I'm convinced from the last two weekends its time to upgrade hardware, or at least my CPU/Motherboard. I need to get two sets of these at the same time. I went to pricewatch.com and the cpu selections available now are just confusing as hell. NewEgg wasn't any easier, too many selections for an uninformed user.
I need suggestions for cpu's and moto's that will use DDR2 ram since I have 4 gigs of that handy. Any links to combo setups and what to look for in cpu's will be much appreciated.
Lexx DDR2 RAM is still what is mainly used. DDR3 is out but not wide spread at all yet. The good news is even if your DDR2 RAM is slow, like Atomm said, you can get it real cheap these days. 2 GB for under $100.
I would get a Duo 2 Core processor at 1.8 or above. A good Asus MB. Get PCI-E and I can give you the video cards.
Ok, grabbed that util and ran it. I have pc3200, 200mhz, cas 3.0, ddr dual.
Question, can I not just look for a gigabyte board that uses pc3200 ram and a dualcore amd/intel chip?
Usually I prefer to look for cpu/moto sets just so it comes in one shipment. Also I have to buy two sets, so a couple of hundred less on ram would help alot.
Just FYI that is DDR ram not DDR2. I don't think you can get an intel core 2 duo with DDR, I may be wrong. I think you are 100% correct Lexx, look for a board with DDR 3200 ram and the type of Proc you want. I have always likes Gigabytes, I used to be an Asus only guy, but then they got less reliable and have zero support.
I found everything on Egghead, ram for $60, giga moto for $80, am2 cpu 2.4 for $90. Add fan and it totaled $230'ish. I had it ready for checkout before I checked my acct. Wifey spent to much on clothes this week, so I have to xfer funds first.
Moto has onboard 6100 video, wonder if thats good enough for a kid that wants to play only Halo2 and UT3?
Moto has onboard 6100 video, wonder if thats good enough for a kid that wants to play only Halo2 and UT3?
Onboard video is never good for gaming. You are getting the lowest video and sound with the built in stuff, that is why it is so cheap. I can get you video cards man... Is this for the son? If so you already know I have one for him as long as the MB is PCI-E.
Yah, I see that, but according to that article, they are recommending all lower end cards and telling you to disable the onboard video and install the 8800. I didnt' want the microATX board because of only 2PCI slots, so I think the one I picked will be just as good, according to the article. I'm also thinking of getting one micro board and giving that to my kid in a micro case I have in stock that is still brand new.
The HDMI version looked good, but lacks a legacy serial port, bad thing to miss for me.
Paladin, what pci e slot cards do you have? x1 or x16??
I want to order this by Fri. I have like two dozen tabs open in FF 🙂
Oh and for what its worth, I had no idea the lower rez you run the harder the processor works. Seems like I haven't been using my video cards power since I bought it. I'm going to try some higher rez's this weekend.
lexx wrote: The HDMI version looked good, but lacks a legacy serial port, bad thing to miss for me.
Do not worry about that, you can get a PCI card for that or even better a USB to parallel/serial adapter. BTW what are you using that needs serial these days? The only thing I have is my Dymo Label printer.
Paladin, what pci e slot cards do you have? x1 or x16??
I believe all PCI-E video cards are 16X. 1X is for other PCI replacement type cards. Not really used much as yet. 1X would be too slow for video I would think but I have to checked into this.
I want to order this by Fri. I have like two dozen tabs open in FF 🙂 Oh and for what its worth, I had no idea the lower rez you run the harder the processor works. Seems like I haven't been using my video cards power since I bought it. I'm going to try some higher rez's this weekend.
Nice link Atomm 🙂
I said before always try 1024X768 min for games. I would even start at 1280X1024 or whatever.
Paladin wrote: Do not worry about that, you can get a PCI card for that or even better a USB to parallel/serial adapter. BTW what are you using that needs serial these days? The only thing I have is my Dymo Label printer. I believe all PCI-E video cards are 16X. 1X is for other PCI replacement type cards. Not really used much as yet. 1X would be too slow for video I would think but I have to checked into this. I said before always try 1024X768 min for games. I would even start at 1280X1024 or whatever.
