Is it time to upgrade my Athlon?

[GlassJaw]

I'm looking for some suggestions... I'm having some screen freeze issues which have gotten pretty old.  After talking to Roy, I think it may be time to upgrade my CPU.  He suggested I post here to solicit some of the "AMD experts" input.  My main goal is to eliminate the screen freezes I've been seeing which Roy explained was probably due the way the game uses the processer to do the audio, combined with my USB headset which he says is a processer hog.  Since my processer is dated and I like my wireless USB headset, it may be time to upgrade the processer.  I'd like to be able to run the game wide open if possible. 

So should I upgrade to a better processer or should I not waist time with the current setup and also upgrade the motherboard? 
What are your upgrade recomendations?

Right now I'm running:
Windows XP
4 gig of DDR 400 RAM (only 3 gig recognized by xp, I learned the hard way)
NVIDIA GeForce 9800 GTX/512mb
AMD Athlon 64 3500
MSI MS-7100 K8N Diamond Motherboard
RAID 0 220Gig

[Fulmar]

New Motherboard/CPU/RAM.  Your GPU is pretty good yet and your CPU etc are a real bottleneck in your system.

[1701E]

Since that Motherboard is Socket 939 (or so Google says) there is no upgrade path, least not one worth it.
If you want to stick with AMD, look for Socket AM2+/AM3, Intel look for LGA 775 or 1366 I think it is.

As Fulmar said, those parts replaced would be the only way.

As for suggestions, I personally stick with AMD (Price), and I use Biostar Motherboards and am going for an AMD Phenom II X3 720BE soon and use 2GB of DDR2-800MHz RAM.  Price is about 200-210$ for that.
A word of warning though, if you go with AMD, do not buy one that says "AM2+/AM3 (with BIOS update)", that means you'll need a Socket AM2/AM2+ installed then upgrade to AM3.

[cattb]

I like gigabyte MOBO myself, if you have the money I would go to ddr3, this way you can upgrade if needed down the road and check your power supply to make sure you have enough power for your upgrade if you go down the road with a new MOBO,CPU and RAM.
Some of the motherboards take ddr2 and others take ddr3, make sure if you decide on something get the correct RAM.
Don't know your intent of use with PC but its for AH gameplay and surfing email,I would go with a 3.0  dual core like the 550 and it unlocked for a easy overclock
my 2 cents

[Ruler2]

A word of warning though, if you go with AMD, do not buy one that says "AM2+/AM3 (with BIOS update)", that means you'll need a Socket AM2/AM2+ installed then upgrade to AM3.

Does that mean that I can go get an AM3 CPU for my AM2+ mobo, update the BIOS, and get the AM3 speeds with the AM2+ board?


GlassJaw... I don't see how it wasn't YOU having FR problems with that old machine   your GPU is probably worth more than the rest of the rig!   You would have a MUCH better experience upgrading your mobo,RAM,and CPU. I went up from my old athlon X2 im using now to a Phenom II X4 940 and good mobo ( least it was good when it worked!) I haven't upgraded the RAM yet, but now I have to with this old PC put back together for my siblings, and that it where it's going to probably cost you. DDR2 RAM is WAY more expensive than it was earlier in the year, I found that out the hard way, I started lookin into RAM just a few WEEKS after the prices spiked! If you want good RAM with 1066,1200,1333, and some 800 speeds you're gonna be looking in the window of 120-180 (up to 220 for some) dollars depending on what brand you want and where you get it. Start hangin out on ebay, that's where I've been for the past few months, only advice I have for ya on ebay is this: let me get mine first or I'll kill ya        It's worth the upgrade if you can do it for ~250-300 bucks, you're gonna love it if ya do it!

[GlassJaw]

What about this combo? 

MSI 790FX-GD70 SocketAM3/140W CPU/AMD 790FX CrossFire/4DDR3-2133(OC)/ATI Quad/Triple CrossFireX/2GbE/R/A/1394/ATX Motherboard $163.99
 
AMD Phenom II X4 955 HDZ955FBGIBOX 3.2 GHz/6 MB L3/125W Processor $165.99

CORSAIR XMS3 DHX 4GB ( 2 X 2GB ) PC3-12800 1600MHz 240-pin DDR3 CL9 Dual Channel Desktop Memory Kit - TW3X4G1600C9DHX - $109.99

[cattb]

my 2 cents
if this will help I not sure how much you know about pc parts.
goto manufacturer web page of MOBO look up motherboard,look up ram for motherboard recommendations, check voltage, check what ram your looking at, you want compatible RAM
Thats a 125 watt CPU do you have enough power supply when this PC is built?
Looks like that motherboard will handle mutiple video cards, do you plan on using multiple cards in the in the futurre?
A single slot video card MOBO is generaly cheaper if you don't have plans of running multiple cards.
If you know this stuff just ignore me
just trying to give yah something to think about

[TilDeath]

What about this combo?  

MSI 790FX-GD70 SocketAM3/140W CPU/AMD 790FX CrossFire/4DDR3-2133(OC)/ATI Quad/Triple CrossFireX/2GbE/R/A/1394/ATX Motherboard $163.99
  
AMD Phenom II X4 955 HDZ955FBGIBOX 3.2 GHz/6 MB L3/125W Processor $165.99

CORSAIR XMS3 DHX 4GB ( 2 X 2GB ) PC3-12800 1600MHz 240-pin DDR3 CL9 Dual Channel Desktop Memory Kit - TW3X4G1600C9DHX - $109.99

Your at $450 there.  You could build a heck of an Intel 775 socket with that investment.

