Is it possible to upgrade a P4 640 to dual core?

[Eleazaros]

Hello,

I have an old dell with a Pentium 4 640 processor in it.

I was wondering if it was possible to upgrade the CPU to a dual-core to extend its life a bit more.

 

[Deleted member 217926]

Probably not but we need to know what motherboard it is to tell you for sure. If so probably only a Pentium D,

 

[Eleazaros]

Probably not but we need to know what motherboard it is to tell you for sure. If so probably only a Pentium D,

Quick reply - thank you very much.

The machine is the Dell Gen 4 XPS. The motherboard has the Intel 925X or 925XE Express chipset.

Is this enough?

 

[Deleted member 217926]

You may actually get a Pentium D to work then. I would save your money for a complete upgrade. For ~$500 you can build a complete AMD machine that would blow what you have now away.

 

[Eleazaros]

Yeah I'm planning on another new machine. I just wanted to extend this one a bit more. The CPU I was looking at is only about $40 - thus the question.

I don't think I'll get any more "proprietary" style systems like this again. outside of plugging in a replacement video, a little more ram and the like... The box won't hold other motherboards, etc.

 

[Deleted member 217926]

You need to find the exact model of your board. Then you can tell if the BIOS will handle a Pentium D.

 

[saaiello]

Download CPU-Z from www.CPUID.com this will tell you what motherboard is in your computer.

 

[Hellboy]

Download CPU-Z from www.CPUID.com this will tell you what motherboard is in your computer.

its a Dell at the end of the day... there not really into being upgraded by much

I would suggest he/she trawls the internet for a cheap board/case/processor bundle - the time and effort on this alone is not worth the agro..

 

[saaiello]

It never hurts to check, but you are right new motherboard is most likely needed for anything worth it.

 

[1965ohio]

I wouldn't consider going from a P4 640 3.2GHz with HT to a Pentium D anyways... the money you waste on a second hand Pentium D, even if it's only $20... could be better spent on RAM or cooling for a new build later. Pentium D is just 2 Pentium 4 chips stuck together and they still communicate with each other at the system FSB.

So it won't be much faster clock for clock unless you would get the highest Pentium D... in that case would also need to upgrade your CPU cooler cause putting 2 Pentium 4 chips together in one case only makes heat go up.

Your chipset does not support Core 2 chips. They have both cores and 1 die and really are worth the money... but your system won't handle it and buying a new Core 2 system now is already out of date.

Save up a little dough and go with an Athlon x2 or x3 setup with 4 gigs of RAM. If your P4 is good enough for your currently daily tasks, just keep saving money for that future build. And if you know a little about system building, then don't go OEM next time. Then you do it yourself, you have more control and more possibilities for future upgrades!

 

[megamanx00]

You should be able to, but it just depends on your Motherboard as to what you can get. You already have a Prescott P4 CPU with 2MB of RAM and Hyper Threading. A true dual core will certainly preform better in multithreaded apps but the improvement may not be that great and would still be slow by today's standards (you're talking about 6 yr old tech after all.) If your board allows you to support the older Core 2 Duos get one of those. If not, then find out the best it does support and see what you can snag on eBay.

If your board supports the 1066FSB (which would make it the 925XE), then the best Pentiums you can get are the dual core EE editions. There is the 840, 955, and 965. They have 4 threads since they are dual cores with hyperthreading. The 925X boards are limited to an 800FSB and DDR2 533.

 

[Eleazaros]

Best answer selected by Eleazaros.