ASUS M2N-SLI DLX nF570
AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 5200+ 2.70GHz (I can overclock to 3.00GHz with no problem)
4x1GB Patriot PC2-6400 4-4-4-12
BFG GeForce GTX 280 OC 1024MB PCI-E
Standard screen resolution is 1680x1050
Im just curious how much my CPU is bottlenecking my system and if i should upgrade to a 2.5GHz Phenom (AMD quad)
Most played games are
HL2
Crysis
Bioshock
Sup com
COD4
I'd just overclock your CPU. The only games, as far as I know, that would benefit from quad core are Crysis and Supreme Commander. The other games would actually hinder from having a slower clocked quad core because they can only utilize 2 cores anyway. The only thing that might help out is the Phenom's extra cache. I wish AMD would have kept the 2x1MB cache on their Brisbane dual cores like they had on the Windsor dual cores. I'd overclock your current CPU to minimize the CPU from bottlenecking your brand new high end GPU. Later on when most programs utilize all four cores, you'll benefit from having a slower clocked quad core compared to a higher clocked dual core. I wouldn't upgrade your CPU until you can upgrade your board to a newer chipset that supports DDR2-1066 RAM. Then I would upgrade it all. Does your board even support Phenoms? I've got the feeling that the nForce 570 chipset doesn't support Phenoms anyway.
Nice rig, Im not being funny but the only thing bottlenecking your graphics card is your AMD chip, for the money you will spend on a phenom(maybe a little more as well) you should change to the Intel C2D range, A Q6600/E8200 will beat any phenom hands down in real world performance and i cant think of a single reason why anyone would want to upgrade to AMD, The phenoms dont overclock very well and even the lowest C2D has the potential to out perform them. My advice is to bin the AMD stuff and buy a good LGA775 mobo and a C2D.
Does your board even support Phenoms? I've got the feeling that the nForce 570 chipset doesn't support Phenoms anyway.
i was a little unsure myself but according to asus's website:
supports AMD socket AM2+/AM2 for Phenom FX/Phenom/Athlon 64/ Sempron/Athlon 64 X2/ Athlon 64 FX/
Oh, I see why they say that. Your board is an AM2 socket, but AM2+ socket CPU's are backwards compatible. However, an AM2+ CPU runs at 2600Mhz FSB (5200MT/s) instead of 1000Mhz FSB (2000MT/s). If you put a Phenom in your board, it'll work, but it'll be downclocked. Don't go quad unless you upgrade your board. You can go Intel like mogwilson said, or you can stay true to yourself and tell Intel to go to Hell... with Blu-Ray, it can go to hell to.