EDIT:  This MB http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128358 134.99 20.00 Rebate
         This Mem http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227289 105.99 Free Shipping and 30.00 Rebate
This or any other 775 Socket CPU http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115036  189.99 Free Shipping

Total 430.97 Less Rebates 380.97 Plus shipping

I have personal experience with these components and they work extremely well together.  This Combo is an overclocking dream.  Easily hit 4.1 GHz on the CPU and in the 1540 to 1803 on the Memory.  This can be hit without adding but a smidgen of voltage to the CPU nothing to the memory and nothing to the North or South Bridges.

This would be best bang for your buc in my opinion.

[GlassJaw]

Yep, I knew all that except the part about voltage for the memory.  I thought it just had to be the same type ie ddr2/ddr3.  Can you elaborate a little?

I upgraded my power supply last year when the old one crapped out... its a BFG 650. 

I don't have immediate plans of multiple video cards but I'd like to keep my options open for the future.

my 2 cents
if this will help I not sure how much you know about pc parts.
goto manufacturer web page of MOBO look up motherboard,look up ram for motherboard recommendations, check voltage, check what ram your looking at, you want compatible RAM
Thats a 125 watt CPU do you have enough power supply when this PC is built?
Looks like that motherboard will handle mutiple video cards, do you plan on using multiple cards in the in the futurre?
A single slot video card MOBO is generaly cheaper if you don't have plans of running multiple cards.
If you know this stuff just ignore me
just trying to give yah something to think about

[GlassJaw]

I'm not very current in the intel vs amd stuff.  Do you know which one is a better processor for the game?

Your at $450 there.  You could build a heck of an Intel 775 socket with that investment.

EDIT:  This MB http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128358 134.99 20.00 Rebate
         This Mem http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820227289 105.99 Free Shipping and 30.00 Rebate
This or any other 775 Socket CPU http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115036  189.99 Free Shipping

Total 430.97 Less Rebates 380.97 Plus shipping

I have personal experience with these components and they work extremely well together.  This Combo is an overclocking dream.  Easily hit 4.1 GHz on the CPU and in the 1540 to 1803 on the Memory.  This can be hit without adding but a smidgen of voltage to the CPU nothing to the memory and nothing to the North or South Bridges.

This would be best bang for your buc in my opinion.

[Skuzzy]

Intel.

[skribetm]

Intel.

seriously?

you would recommend core2duo vs. amd phenom ii 955?

*edit: while were on the topic of the front-side-bus/fsb, heres why a chip with an integrated memory controller has better bandwidth/memory access than a processor that uses an fsb to access memory.

Let's look at history again.

In 2006, Intel was doing great with the dual core Conroe processors. These used an 800 Mhz FSB which would give 400 Mhz of memory per core or about what AMD had back in 2003 with socket 754. Kentsfield bumped the FSB to 1066 Mhz which allowed two channels of 533 Mhz memory. This knocked the ratio down to just 266 Mhz per core or about 2/3rds of socket 754.

During this time it wasn't unusual to see memory as fast as DDR3-1066 on Intel motherboards so I'm sure some Intel fans were deluded enough to believe that they really could fit 2132 Mhz of data through a 1066 Mhz pipe. Penryn bumped the FSB to 1333 Mhz which allowed for 333 Mhz per core or just under socket 754. Penryn relied on large L2 cache to fudge the benchmarks. In fact, when Nehalem's SPEC benchmarks were not higher than Dunnington's, Intel was sheepishly forced to admit that Dunnington's SPEC benchmarks had been artificially boosted due to the large cache. With artificial benchmarks in hand and a much higher clock rate with Phenom stalled at 2.3 Ghz, people who plunked down money for Penryn quads could feel good about their purchase. And, that warm feeling lasted up to about mid 2008. When Phenom hit 2.6 Ghz and was finally able to overclock with SB 750 it was no longer possible to hide the memory bottleneck. Penryn overnight was reduced to Celeron level performance. Sure, some tried very hard to claim that Penryn wasn't really so outdated because it was faster in some areas but with everyone whooping and hollering about Nehalem's 3 x 1066 Mhz of memory (800 Mhz per core), that was a bitter pill to swallow. No matter how you slice it, all those Penryn buyers got screwed as bad or worse as the socket 754 buyers did back in 2003.

http://bit.ly/6qciKy

if running aces high ii only involves a max memory of 6MB needed(size of L2 cache of processor recommended here), the core2 would be a good buy.
but if you need ddram/memory access to run aces high, get the processor with the better architecture.

[GlassJaw]

Ok, Intel it is... I did a little research just now and it does look like Intel outperforms the AMD by a reasonable margin.

I was looking at TillDeaths combo... Seems like a good choice.  Anyone else want to chime in before I place the order?

Intel.

[Dragon]

I second those parts.  I've used the MB and the memory on a previous build with the 8400 processor.  You won't be disappointed.

[Ghastly]

The only other thing you might consider is that it's being hinted that Socket 775 is approaching end of life. If you are someone who feels cheated if they can't upgrade the performance of their system dramatically in a few years, a socket 1366 based solution will likely provide a better platform, albeit at a higher price.  

Having said that, I myself chose to build a socket 775 based system a few months ago since by the time I'm worried about upgrading it 1366 will likely be approaching end of life too.  

The important point being that if you are at least aware that there is a tradeoff, you can make the choice based upon whether savings now or future upgrades are more important to you.

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