I just ordered everything in that article except the video card. I didn't *need* HDMI, but I thought if I dont' really like this motherboard, I'll demote it to my multimedia center next year. I also bought both versions of the motherboard, one m-atx, one standard atx (has 4 pci slots instead of just 2) Serial can be added by using a standard one found in any box of old junk. I need serial for my mouse remote/uIce setup.
Amazing what I've learned again this week, and this will be my first AMD setup. I just hope this stuff holds up, as my last gigabyte moto was well over $170.
I set UT3 at 1024 and at 1152 tonite and it was just dismal performance wise. I care more about FPS than how pretty it looked. There is no way I'm heading into Nov 19th with this setup 🙂 I just hope a micro ATX board fits ok in my case.
Atomm wrote: Congrats! I hope UT3 plays a hundred times better for you....
Thanks. The first thing I wanna try is QW:ET. If I can get the fps up it may not dizzy me out. Now I want to figure out the best way to run my current system as a server. The last couple of days I've been using remote desktop to a P4, but it is a hokey setup and slow as hell.
Whats the fastest way to setup a server thats only doing usenet and file storage?? Since I'm only 768k DSL, I don't want a bottleneck either.
I've received all my parts and started assembling them. There was a couple of problems noone seemed to mention, you need a new powersupply for modern motherboards. I thought no biggie, got online and ordered two that said compatible with AMD and P4 w/Sata. Great. They had 24pin headers, but NOT connectors for pci-e cards. Argghh 🙂
Anyways, I hacked up a old powersupply 20pin connector and made one and soldered it inside the powersupply box to maximize the voltage output to the video card. Hehehe, next day I was at Paladins' and he had a couple of adapters in his box, lol. Thanks man, I appreciate them, heh.
The board with the ati-490 HDTV chipset works perfectly, well it does with Vista. XP wouldn't install without blue screens, but it may now after upgrading the bios. Its speedie and fps were double what I've ever had. I installed an arctic fan on it and ran it for a 72hr burn test. It hasn't gotten over 90F. Didn't do much over clocking, only about 12% and the heat didn't drift too much higher. Nice fan even if it is the size of a cinder block 😉
My board (nvideo 410 chipset) is a dud. I spent hours trying to get an OS installed. Kept saying I didn't have a compatible windows partition to install to. I ended up having to put the drive through a partition manager and wiping the boot sectors and starting over from scratch. Got XP installed and then added the GT video card and it had flipouts. Monitor just kept clicking on/off every couple of seconds. Maddening.
I sent off an email to Newegg requesting an RMA, now 24hrs later still waiting to hear back from them. So looks like I'm outta action until well after the holiday since my game drive is sitting empty in a bad box.
I just love upgrading 😏 At least my kid is up and flying ok. Picked up Halo2 yesterday and I think he's in heaven 🙂
The board with the ati-490 HDTV chipset works perfectly, well it does with Vista. XP wouldn't install without blue screens, but it may now after upgrading the bios.
You may be installing XP with SP1 on the disk. Get an XP disk with SP2 or slipstream one yourself. XP will install with SP2 I am sure. SP1 is missing some drivers etc....
Paladin wrote: You may be installing XP with SP1 on the disk. Get an XP disk with SP2 or slipstream one yourself. XP will install with SP2 I am sure. SP1 is missing some drivers etc....
Ya know, I had so many disks lying around this week that may have been it. I was having problems getting it to boot from cds' because the HD ports were tricked out over something with the HD boot sector. I used Paragon partition manager which repaired it, where Norton couldn't deal with it. I think I've solved every other issue except the lan issue, and a d-link card fixed that. I was able to partition and install XP SP2 and Vista. I'm still convinced it took a bios upgrade from gigabyte for Vista.
It dawned on me to try a different video card since the GS was still in the house. Worked like a charm. I put the GT card in my kids new system and it had the same results 🙁 The card sadly is defective. 😈
Great news is I can cancel my rma. I'm going to keep the motherboard and look for another video card option. I tried the onboard video and for piss sake it wont' even run UT04, lol. At least for the time being, I can get it setup and get all the software installed and tweaked to my liking.
Thanks for the help fellows. At least I'm on the right path now 🙂