Opteron or Athlon 64 X2 ??

[blashyrkh]

Hello everyone, I need your advise on a matter that has been bugging me.
I have an Asus A8N-SLI mobo with an athlon 3800+ single core. I'm thinking about updating my CPU. The socket is 939 so I dont have many options but at least prices have dropped.
I'm thinking about going for an Athlon 64 X2 4400+. I believe I'll gain about 30-35% raw performance dont you think? But lately I noticed that Opterons have gone cheap for 939 socket.
First of all, I'm not absolutely sure if my board supports Opterons. Does it?
Second, are opterons only for servers? can i have stardard WinXP or Vista running with no compatibility issues?
Third, which one is faster?? Opterons seem to be more advanced.
Also, I have PC2700 ram (1GB). I wont have any problems with either CPU, will I? (Except probably performance loss over faster memory.)

I would like to see what you guys think.

Thank you in advance for your help.

PS. If you could give me any sites where I can buy 939 CPU's, it would be great! TY

 

[Craxbax]

First, any s939 dual core Opty should work fine in your board.
Second, you really should list what your main uses will be, will you be OCing, and your budget. Also the complete specs for your present system are important to list so people can make the best recommendations for your needs.
Third, since you will also need ram to maximize your upgrade you may consider moving up to AM2 or C2D. With the current prices for s939 RAM and the poor availability of s939 processors, you may almost be able to buy AM2 cpu/ram/and MB for the close to the same price as just s939 cpu/ram. Plus you will have a much greater choice of CPUs to choose from.

 

[blashyrkh]

Ok, as I mentioned already, I have an Asus A8N-SLI with an AMD 3800+.
I have 1 GB of ram PC2700 (no name but not totally bad), also an Nvidia 7900GTX and one Raptor 160GB and a WD 500Gb. I want it for games mostly. Unfortunatelly my finances are very bad atm so i'm trying the cheapest solutions. Would my board support DDR2-800 if I upgrade the CPU or I'm just daydreaming here?
Forget about AM2 for now please. Of the 2 CPU's I have in mind, which one is better performance and money wise? Don't want to spend a lot in this system because i'll probably get a new system in about 9 months when the new Cpu's and GPU's come out.

thank you

 

[Craxbax]

No, your MB uses DDR not DDR2. You may not want to here this but if it is mostly for gaming I would suggest you just increase your ram to 2gb and OC the cpu for the cheapest solution. Your 3800+ is more than adequate for most games out (as is your GTX.) If you are going to upgrade in 9 months and money is an issue then save up for better components instead of attempting a temporary fix that won't yield big improvements in games.

 

[Cybercraig]

Well you can get a 170 OPty at the moment for $115.00US. You'll get the large heatpipe cooler with it too. Memory speed is not as important to AMD as Intel. You could still use a divider and clock up the OPty to 2.5ghz or so. Mine runs at 2.66. If you don't overclock then don't spend the money. You won't notice any performance gains in games over your 3800.

 

[f61]

But on the other hand:

Any of these Memory Chips will do excellent if you can take PC3200.

about $US150 MINUS rebate at the egg.

However, you could spend zero dollars and just wait the 9 months, and get $100-$150 MORE of what you need to upgrade. In 9 months a P35 board/E6750 CPU/2x1Gb 667MHz will be ridiculously cheap, and the best board will be indicated. From here, the sky's the limit on CPU and o/c.

f61

 

[ethel]

You should try overclocking your 3800+ first to see how far it will go - if you can get it to 2.4GHz or more there is very little point in upgrading.

 

[blashyrkh]

Hey ethel, the athlon 3800+ is operating at 2,4GHz normally. Any ideas about how far I can push it in OC?

 

[mitch074]

Not much higher - I'd say 2.6 - 2.8 GHz, with good cooling.

You would get better results from extra RAM (if you have a single 1 Gb stick, another one would enable dual channel - if not, then extra RAM can't hurt anyway)

Athlons are extremely dependent on RAM access speed; as such, higher RAM clock speeds help some, lower settings (2-3-3-8 instead of 4-4-4-12, for example, at DDR400 speed) would help some.

s939 with good quality RAM and an overclock have nothing to fear from an AM2 setup. My advice: get two sticks of fast (3-3-3-8) DDR400 and a good cooler, and fine-tune your system.

 

[rammedstein]

get an opty 165 and take th ihs off it and oc it.

 

[ethel]

Hey ethel, the athlon 3800+ is operating at 2,4GHz normally. Any ideas about how far I can push it in OC?

I'm sure the 3800+ runs at 2.0GHz stock speed. If you've already got it to 2.4GHz, then the only meaningful upgrade would be to a Core 2 Duo and overclock that to 3GHz+.

If you're lucky you'll be able to get your 3800+ to 2.6/2.8GHz. Maybe up the voltage a little and see how she flies.

I'm running an Opteron 165 @ 2.7GHz and I see absolutely no need to consider upgrading that for the foreseeable future.

 

[mitch074]

no - the single core K8 runs at 2.4 GHz (it's the X2 3800+ that runs at 2.0 GHz, the single-core 2.0 GHz K8 is the 3200+).
I don't think you can push this past 2.8 GHz with good cooling, a good mobo and lotsa luck.

 

[lcdguy]

1. an opteron will work in that board i have a opteron 165 running quite nicely in my a8n32-sli

2. i would bump up your ram to around 2gb, it will help.

3. if you really are looking at doing a major upgrade in 9 months save your pennies now and wait. your upgrade will be that much better.

 

[fx51]

Go with the / Opteron 185

 

[utaka95]

That ram is the biggest anchor in your system, A little searching will turn up 2 gigs of ddr 400 for a little more than $100. I upgraded a 2.4 gig 3800 to 4600 x2 last year and it made NO difference in gaming. Video editing on the other hand....

