New PC to play TES Oblivion

[matm347]

Originally Posted by Yawgm0th

A 4GHz P4 will not beat a mid-range Athlon 64 in most gaming applications. I don't know what benchmarks you'be been looking at, but you've been misinformed. It would be comparable to a 2.0GHz to 2.5GHz Athlon 64, depending on the game. Intel's new processors, on the other hand, appear to be ready to topple AMD's advantage at stock speeds. Granted, AM2 is coming out sooner and there will be some more clock boosts and no one knows for sure what performance change the new socket will bring, but Intel's next generation does not need to be overclocked (nor clocked that high at all) to beat AMD gaming performance by a considerable margin. That's assuming Intel didn't do something funky to the AMD system they tested on at IDF.

DDR2 isn't really slower anymore (the speeds have gotten to the point where it can make up for the latencies and the high DDR overclocks), and it has absolutely nothing to do with the performance difference. If you can remember back to when LGA775 came out, DDR and DDR2 performance tests were run on just about every site and they showed less than 5% difference in 95% of applications, and not all of them were in DDR1's favor.

You can see how the new socket will not help at all until faster RAM (DDR2-800) comes out.
http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/02/...orm/index.html

I was talking about Intel's new 65nm chips needeing to be overclocked to keep up/beat AMD in games and some apps. Everyone knows their current lineup sux.

Read that review here..
http://www.tomshardware.com/2005/12/...treme_edition/

Take note that this review was done before AMD came out with faster chips (FX-60) and no AMD overclocking was done, which they should have IMO.

[Yawgm0th]

Sorry, but I have enough sense not to read Tom's Hardware. In any case, I wouldn't trust any benchmarks done this early. I would expect any tests done on both Intel and AMD's next gens done now to have different results with the retail products, especially with (as you said) 800MHz DDR2 becoming available. That said, I'm certainly not expecting the initial release of AM2 to be much (if any) faster than socket 939.

I thought you were referring to the next gen. I see now that you meant the new 65nm P4s. Sorry about that.

[AlexK]

I didn't know I was supposed to get DDR, will get the OCZ GX that u suggested, again if I can find it.Thanks for the info yawgmoth, I dont plan on going the dual gpu route the price isn't worth the performance increase, but thats just me.I was going to get an LCD before what u said, I'll stick with my CRT for now.

Still waiting to know if the motherboard is available here, was told that it will take a couple of days to get an answer from suppliers.

If I do decide to go with the DFI board which 1 should I get?

DFI LanParty UT NF4 SLi-D
DFI LanParty UT NF4 SLI-D
.DFI LanParty AMD UT NF4 Ultra Dual Express
DFI LanParty UT NF4 SLI-D R AMD
DFI nF4 SLI-DR Expert

Anyone have any links to info on setting up the DFI like tweaking bios
settings,info on which bios to use, installing components & making sure it picks up the right ram timings etc.

Still not sure on case & cooling.Can u guys recommend a case & fans thats good from personal experience or reviews & should I put the max amount of fans that a case can accomodate or not?

[Yawgm0th]

Get a DFI LanParty UT NF4 Ultra-D.

If you plan on overclocking, I'd recommend you use an XP-90 for your heatsink and a 92mm Panaflo L1B for your fan. Use Panaflo L1As for any 80mm case fans you have. Have two to four intake in the front or side, a couple exhaust in the back, and (if possible) an exhaust fan on the top of the case. If the case takes 120mm fans go for a 120mm Yate Loon or Silverstone fan. They (as well as the Panaflos) move lots of air but make very little noise.

[matm347]

Originally Posted by Yawgm0th

Sorry, but I have enough sense not to read Tom's Hardware.

What's wrong with Toms? It's not the ONLY place I go, but they do seem to have more diverse reviews.

[casecutter]

Toms can be quite biased on their reviews. They have a reputation of having less than credible reviews. They are still a reference source, but certainly not to be used by themselves as a guide.

[matm347]

I've heard that before, but for the few years I've been reading there I just don't see who they are biased towards. I've not seen any of their reviews that were in conflict with another site, their numbers may have been higher/lower, but I attributed that to the different setups. The point of "brand X" card being faster than "brand Y" has been consistent with other review sites, from what I've seen anyway.

[AlexK]

What do u guys think about these, I know they overclock really well but how do they perform at stock speeds compared to the x2 4400?

Can someone tell me how fast they are, as well as the x2 4400, in relation to a
P4 3.0ghz

AMD Opteron 146 Socket 939 Single Core CPU
AMD Opteron 148 Socket 939 Single Core CPU
AMD Opteron 150 Socket 939 Single Core CPU

AMD Opteron 165 Socket 939 Dual Core CPU
AMD Opteron 170 Socket 939 Dual Core CPU

[matm347]

I'm no Opteron expert, but I've heard good things about the 165. They are also supposed to overclock better than the 4400+. Stock for stock, the 4400 would be better, as it has 400 more MHz.
The 165 vs 170 are the same except for the stock speeds, they both are supposed to overclock the same.

But you'll really want to narrow your choices to dual cores, many games support multi-thread now and show good performance boosts.

I had a 3.0 P4(2.6 overclocked) and my AMD "feels" at least twice as fast using apps, games are hard to judge due to the GPU doing so much work but with the 1900XTX you were thinking about getting, you won't have to worry about not having enough performance for quite some time.

[AlexK]

I guess I'll stick with the x2 4400 then.

I've found the Asus A8R32-MVP Delux AMD Motherboard -Cross Fire Edition,
will be ordering it next week due to stock shortages.I can't find the OCZ GX ram anywhere though.

So which ram should I go for?

1.Mushkin eXtreme Performance 1GB (2x512MB) XP3200 2-2-2
2.Mushkin eXtreme Performance 2GB (2x1GB) XP4000 3-4-3-8
3.Mushkin High Performance 2GB (2x1GB) HP3200 2-3-2

4.OCZ EL DDR PC-3200 Dual Channel Gold 1GB (2*512MB)
5.OCZ EL DDR PC-3500 Gold GX Dual Channel 1GB (2*512MB)
6.OCZ EL DDR PC-4800 Dual Channel Platinum Elite Edition TCCD 1GB

7.Team Extreem Overclocking DDR 500MHz 1 GB *2 Dual Channel-
PC4000 DDR500MHz 1GB*2 (dual) 3-4-4-8 64*8 16 Chips Samsung UCCC modules.

8.Corsair?

Is there any difference between an MSI ATi Radeon X1900XTX & a GeCube Radeon X1900XTX?

Also I was thinking of getting a WD raptor HD but I've read that they
aren't reliable, should I get the sata instead?