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Penryn or Nehalem

C

crazymonkee84

Limp Gawd
Joined
Jan 18, 2006
Messages
506
So currently, my setup is an epox 9npa+ ultra, 3800+x2, 1 gig ddr1 ram, 7900gto, and a 250 gig and 320 gig hardrive. I've been waiting to upgrade to new hardware for a while now and my plan is to wait for nehalem. Should I just get a 9450, some ddr3 ram, a new video card, and of course a motherboard. Should I just do that and forget about nehalem? I play games and stuff, but I don't do anything that requires the best computer hardware out there. Anybody have any advice?
 
crazymonkee84 said:
So currently, my setup is an epox 9npa+ ultra, 3800+x2, 1 gig ddr1 ram, 7900gto, and a 250 gig and 320 gig hardrive. I've been waiting to upgrade to new hardware for a while now and my plan is to wait for nehalem. Should I just get a 9450, some ddr3 ram, a new video card, and of course a motherboard. Should I just do that and forget about nehalem? I play games and stuff, but I don't do anything that requires the best computer hardware out there. Anybody have any advice?
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If you're poor, Penryn.
If you're rich, Nehalem.
 
Right now you probably want to stick with S775 as the Nehalem platform will take a little while to mature, not to mention it will be a little too expensive out of the gate.

You'd be very happy with a dual core setup - get something affordable for right now and then do an upgrade when i7 is ready.
 
Thing is, once I get stuff right now I probably won't be getting anything new for a while. I won't buy a new motherboard and a 9450 just to get another motherboard and a nehalem a year later.
 
crazymonkee84 said:
Thing is, once I get stuff right now I probably won't be getting anything new for a while. I won't buy a new motherboard and a 9450 just to get another motherboard and a nehalem a year later.
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from the looks of your first post it looks like you dont upgrade very often. id personally go with the penryn's.
 
I too was orginally set on getting the Nehalem when I was orginally planning to build my SFF gaming box. However, after much research and budget balancing, I decided the Penyrn would more then satisfy my needs for a much lower price then what prices the Nehalems will be launching at. Plus the fact that my SFF build need a mATX board, the likely hood of launch mATX is pretty small and also at a price.

The Penyrn will definently be a step up from my old single core Athlon 3700+ thats served me we well these past 3 years.
 
Hiyruu said:
If you're poor, Penryn.
If you're rich, Nehalem.
Click to expand...

This.

Obviously Nehalem would be better from a performance standpoint, and it will be higher-end for a longer period of time. If you can afford to pay the premium for the newer hardware, then it's worth going for since you plan on keeping your PC for a long time. However, if you don't have unlimited funds to play with, a Penryn system would still give you great performance right now, and will also last you a while without breaking the bank.
 
The system you have could use updating now. I mean you can play the waiting game forever, if you get something solid now, you can't lose. Especially if you're only gaming as you said. Totally not worth waiting longer if thats all you're doing.
 
crazymonkee84 said:
Thing is, once I get stuff right now I probably won't be getting anything new for a while. I won't buy a new motherboard and a 9450 just to get another motherboard and a nehalem a year later.
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im in the same boat as u and i would get the i7 mate. i dont upgrade much so a i7 will last alot longer then a dual core thats for sure
 
crazymonkee84 said:
So currently, my setup is an epox 9npa+ ultra, 3800+x2, 1 gig ddr1 ram, 7900gto, and a 250 gig and 320 gig hardrive. I've been waiting to upgrade to new hardware for a while now and my plan is to wait for nehalem. Should I just get a 9450, some ddr3 ram, a new video card, and of course a motherboard. Should I just do that and forget about nehalem? I play games and stuff, but I don't do anything that requires the best computer hardware out there. Anybody have any advice?
Click to expand...

Depends. I'm in the same boat for the most part. I'd recommend the following. Upgrade your ram, at least double it. Then depending on your monitor, upgrade your gpu. your CPU should hold you for the maturing period of Nehalem.
 
I'm current running dual monitors with a samsung 226bw and all these new games coming out this week are really pushing me to get a new video card. I absolutely hate my ram and have been wanting to upgrade but ddr1 ram is terribly priced....Right now people seem to be telling to go to Penryn. If I wait for nehalem I know I'm going to get nehalem with out a doubt. Just money-performance wise which is smarter?
 
crazymonkee84 said:
Just money-performance wise which is smarter?
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Depends on what you need that performance in. Gaming? Video encoding and rendering? Photoshop? etc.

However I would say Penryn is smarter price to performance wise for gaming at least, at least for now. Official reviews of Nehalem's performance as well as actual real market costs aren't out yet so really can't say without a doubt that Nehalem is the worth it for video encoding and rendering as well as other multi-threaded apps.
 
