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How cheap can one switch to c2d?

M

mybrainisawaffle

Limp Gawd
Joined
Mar 20, 2006
Messages
353
Currently my rig has:

+3500 Newcastle
2 x 1 gig Corsair XMS 3-5-5-7
Asrock 939dual
500w Bluestream PSU
x1800gto2 PCI-E

What's the cheapest C2D setup with w 2 gigs of ram and a PCI-E slot I could go for? How much could I sell my ram, mobo, and processor and buy new ones for?
 
asrock 775vsta-dual motherboard - $60
e4300 cpu - $160 (ish)

Use your ram and video card.
easy overclock to 2.4ghz with the 4300. 2.8ish is about max for the board.

here's a comparison of two systems, mine and a buddys

mine: msi 975x plat mobo, core 2 duo 6400 @ 3.2ghz, 2GB DDR 2 800 .. fsb @ 402, x1950gt video card (not overclocked, under Vista)
3dmark 05 score: 9500

buddys: asrock 775-vsta, e4300 cpu @ 2.8ghz, 2GB DDR ram, x1950gt video card (overclocked core on video card, windows xp pro sp1)
3dmark 05 score (overclocked core on video): 9900

In short, there's very little difference, and with him overclocking the video card, his scores are higher. I'm sure I could hit around 10500 or so with the video overclocking, if i wasn't running vista. The point is that the pcix speed of the 775vsta makes no difference.

I'd rate it as a good inexpensive setup.
 
Spudsdude said:
In short, there's very little difference, and with him overclocking the video card, his scores are higher. I'm sure I could hit around 10500 or so with the video overclocking, if i wasn't running vista. The point is that the pcix speed of the 775vsta makes no difference.
Click to expand...

I agree... here's more info on the board.

http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.aspx?i=2810
http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.aspx?i=2813
http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.aspx?i=2814

Summary: DDR400 is fine for now, it won't slow performance. The PCI-E 4x slot only slows down high performance cards by about 10%, which isn't much.

Theres a quad version out now, though... I'll have to look into that, hehe.
 
Don't go with a Asrock. :confused:

Go with a 965p board for sure and sell what you need to sell off.
 
Yeah gaming. Right now I have my +3500 at stock. I'd like to hope I could OC what ever c2d I got, since I have a pretty good PSU.
 
Marvelous said:
Don't go with a Asrock. :confused:

Go with a 965p board for sure and sell what you need to sell off.
Click to expand...

He was asking for the cheapest possible solution for the switch. If he goes with a 9X5 chipset, he'll need new ram, since they all use DDR2. He currently has an AsRock board. AsRock is Asus' budget line. Whats wrong with AsRock?

mybrainisawaffle said:
Yeah gaming. Right now I have my +3500 at stock. I'd like to hope I could OC what ever c2d I got, since I have a pretty good PSU.
Click to expand...

I don't think you'll see a HUGE improvement in games, unless those games are CPU intensive or are optimized to take advantage of multi-core CPUs (e.g. HL2/Source engine). I'm thinking you'll see around a 20% performance increase, but I'm not sure.
 
Well I mean I'm willing to drop a couple hundred down, and I should be able to get $200 for the parts I have, and I want to see a big increase in performance here. I'm willing to buy new ram, cpu, and mobo, and recommendations there?
 
Ahh... in that case, you could build a much better system. What's your budget?
 
enginurd said:
I agree... here's more info on the board.

http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.aspx?i=2810
http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.aspx?i=2813
http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.aspx?i=2814

Summary: DDR400 is fine for now, it won't slow performance. The PCI-E 4x slot only slows down high performance cards by about 10%, which isn't much.

Theres a quad version out now, though... I'll have to look into that, hehe.
Click to expand...

yeah dude, the PCIe will pull your performance more than 10%. I've seen 3dmark scores of 2k under normal... with 8x PCie over 16x...
 
There's a thread in the distributed computing forum for a c2d build. Maybe throw in a 6400 instead of a 4300 and off you go.

 
It cost me 5$CAN to upgrade from a AMD 4400+ to an Intel E6400!
I sold my 4400+ S939 for 310$CAN, my OCZ DDR500 2GB for 225$ and my ASUS A8R32-MVP for 110$.
Thre demand for X2 S939 is crazy.
I was able to get a E6400 + OCZ DDR2 800 2GB + DS3 3.3 for 650$CAN incl. tax and shipping.
My E6400 runs at 3.2GHZ and the performance blasts away my previous 4400+.
 
enginurd said:
He was asking for the cheapest possible solution for the switch. If he goes with a 9X5 chipset, he'll need new ram, since they all use DDR2. He currently has an AsRock board. AsRock is Asus' budget line. Whats wrong with AsRock?
Click to expand...

