 4200 would be better than pc2 5300 as the latter would slow the system down. Would this be the case for my scenario as the price for the two types of value ram are very similar, unless i'm mistaken.
Please feel free to correct my decision if I'm going astray. Many thanks
Careful, its not the speed (freq) of the ram but loose latency timings that will adversely affect it.
AMD AM2 CPUs are much more sensitive to performance variations from loose timing than C2Ds are, as based on results from Anands testing.
Moot point for you though. For overclocking, you should be buying the best ram you can afford. 2x512mb is good,( better than 1x1GB) but get the quality stuff.
See Wusys C2D overclocking guide in the CPU overclocking section. Wusy did an outstanding job putting it together and it provides far greater expertise than I can.
In fact, if money is really tight, and you are absolutely sure you are going to overclock, I would go with a 6300 and use the extra cash to buy the best ram you can in 667, 800 if you can swing it though. Overclocking changes everything in terms of how to invest your cash
Why cant life be a bit simpler. Sometimes I envy those who just go out and buy on the spur of the moment. Many seem quite happy. I noticed JumpingJack et al talking about ignorance in another thread somewhere; there are others who would argue ignorance is bliss.....
It doesn't help when I dont fully understand this latency stuff. oh well, guess its back to more research. Don't know where I'd be without the help of members in this forum though. You guys are great!
One of the links provided in this FAQ is to a Corsair web presentation, a slide-show with audio called Memory Basics. As these things go, it doesn't suck and may also be of help to you. And it's probably the only chance you'll get in your life to hear a woman talk to you with almost breathless excitement about "Memory Latency" and "Serial Presence Detect".
(Edited to correct errors) Since you want to overclock you may want to go with DDR2-800. Then you would be guaranteed that if you set the FSB to 400 the memory will be able to keep up. But there's no universal rule. Lots of other folks also go with DDR2-667 to save some money. That way they are still guaranteed at least FSB 333 and, in fact, can often go higher than that by overclocking the DRAM as well as the CPU.
Finally, FWIW, if you can only afford 1GB then going with 2x512MB is probably better than 1x 1GB. That way you can get the performance advantage of running your memory dual channel.
One of the links provided in this FAQ is to a Corsair web presentation, a slide-show with audio called Memory Basics. As these things go, it doesn't suck and may also be of help to you. And it's probably the only chance you'll get in your life to hear a woman talk to you with almost breathless excitement about "Memory Latency" and "Serial Presence Detect".
Since you want to overclock you may want to go with DDR2-400. Then you would be guaranteed that if you set the FSB to 400 the memory will be able to keep up. But there's no universal rule. Lots of other folks also go with DDR-667 to save some money. That way they are still guaranteed at least FSB 333 and, in fact, can often go higher than that by overclocking the DRAM as well as the CPU.
Finally, FWIW, if you can only afford 1GB then going with 2x512MB is probably better than 1x 1GB. That way you can get the performance advantage of running your memory dual channel.
-john, the redundant legacy dinosaur.
Just pointing out that you probably meant DDR2-800. DDR2-400 runs 1:1 with the FSB at 200MHz.
Why cant life be a bit simpler. Sometimes I envy those who just go out and buy on the spur of the moment. Many seem quite happy. I noticed JumpingJack et al talking about ignorance in another thread somewhere; there are others who would argue ignorance is bliss.....
It doesn't help when I dont fully understand this latency stuff. oh well, guess its back to more research. Don't know where I'd be without the help of members in this forum though. You guys are great!
OK,
higher freq ram is faster ie 800>677>533. Assuming they are all of equivelent quality.
However, if you take a lower quality ram, say in 677, its latency can have a negative enough impact to make overall system performance lower than high quality 533.
What is latency?
First, with RAM, you will see people refer to latency by 3 names:
Latency
CAS
CAS Latency
They all mean he same thing. The proper term is CAS Latency and stands for Column Access Strobe(or Select) Latency.
But what is it? It is the clock cycle delay between the request for data (stored in the ram) and the action to access the data. In short, higher is worse because it means more time is spent before the data is accessed.
Heres is a very good article on it. The article is a bit older, but still applicable. NOTE: The testes were performed using 939 athons which were much less sensative to loose timings and higher latencies
Stop giving wrong benchmarks, its only a 13 second Lead.
