I am in the market for a new machine now, and the situation can not wait (dead CPU). I have a fairly loose budget, but am not a bleeding edge kind of fellow. What platform, at this time, has the best upgrade path? I want and easy upgrade path to the new gen/rev of processors that will be coming out soon (Penryn or Phenom).
My current (dead) setup is:
AMD X2 4200+ Manchester
nForce4 Ultra 939
nVidia 7800GT
OCZ 2GB DDR PC3200
Zalman 7500-CU
Things I do:
WoW
Supreme Commander
HL2 and derivatives
TFC (when it comes out)
Software Development (physics engine, very CPU intensive ATM)
PVR
Which, other than Supreme Commander and probably TFC is more than enough for my needs, but I can't justify fixing the current rig (buying obsolete hardware just doesn't jive with me).
Right now I am considering one of the following:
C2D E66xx or E67xx
P35/775 based board
2GB DDR2 800
Same vid
Zalman 9700
or
X2 6000+
nForce 570 or 590 AM2 board
2GB DDR2 800
Same vid
Zalman 9700
Which has the best upgrade path? Optimally, I would want to be able to do a drop in replacement of the CPU in about 6 months with a Phenom or an Intel quad of some sort. Is that possible, or am i stuck with replacing the MB and RAM again too? Do I need an AM2+ to later drop in a Phenom? Am I likely to get a board that a manufacturer will provide support for Phenom? Will Penryn likely be supported on the board above?
Also, which of the above has the best thermal and noise characteristics? I can't find any direct comparisons on the net.
If you want the best price/performance i would buy this
C2D E2160 or an E6600 if you don't know how to o/c
A-P35-DS3L
Ram: Patriot Extreme Performance 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM Same vid
Tuniq Tower 120/ or Thermalright ultra 120 extreme
You should spend about $300-$320 on this upgrade and you can easily overclock the e2160 to 3.0-3.2ghz (will smoke the x2 6000+) and you can just drop a quad core Penryn when they come out in January.
Get the Q6600 now and forget upgrading in 6months.
The Intel Chips coming up in 6months will only be a modest upgrade.
The Chips coming out in late '08 are going to be the next gen ones.
So you are better off waiting about a year for your upgrade.
The AMD's put off alot more heat than the AMD chips.
(Note: Current Mobos will accept both Phenom and Pennryn)
From a strictly "long term" point of view. Going with AMD may be the better choice.
AMD will be releasing socket AM3 CPUs in 2008 since they plan on switching over to DDR3 RAM. AM2 and AM3 are pin compatible so AM3 should last at least until 2009. I'm not sure what socket the next generation of AMD CPU will use (after Phenom). While socket AM3 CPUs can be used on socket AM2 motherboards, AM2 CPUs will not work on socket AM3 motherboards because of the lack of DDR2 support.
As for Intel, their next generation of CPUs (Nehalem - 2nd half of 2008) will require a new motherboard since Intel is changing sockets again. I think LGA775 had a 3 or 4 year run. That means Penryn CPUs will be your final upgrade path if you build a system around the Core 2 Duo right now.
As for performance, I think Intel's continuing line of Core 2 Duos will outperform AMD's Phenom CPUs especially since the initial Phenoms are having some manufacturing problems which is why they will be "Tri-Core" CPUs until AMD can improve their manufacturing process.
Hypothetically speaking, if you want to upgrade a PC you build today in late 2009 then you should be able to do so if you go down the AMD path. You should be able to drop in any socket AM3 CPU into a current generation socket AM2 motherboard. you will only lack support for DDR3. At this point in time DDR3 doesn't really offer much improvements over DDR2, the that should change by 2009.
Upgrading an Intel platform in 2009 means you will be stuck with a Penryn CPU. That's not inherently bad, but whatever new generation of CPU AMD releases in 2009 (if they release one) may outperform the Penryn.
I intend on upgrading my PC when Penryn is released next year, but if I see some preliminary benchmarks of Nehalem's performance, then I'll probably wait for Nehalem.
I agree with jaguarskx, that going with AMD will be more suitable for you in "long terms". The future AM3 CPU can easily drop into current AM2 Motherboards (if AMD keeps their promise). However, if you want gaming performance, Phenom will likely not live up to the hype. Since it is a server chip, it is designed to handle server applications, but not desktop applications. If you only game, Core 2 will be your best bet.
As a result, I would suggest you going with P35 board, and an E6x50 CPUs. E6x50s are less expensive than their E6x00 counterparts, and run at the same speed. If you're not into OCing, you should seriously consider E6x50 series.
