Phenom II 940 or 955?

[LiteBulb]

I'm putting together a new system which I'll buy in June. Keep in mind, I'm not upgrading anything. My old pc is a Dell 8300 P4, so I'm starting from scratch.

I don't know whether to go with the PII 940 or 955. The dilemma for me isn't so much price as is longevity. In terms of price, on newegg, a solid AM2+ setup is only about $60 less than a comparable AM3 setup. Should I go AM2+ mobo and 940 with ddr2 ram or go AM3 with a 955 and ddr3. Would going AM2+ hold me over for a good three years or should I go AM3?

I've read that the 955 and ddr3 don't give you much performance gain, but I don't want an AM2+ rig to become outdated. It's not like I have a rig to compare ddr3 to anyways, so whatever I get will be a tremendous boost for me!

I'm still on the fence...

 

[bonanzaguy]

If money isnt an issue I would go with the DDR3. I can't say for myself but from benchmarks I have read as well as from what other people have said on the forum there isnt really a performance difference between DDR3 and DDR2. I dont see how that would magically change in a few years so either would probably offer the same performance down the road as they do now.
However, if for some reason you decide you want to buy a new CPU that comes out in a few years it's likely that you will be able to fit it into an AM3 board, but may or may not be able to use an AM2+ board. Atleast that's what I would think.

 

[LiteBulb]

Ok thanks. I've been thinking about it more and more. I've decided to go with AM3. Even if it's not much better than an AM2+ setup, I wouldn't know because I never had an AM2+ setup! Plus, if ddr3 gets better in the future, I will be okay.

Thanks for the help.

 

[sharken]

what is your budget? and what you intend on the main use of the computer?

 

[LiteBulb]

Well I put together a wishlist on newegg. With everything the total for a AM2+ setup is about $1300, that's with the main components and a keyboard, mouse, headset, speakers, etc. Going with AM3 would only make me change my mobo, CPU, and ram, right? That change would add roughly $60, so I'm not worried about it.

I would use this for gaming mostly.

 

[sharken]

for that you can build an entire i7 system....

 

[LiteBulb]

True, but I would have to eliminate some of my other peripherals to make up the cost. That, or I would have to use the cheapest Core i7 parts around, instead of using very nice Phenom II parts.

Plus, I like supporting the little guy getting sh****ed on. And I honestly don't need an i7 rig, because I already don't really need a Phenom II rig haha!

 

[sharken]

understood

 

[medjohnson77]

if your starting from ground up on a new build, go with the phenom II 955 and AM3 for sure. Good luck with your build, hope it turns out good for you.

 

[sharken]

no its still watered down

 

[sharken]

The 940 is watered down too...

 

[bdcrlsn]

He still wants him to get an i7 setup. I can vouch for saving money on a PII system over an i7 system, and it can still do all the things that the i7 can do. (Except having 4 virtual cores )

 

[sharken]

no it cant, your in denial

 

[Wisecracker]

PhII 720BE / Gigabyte 790x AM3: $245 AR
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.182106

G.SKILL 4GB (2 x 2GB) DDR3 1600: $60
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231193



Anand: Phenom II X3 720BE & CrossFire X Performance
http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=3533&p=9

 

[xtc28]

PII 940 Does pretty good on my Gigabyte MA790X-UDP4. Actually it does better than pretty good, i7 WEED EATER to be more correct........BUT, I do have to do some serious overclocking 5.0GHz on Juice, water cooled that is. A single BFG GTX 280 does me better than my previous dual 4850's. So Ill likely switching boards soon...... HELL maybe just build an i7 or AM3..... Probabably the latter Ill support AMD till death! !!! Just got a hell of deal on a 280 and that got two other pcs running with good Video cards. Lucky me. You should hear about my other rigs...... Ill save those for later.

By the way I could build 3 really smokin PII 940 rigs for the price of 1 HOT i7 build. Then there is always Load balancing Clustering with Linux or even Windows these days. Trust me i7 users just a couple AMD PCs in my arsenal will shred you up and your little puppy dog too.

 

[xtc28]

That i7 seven really is a marvel though and my super clocker still gets too hot too fast 4.2 is stable.

 

[The Third Level]

i77! OMFG CALL THE PRESS

 

[dwaynerobertson]

I'll never buy an i7, I'll buy another intel chip when they decide to come out with 8 cores. I think that buying an i7 right now would be a serious waste of money. usb 3.0 will be coming out and a bunch of new crap like pci express 3.0 you'll have to update your system sooner than you think so why waste your money on old motherboards with "newer technology" like i7. It isn't worth the price performance ratio right now. When their motherboards drop in price they will be. Until then I'm sticking with my phenom 2 940.

 

[nss000]

PII 940 Does pretty good on my Gigabyte MA790X-UDP4. Actually it does better than pretty good, i7 WEED EATER to be more correct........BUT, I do have to do some serious overclocking 5.0GHz on Juice, water cooled that is. A single BFG GTX 280 does me better than my previous dual 4850's. So Ill likely switching boards soon...... HELL maybe just build an i7 or AM3..... Probabably the latter Ill support AMD till death! !!! Just got a hell of deal on a 280 and that got two other pcs running with good Video cards. Lucky me. You should hear about my other rigs...... Ill save those for later.

By the way I could build 3 really smokin PII 940 rigs for the price of 1 HOT i7 build. Then there is always Load balancing Clustering with Linux or even Windows these days. Trust me i7 users just a couple AMD PCs in my arsenal will shred you up and your little puppy dog too.

Gamrboy puffle for the under 15-yo crowd. When children get their butts outa crysis ( har har har ) , they discover the only big-dog barking floating-point tunes is i7.

I understand AMD-9XX cpus conceal a micro_bamboo slide_rule for serious work. Can'tcha smell the wood chips burn...

 

[Hindesite]

If you can afford the extra cost, I'd say go with the 955 and DDR3 in a heartbeat.

I actually helped two of my friends build these two setups, one obviously needing a cheaper rig then the other, and you can definately tell the difference. The 940 with DDR2 build is still fast and definatley worth the price, but the 955 is an even better price to performance ratio if you can afford it, no question.

 

[jj463rd]

One thing that I noticed is that at newegg there was a combo deal with the Phenom II x4 955 and Windows Vista Ultimate Edition (both the 32 and 64 bit versions) for $60 off.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.198025
and
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.198028
This might help on offsetting your build.

 

[witcherx]

955.... pounce on it...

 

[Guest]

Gamrboy puffle for the under 15-yo crowd. When children get their butts outa crysis ( har har har ) , they discover the only big-dog barking floating-point tunes is i7.

I understand AMD-9XX cpus conceal a micro_bamboo slide_rule for serious work. Can'tcha smell the wood chips burn...

lol ? you dont know what you are talking about and you say they are the children ? crysis is a gpu based game... you wont get more fps on i7 then on phenom II 940 or 955 unless you have a better graphic card...
you need to search more instead of talking nonsense...

 

[Helloworld_98]

^ well actually as soon as you hit two GPU's, the i7 will have an fps advantage, can't remember how much on average but any more fps in crysis is amazing.

 

[Guest]

^ well actually as soon as you hit two GPU's, the i7 will have an fps advantage, can't remember how much on average but any more fps in crysis is amazing.

well why will that be ? the 940 and 955 wont bottleneck the graphic card... so cryssi still being a gpu based game... so the limitations are the same to i7 and phenom II...