As much as I'd want to say Penryns since you don't upgrade much, Nehalem is just looming around the corner and they'll definitely last you longer than upgrading now. I wish I didn't bite the upgrade bug but the damage has been done. :(
 
crazymonkee84 said:
I'm current running dual monitors with a samsung 226bw and all these new games coming out this week are really pushing me to get a new video card. I absolutely hate my ram and have been wanting to upgrade but ddr1 ram is terribly priced....Right now people seem to be telling to go to Penryn. If I wait for nehalem I know I'm going to get nehalem with out a doubt. Just money-performance wise which is smarter?
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Bang for your buck on the dollar the top high end stuff will never win that category. Its not designed to compete there. Many of us, myself included do however look for the best value. Now you threw an interesting factor in the end there by asking which is smarter. Given how long you kept your last rig if you were to keep a new build equally long, over time it probably would be smarter, though initially more expensive to invest with Nehalem. More and more is stuff being optimized for quad core. Just look how much progress has occured in the last year gaming wise between utilizing two versus four cores. A year from now where will it be. If you keep that rig for 2-3 years where will you be with quad core optimization. Sometimes when we buy long term you do have to think of it as an investment with more up front costs but more long term rewards as well.

Without question at the end of 2008 the Penryn road is the cheaper road to travel. Its not like thats not a lot of cpu power either. But if you haven't upgraded at all come say 2010 then the gap will be much larger. Weigh it over
 
One thing to think about. If some of the previews are true and say clock for clock the new chips are 5-10% faster than what we have now in 2010-11 isn't he going to be in about the same boat either way?

I mean really has anyone ever looked back and though "If I had gotten that model up 3 years ago when I bought my last upgrade I wouldn't need to buy an upgrade now"
 
zeekle said:
One thing to think about. If some of the previews are true and say clock for clock the new chips are 5-10% faster than what we have now in 2010-11 isn't he going to be in about the same boat either way?

I mean really has anyone ever looked back and though "If I had gotten that model up 3 years ago when I bought my last upgrade I wouldn't need to buy an upgrade now"
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My point is this. Buying S775 now limits your upgrade pathway. What s775 cpu can one buy in 12 or 18months. We all know there are many guys who swtiched over to s939 in the months right before AM2. What can they do now? Now if the OP or anyone is merely planning on running a system for 3 years and then starting over with a brand new rig then fine so be it. But if like many do one plans periodic upgrades then the Nehalem platform is the smarter choice IMO. Not the cheaper or better bang for the buck choice but the smarter choice.

Don't get me wrong just last month I made a $500C2D with a e7200 build but then again I was governed solely by price and I am not expecting this rig to be my primary in 2-3 years. In my case I can and likely will drop a quad in there next year
 
Penryn is a safe bet for a long time to come imo for video gaming. I dont see the pc gaming market all of a sudden exploding anytime soon. That market segment has been stagnant for years now when it comes to cpu power.

I mean hell as it is all you really need to do is oc your cpu and get an extra gig of memory and you're for the most part all set. All you need to worry about then is your choice of video card.
 
even though i7 looks awesome if you want to upgrade now its a good time to just go with penryn and save some coin :) (seems like the general consensus here anyway)
 
Something I've been confused about for a while is when we say the Nehalem price point will be up there, are we assuming $500? $1000? I remember in the P4 days when $500 was top, now the best Penryns still go for what, $900?
 
jerryrigged said:
Something I've been confused about for a while is when we say the Nehalem price point will be up there, are we assuming $500? $1000? I remember in the P4 days when $500 was top, now the best Penryns still go for what, $900?
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obviously you shouldn't go for the Xtreme editions... Unless you really want people to know you ripped yourself off or just have a ton of $$$

The lowest lineup for i7 is expected to be around $300~ at launch
 
Theres probably going to be an extra $300 premium on a i7 setup in comparison to an equivalent penryn setup.

If you think that extra 300 meets your price/performance ratio for what i7 give you over penryn then well its obviously worth it. But if all you're doing is playing video games and watching porn than id say no, not really.
 
DemonDiablo said:
Theres probably going to be an extra $300 premium on a i7 setup in comparison to an equivalent penryn setup.

If you think that extra 300 meets your price/performance ratio for what i7 give you over penryn then well its obviously worth it. But if all you're doing is playing video games and watching porn than id say no, not really.
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:eek:

Well stated. It will be interesting to see how quickly prices dip. Which is to say what will a Nehalem build cost in Q1 or Q2 next year. Guys with mid level rigs who can afford to wait 3-6 months on a upgrade might be well served to do just that.
 
Either way, I anticipate my new Core 2 E8500 setup that i'll be building this halloween will completely assrape my old Athlon 64 3700+ setup. Amazing what a few years does to high end computer hardware.
 
Freezebyte said:
Either way, I anticipate my new Core 2 E8500 setup that i'll be building this halloween will completely assrape my old Athlon 64 3700+ setup. Amazing what a few years does to high end computer hardware.
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No doubt or question about that. Amazing what a single year does to high end computer hardware.
 
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