 

[jonisginger]

Well you can get a 170 OPty at the moment for $115.00US. You'll get the large heatpipe cooler with it too. Memory speed is not as important to AMD as Intel. You could still use a divider and clock up the OPty to 2.5ghz or so. Mine runs at 2.66. If you don't overclock then don't spend the money. You won't notice any performance gains in games over your 3800.

I think that memory latency and speed are extremely sensitive on AMDs due to the inbuilt memory controller. May be wrong though...

 

[nh484000]

With an AMD CPU RAM speed and timinf greatly effect preformance.

You CPU runs at 2.4 GHZ and has 1 MB of chache. With the stock cooler you should be able to hit 2.5 ish with out a problem. Those 3800+ can oc to 2.8 ish with aftermarket cooling i believe, and you have a great board for OC.

For the best speed, however, You should change your ram to DDR400. The downside to this is that it is already "the old standard" and you are basically throwing money away. If you are going to keep your computer for another 9 months and JUST gaming i would keep your current CPU oc a little maybe get some new ram... maybe?

Then in 9 months get a whole new system with ddr2 or maybe ddr3 memory. Keep the HDS, Case, GPU and ebay the rest, and upgrade to a new cpu and mobo.

Hope this helps

 

[ethel]

no - the single core K8 runs at 2.4 GHz (it's the X2 3800+ that runs at 2.0 GHz, the single-core 2.0 GHz K8 is the 3200+).
I don't think you can push this past 2.8 GHz with good cooling, a good mobo and lotsa luck.

Oops, somehow missed 'single core' in the OP's post

In which case, as others have said get an Opteron 170 and overclock it. You can't go wrong with these - you're virtually guaranteed 2.7GHz, you'll have two cores, and they are cheap as chips.

 

[mirceaizvoran]

hi there.

First we would like to know if u are willing to overclock....if yes the opteron would be the best choice. But above all, the Opteron is the best -(2*1 MB cache) (4400+x2 - 2*512 k cache)

 

[Cybercraig]

Yup, you're wrong! With the memory controller on-die AMD is faster than Intel accessing with the same speed memory.

 

[frankienyc123]

s939 and ddr are pretty much dead, it doesnt pay to put muvh money nto a s939 system. A decnt cpu and 2gigs of ddr are going to cost you almost $300. In a few weeks the cpus will drop in price again ad for $300-$350 youll be able to get a nice Am2 or c2d system that will easily outperform your current system. You could even sell your cpu and mobo to get back some of your money.
AM2 System
GIGABYTE GA-M57SLI-S4 $99 (newegg)
2x1gig Crucial Ballistix pc6400 $114 - $40MIR=$69 (newegg)
AMD 5400x2 2.8ghz $155 (newegg)

TOTAL $323

With a system like that your gaining a second core, 400mhz higher clock speed and double the memory at nearly double the speed for roughly what it would cost you to buy an Opteron170 and 2gigs of ddr which still wont perform as good unless you can overclock it to 2.8ghz. If your interested in overclocking you could put together a similar Intel based system usng an e6300 or e6420 either of which can reach 3ghz with not much trouble.

 

[boner]

dude just stick with the Athlon 3800+ and overclock it and for the memory part, what OS do you have and what games are you gonna run in your pc because you can overclock your video car(just a little bit and you'll see some gain performance) no but seriously, reply to my messages in what's your OS and what games are you gonna get

 

[blashyrkh]

Thanks a lot guys. It seems that it would be better if I kept my CPU and got some RAM maybe rather than a new CPU. I'll just keep my money for an upgrade. I do intend to do some overclocking on the CPU but unfortunatelly, my card is made by NVidia for DELL and the clock frequencies appear to be locked! Damn you Dell!! (Well, it was free but still...). BTW anyone knows if it's possible to unlock the card with bios update or some other software?

 

[ZOldDude]

see next post...big edit.

 

[ZOldDude]

Hello everyone, I need your advise on a matter that has been bugging me.
I have an Asus A8N-SLI mobo with an athlon 3800+ single core. I'm thinking about updating my CPU. The socket is 939 so I dont have many options but at least prices have dropped.
I'm thinking about going for an Athlon 64 X2 4400+. I believe I'll gain about 30-35% raw performance dont you think? But lately I noticed that Opterons have gone cheap for 939 socket.
First of all, I'm not absolutely sure if my board supports Opterons. Does it?
Second, are opterons only for servers? can i have stardard WinXP or Vista running with no compatibility issues?
Third, which one is faster?? Opterons seem to be more advanced.
Also, I have PC2700 ram (1GB). I wont have any problems with either CPU, will I? (Except probably performance loss over faster memory.)

I would like to see what you guys think.

Thank you in advance for your help.

PS. If you could give me any sites where I can buy 939 CPU's, it would be great! TY

July 2nd I put an Optron 180 and some Muskin Redline DDR1-500 (could not find G.Skill DDR1-500 2 X 1GB) onto a crappy Asus A8N-E MB and @ all stock volts had it doing 3Ghz 1:1 stable with a "lite" 25% OC.
The guy had a cheap P.O.S. Ultra PSU and so I did not bother to tweek the system.

Depending on if 1 or 2 cores and model # I have no problem getting Optrons either 1Ghz or 50% OC on stock volts with a good PSU (PC Power & Cooling).

On my DFI Expert MB's I have no problem running Optron 146/148 at a full 50% OC on stock volts.

OEM price for an Optron 146 is like $40 now.

Run you CPU on a ratio if you have "slow" ram....with 25-50% more CPU clocks ram means nothing (I use fast ram however for the 1:1 effect).

Socket 939 FTW!