That's why I suggested he should sell his old stuff. He can get money back and recover most of the stuff he is going to buy new.
What's wrong with Asrock? It runs PCI-E at 4x. It has barely any overclocking ability. It performs considerably less than 965p boards at same clock speed.

Here's something that will put things over the top. While x1000 series doesn't hamper performance Geforce 8 series do by noticeable margin.

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/03/27/pci_express_scaling_analysis/page8.html#call_of_duty_2

What is this worth? Another $40 you spend on quality motherboard with proper platform to run your chip with?
 
Marvelous said:
That's why I suggested he should sell his old stuff. He can get money back and recover most of the stuff he is going to buy new.
What's wrong with Asrock? It runs PCI-E at 4x. It has barely any overclocking ability. It performs considerably less than 965p boards at same clock speed.

Here's something that will put things over the top. While x1000 series doesn't hamper performance Geforce 8 series do by noticeable margin.

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/03/27/pci_express_scaling_analysis/page8.html#call_of_duty_2

What is this worth? Another $40 you spend on quality motherboard with proper platform to run your chip with?
Click to expand...

Yes, its well worth it for the better board, but the original question was the cheapest solution while still getting good performance. Even though the AsRock board runs the pci-e at 4x, its still good enough for budget performance (depending on the game I guess, as well as the card used). Again, I agree, the extra $40 for a better board is well worth it. Though, the asrock is still the cheapest solution because it allows people to use their old ram, which is still good enough for today's apps/games, and old vidcard; it also gives them a chance to stretch a bit more when it comes time to upgrade to pci-e and ddr2. Its a good stopgap budget solution, but if you're willing to spring for the other components, then the asrock board is useless. Though, it doesnt really matter now, since he's willing to pay more than just the bare minimum.
 
Then what is the point even upgrading to core 2 duo for if you can barely overclock or run your video card at 16x PCI-E? :confused: Your just giving him bad advice because what he asked for instead of what he can benefit of upgrading.

He can stick a Athlon X2 in his current motherboard and be done with it. :eek:

He will be wasting time and money upgrading when x2 are cheaper and perform just as fast as core 2 duo on a Asrock. :rolleyes:
 
^^this guy is right. unless he goes to ddr2 and 16 lanes pciex, there is no point in upgrading to c2d.
he can get, tops $200 for his cpu, mainboard and ram. that will cover the price of a 6300/4300 and a decent hs/f. then he needs decent ram ($150 and up) and a decent mainboard ($100 and up.) so he can upgrade to an oc'able c2d rig for $250-300 out of pocket, and see gains of probably 30-40% (dual core plus c2d arch plus ddr2 plus 16 lane pciex)
 
At 2.5GHz C2D will outperform a 3GHz X2, a Asrock will do that and that NewCastle can't come close. The 4x PCI-E makes little difference with anything other than a 8800 and he has a x1800gto2. Any game that can utilize the extra CPU power will be faster.

Gigabyte 965 S3 or Biostar Tforce965 - $105
SuperTalent DDR2-800 (D9GMH) $156

You can go cheaper but that's the lowest priced for good overclocking potential.
 
Would be cheaper if you could use DDR. It'll cost you something like:

Motherboard - $100
CPU - $170
Memory - $130

So around $400. Well worth the jump in performance.
 
In my case, it is a barton 2500xp that has been slowly dying. Would it not be reasonable to snag a 6300 with the asrock and utilize my AGP card and DDR? This is not my gaming machine, so the video card is not a big deal.
 
Noetic said:
In my case, it is a barton 2500xp that has been slowly dying. Would it not be reasonable to snag a 6300 with the asrock and utilize my AGP card and DDR? This is not my gaming machine, so the video card is not a big deal.
Click to expand...

Sure. Even if you were gaming, it still wouldn't be too bad considering the price and getting more life out of ddr/agp stuff.
 
enginurd said:
Sure. Even if you were gaming, it still wouldn't be too bad considering the price and getting more life out of ddr/agp stuff.
Click to expand...

Thank you for the response.

Hmmm... The 4300 or 4400 would probably suffice. How well does this board o/c? <snicker>
 
Noetic said:
Thank you for the response.

Hmmm... The 4300 or 4400 would probably suffice. How well does this board o/c? <snicker>
Click to expand...

A few friends have gotten it to 298Mhz, and one only reached 276. With the E4300 or E4400, thats still a good OC considering the price. The E4X00 series have nice, high multipliers for easy OC'ing:

298 * 9 = 2.68Ghz
298 * 10 = 2.98Ghz
276 * 9 = 2.48Ghz
276 * 10 = 2.76Ghz
 
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