If you want to use this PC for the next 3~4 years, you can easily upgrade your computer to Penryn, which will be relatively cheaper by then. However, because Intel's newer generation CPU codenamed Nehalem will come out in 2H08, and they feature a complete different socket, you will not be able to upgrade to 8 cores.
It all comes back to whether the gaming softwares will greatly take advantage of multi-core by 2009. Chances are games won't be fully optimized for multi-core by then, so having a quad-core system should still be relatively safe. I'm sure having a 3.4~3.6Ghz quad core processor can still hold its place in terms of performance.
I know I'm getting a little wordy here, but I promise this is my last point . Pouring your money into graphic cards will be better off than pouring money into processors. You'll have a better gaming experience.
Abit IP35 Pro
C2D E6750 (don't care to overclock, would rather not deal with the issues)
2x1GB DDR2 800 4-4-4-12
430W ATX12V 2.0
Zalman 9500 (I like a quiet box, plus might OC the chip once it's past its prime in performance)
I don't care to overclock, so I went with the 6750. It's dirt cheap comparatively though, since I bought the 4200+ for $400 and the E6750 today is only $200, lol.
I'm not much of a 3d gamer, so my 7800GT is doing just fine for me right now. The E6750 should greatly improve my Supreme Commander performance, which is my only real performance issue with my current rig.
get the p35 forget the amd fanatics - if that is not the lamest amd argument - i have heard yet
the new intel chips in 08 will last 5 years with 4 fast cores
skip the abit go for asus p5k- e wifi
overclock is the only way to go - if you can not bare to do it yourself the mobo has auto oc
Not everyone wants to touch overclocking. Whether its because they have no experience, don't want to risk their processors, or simply don't have the equipment to do it, you have to respect their choice.
Please don't associate Core 2 with overclocking. I know they overclock very, very well, but that doesn't mean everyone who gets a Core 2 should overclock.
Abit IP35 Pro
C2D E6750 (don't care to overclock, would rather not deal with the issues)
2x1GB DDR2 800 4-4-4-12
430W ATX12V 2.0
Zalman 9500 (I like a quiet box, plus might OC the chip once it's past its prime in performance)
I don't care to overclock, so I went with the 6750. It's dirt cheap comparatively though, since I bought the 4200+ for $400 and the E6750 today is only $200, lol.
I'm not much of a 3d gamer, so my 7800GT is doing just fine for me right now. The E6750 should greatly improve my Supreme Commander performance, which is my only real performance issue with my current rig.
Thanks for the thoughts!
I'm hoping that your 430w PSU is of decent quality? If you buying this with your other parts, we can help suggest some decent PSU's, if you don't already own it. Did you have a budget for all of your parts?
I was comparing the architecture of Phenom and Core 2. I apologize if my wording caused confusion.
Phenom is a derivation of the server chip Barcelona, so its architecture is more suitable for server applications, like heavy floating point math, and scalability.
In desktop environment, you rarely need scalability (unless you want to be FASN8ed), floating point math, and fast interconnect.
On the other hand, Core 2 is designed from Mobile, so its a lot more relevant to everyday computing, including gaming.
This is why you see Core 2 trouncing Phenom in game FPS, and load speed.
errr no phenom gaming specs have been released, if you can post links i would like to see them. only benchies that have been released have been barcelona bench's in games, and barcelona is the server chip, on a server motherboard with ECC ram at 667.....phenom will be better for gaming then barcelona consider it will have htt3.0 and ddr800/ddr 1066 (standard memory not server memory) that and from what ive read, k10 will be very similar if not better to penryn clock for clock. do your research dont compair apples and oranges(server to consumer) chips. as soon at we get some phenom benchs we'll see how it stacks up with penryn(imo i think it will be as good clock for clock as penryn maybe a little less) also k10 has samples running at 3.7ghz so later revisions of the silicone will render much higher clocks, and hopefully great oc's :-D. im not a fanboy just want to get the facts straight. if i am wrong in any of this info send me a link to where it says im wrong and i will admit im wrong(we all make mistakes) id say if you want upgradeability, go with an AMD setup, if you want the best system now, go with intel. its the end of the line in mid 08 though because of the socket change and intels IMC with quickpath, then things should get interesting :-D. i just realised how much i just typed and im going to shut up now.
if i had any idea what site i read that on i would post it but i do rember reading that(im fairly sure i didnt dream it up....) ill look around i visit so many sites its hard to keep track of what i read where, but im preatty sure phenom will be launching on B3 or B2 revision. ill be sure to look around tonight for where i read all this.
