Motherboard and Processor recomendations?

[arablizzard2413]

Anyone know of a good motherboard and processor (I don't like AMD much though). I have a Pentium III 866mhz right now and I want to get a faster processor (which requires a motherboard upgrade). I recently got a Nvidia 5900XT and I want something that has a faster AGP slot (mine is v2, and the card runs better on a v3). Integrated USB 2.0 would be nice too, but if not I have a card right now...

[rupert86]

You don't sound like a hardware geek. Anyway, I myself think an Intel Pentium 4 2.26 GHz (not the Prescott which is 2.26A GHz) coupled with a Gigabyte 8VT880-L (or the 8VT880-RZ but it sure is more expensive) would make the best cost performance ratio.

Notes:

1. Hyper-Threading is a waste of money if the application is not really tailored for multi-processor systems.

2. Intel's chipsets are far faster (and more expensive) but a very tight chipset interconnect (or interhub link) which is only 266 MB/s for 865 & 875P & their variants. This makes installation time (of std WinXPSP1a) greater by 10 mins. If you can bear it, go for the more expensive solutions by Intel.

3. This combination is an approach to the best cost-performance ratio: It will certainly not run DOOM III and the likes.

[Doggie]

to be quite honest, i'd settle for an amd athlon or above and a generic amd mobo, amd performs quite well and is cheaper

[SiMoNsAyS]

to be quite honest, i'd settle for an amd athlon or above and a generic amd mobo, amd performs quite well and is cheaper

i will choose amd too, cheaper, cooler and overclocking works better on them. 2500+ barton can be overclocked to 3400+ easy.

...but i'll not choose a generic mobo, look for a nforce2 chipset, then many usb 2.0 ports (6 at least) and next maybe sata support, many pci slots (5 at least)...

you know as more things you got, more $ you'll spend...

mine it's 3000+ and a7n8x deluxe. u can buy a 2500+ barton and a7n8x, expend the rest of bucks on a good brand (not generic) ddr400 memory.

[CoffeeFiend]

I'd go AMD too. The Athlon 64's are coming down a lot in price too...

[Drewdatrip]

If your looking for Inel you may wanna to look into the new chipset ie the 915.

It uses a 775 BGA socket rather then a 478 pin and is the wave of the furture intel line. THus it will be more upgradeable. Generally you pay alot more for the bleeding edge, but for some reason in this case the new Cpus and Mobos are either the same price or even cheaper! The only piece of hardware that is abit more expensive is the DDr2 but only by 25% or so.

Id say gofor the MSI 915p mobo and the 530 or 550 cpu

just my 2 cents

|Drew|

[Kenny McCormick]

Go with a AMD Athlon 64.

[rupert86]

Hey guys arablizzard2413 told you he didn't like AMD. I myself use AMD and know all the ways its better than Intel. Please don't force him into buying an AMD.

Again, for the best cost-performance: AMD Sempron 3100+ (socket 754) + MSI K8T-Neo (VIA K8T800).

+ it has an even better cost-performance ratio than my earlier recommendation, since AMDs generally have better cost-perf ratio.

[Ghost]

The sempron is a good one to go for, just remember that socket 754 is being scrubed so it won't be upgradable. For P4 don't go below 2.8Ghz. Its not worth it.

[arablizzard2413]

Thanks guys, I got my new setup now: Intel Pentium 4 3.2GHZ with HT Technology (which I'm using becasue my video encodeing program I use works faster with it) 512 megs of DDR ram (I wanted more but it cost too much, maybe I'll get it later...) on a Soyo SY-P4VTP Motherboard with a new 400watt power supply that has a few blue led lights. I'm really happy now! My computer is out of the stone age of 2000 and into the glorious year of 2004! It boots a lot faster now too, the oldly problem now is the light that comes from the back of my desk at night because I leave it on all the time, oh well. My Nividia GeForceFX 5900XT is running like a dream too, the speed of the newer AGP slots helps tremendously, but now I have even less PCI slots because it covers one extra slot and the mother board has 5 slots intead of 6, but I was able to take out a bunch of my "upgrade" cards som I have a little more breathing room.

Funny you should mention Gigabyte, that's what my old motherboard was, but they didn't have any at Microcenter....I liked that motherboard, it's going to find a new home as part of my web server project now. We have an AMD processor on the family computer and I hate it, it doesn't have any of the optimizations like MMX and SSE and stuff which I use for my encoding programs, so it runs too slow for my likeing.

6 USB 2.0 slots? I don't even have that many devices that use USB! I have 4 right now, I don't see why I would need more...

I have SATA, but no drives to use it :sigh:

Oh yeah, and I don't play DOOM III, but I do play The Sims 2, so I'll get hours of benefit from this!...

[rupert86]

Congrats on your new system. Its even better than what I recommended. Its cool.

But for video encoding you sure need dual DDR?

[buletov]

We have an AMD processor on the family computer and I hate it, it doesn't have any of the optimizations like MMX and SSE and stuff which I use for my encoding programs, so it runs too slow for my likeing.

what amd? 200Mhz?

C'mon, Barton @ 3200+ on Asus NForce2 chipset with 1GB of brand memory wolud probably cost you less then that Intel of yours, and the performace would be similar...except the 1GB using DualChannel would mean a LOT for multimedia work...thus it WOULD BE FASTER in the end. And Barton does support both MMX and SSE, and the newer derivations of these, with an additional support for 3Dnow technology...

but it's your loss..

[arablizzard2413]

Accually the AMD processor we have is a 1GHz and it lacks support for MMX and SSE, I would have gotten the 1 gigabyte of DDR memory (and will be at some time), but my dad didn't want to spend more for memory. Also, the AMD compatable boards at my Microcenter store were MORE expensive than my $80.00 Soyo mother board, and with the processor it would have been CHEAPER to get the Pentium 4 (which I did). This setup is already knocking the socks off my friend's AMD computer he bought and built recently, making the Intel a better decision in my eyes.

*rupert86: The guy at the store suggested DDR, so we got it.

Now all I need to do is find a way to cool down my system again, it's a lot warmer than my pentium 3

[rupert86]

I was talking abt dual-channel DDR. Its not the property of RAM, rather of the chipset. But the VIA PT800 doesn't have a dual-channel memory controller, whereas PT880 has. And both Intel's 865xx and 875P also have.

[buletov]

@arablizzard2413: yeah but what is a prize difference between p4 and amd proc?

"This setup is already knocking the socks off my friend's AMD computer he bought and built recently" -> THIS MEANS NOTHING, what are his specs?

& i was talking about asus a7n8x motherboard, zilions time better than soyo