Yes, now, if you had to choose between an AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+ Toledo 2.2GHz 2 x 512KB L2 Cache or an AMD Opteron 165 Denmark 1.8GHz 2 x 1MB L2 Cache for video encoding purposes, logic would seem to dictate the Opteron, right?
errr no phenom gaming specs have been released, if you can post links i would like to see them. only benchies that have been released have been barcelona bench's in games, and barcelona is the server chip, on a server motherboard with ECC ram at 667.....
Correct. The other "demo" we saw was at AMD's Analysis Day, which was a 3.0Ghz Phenom running Stranglehold w/ Tri-fire. There's no clear way to judge the performance of the rig.
Quote :
phenom will be better for gaming then barcelona consider it will have htt3.0 and ddr800/ddr 1066 (standard memory not server memory) that and from what ive read, k10 will be very similar if not better to penryn clock for clock.
Ok, wrong, and wrong. Phenom will indeed have HT3.0, but it will not benefit in gaming. If bandwidth is so important to gaming, why is Intel's Core 2 trouncing K8, when FSB is clearly inferior than HT?
Secondly, according to Anandtech, K10 only has about 15% IPC improvement over K8, which is still another 15~20% short of Core 2. Penryn is about 5~10% superior than Core 2 in IPC. You do the math.
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In other words, how much faster can we expect Phenom to be vs. the Athlon 64 X2? To put it succinctly, it looks like around 15% clock for clock
do your research dont compair apples and oranges(server to consumer) chips. as soon at we get some phenom benchs we'll see how it stacks up with penryn(imo i think it will be as good clock for clock as penryn maybe a little less)
I would say, with all due respect, I did a lot more research than you do. True, I shouldn't compare apples to oranges, but it is pretty clear that K10 will not dethrone Core 2 architecture in terms of performance. Penryn will extend that. On the other hand, with Phenom completely NDAed, we can only derive Phenom's performance from Barcelona, since they share the exact same core, just different package. HT3 will not save Phenom. DDR2 800 will likely slightly improve Phenom's performance, but not to a substantiate degree. AMD's memory divider has been known for its inability to completely accommodate RAMs at different speed. Hence, using DDR2-800 will benefit in some cases, but not all cases.
Image courtesy of George Ou from blogs.zdnets.com/Ou
As a result, you won't see a fixed improvement with DDR2-800. Phenom's only chance is clockspeed, which with AMD's 65nm yield at 30%, I really don't see it happening.
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also k10 has samples running at 3.7ghz so later revisions of the silicone will render much higher clocks, and hopefully great oc's :-D.
This sentence basically tells me that you've done NO research at all. Where is the demo that showed K10 running at 3.7ghz? What is the system specification? What is the methodology?
The highest clocked K10 was allegedly presented at AMD's Analysis Day, which is 3.0Ghz. However, no one was allowed to run any benchmarks, or view the device manager, or leave the game demo. The "3.0Ghz" was from a screenshot taken by AMD, BEFORE the Analysis Day, that was distributed to the media.
In other words, no one can verify the validity of 3.0Ghz. If we exclude that one, the highest clocked Barcelona is at 2.5Ghz, which was done by Anand.
Quote :
im not a fanboy just want to get the facts straight. if i am wrong in any of this info send me a link to where it says im wrong and i will admit im wrong(we all make mistakes).
How about, put a link up whenever you make a claim to back it up? You just made a bunch of claims that no one can back up, including you. e.g. 3.7Ghz Phenom.
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id say if you want upgradeability, go with an AMD setup, if you want the best system now, go with intel. its the end of the line in mid 08 though because of the socket change and intels IMC with quickpath, then things should get interesting :-D. i just realised how much i just typed and im going to shut up now.
I agree with you, only if you want strictly upgradeability. If you want performance AND upgradeability, Intel is much more suitable for you. True, you will be able to drop AM3 processor into AM2 sockets, but that's will disable some features. In terms of performance, Phenom will likely not be able to compete with Core 2 clock-for-clock. As a result, if you purchase a P35 board, you can drop in Penryn later, which will likely to last you through 2010. As Penryn's speed increase, you'll get much better performance than Phenom.
Message edited by yomamafor1 on 10-01-2007 at 08:41:41 PM
. Pouring your money into graphic cards will be better off than pouring money into processors. You'll have a better gaming experience.
but i do rember reading that(im fairly sure i didnt dream it up....) ill look around i visit so many sites its hard to keep track of what i read where, but im preatty sure phenom will be launching on B3 or B2 revision. ill be sure to look around tonight for where i read all this. 
. some 170's have been seen at 3.0+ on air.
