what's up guys, I recently ordered some new computer parts from newegg and wanted to know what you guys think. Considering i'm on a budget and desperately felt I needed to upgrade from my current rig, I went with the best parts I thought would suit me as far my price range. I'm just wondering how much of a performance increase I will see, and what do you guys think about this setup.

New PC
AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ AM2
GIGABYTE GA-M55SLI-S4 Socket AM2
OCZ Gold Series 1GB (2 x 512MB) DDR2 667
eVGA 7600GT 256mb PCI-E
WD 160gb SATA 3.0Gb/s

Old PC
AMD Athlon 64 2800+ s754
GIGABYTE GA-KN8S Socket 754
KINGSTON HYPER-X 2X512 DDR400
eVGA 6600GT 128 8X AGP
SEAGATE 80gb ATA100

I can understand the excitement and the desire to hurry up and buy the parts for your new screamer.

From what I can see, the biggest jump for the new setup over the old one will be the difference between the memory, single-channel bottlenecked on the s754, to the DDR2 dual channel on the AM2.

Quite honestly, you will see some improvement on the graphics side, although I don't think it's going to be the difference between Pong and Far Cry, more like Far Cry at 640x480 to 1024x768...

Now, as far as what I think you should have done, you could have posted a thread asking for advice on bang-for-the-buck components with which to upgrade your machine. The fine folks around here would probably have been able to help you find not only better components, but possibly even cheaper ones, allowing more of your budget towards shipping costs (ie: get it 2-day delivery as opposed to 3-7 day=whenthehellever delivery).

Grandpa hit on the nail. You'll notice a nice difference but nothing spectacular. Most likely you're looking at being able to play games at 10*7 with everything on high as opposed to 8*6 with everything on high/med. The dual core won't really make much of a difference unless you're planning on heavy multitasking.

Quote: Originally Posted by GrandpaNoob72 I can understand the excitement and the desire to hurry up and buy the parts for your new screamer. From what I can see, the biggest jump for the new setup over the old one will be the difference between the memory, single-channel bottlenecked on the s754, to the DDR2 dual channel on the AM2. Quite honestly, you will see some improvement on the graphics side, although I don't think it's going to be the difference between Pong and Far Cry, more like Far Cry at 640x480 to 1024x768... Now, as far as what I think you should have done, you could have posted a thread asking for advice on bang-for-the-buck components with which to upgrade your machine. The fine folks around here would probably have been able to help you find not only better components, but possibly even cheaper ones, allowing more of your budget towards shipping costs (ie: get it 2-day delivery as opposed to 3-7 day=whenthehellever delivery).

True. I understand what you mean, and you're right I should have asked for advice before ordering. But its not too late to cancle my order, I just ordered everything today and haven't sent in the check yet. I ended up spending $ 538.50 on all the parts including shipping, my budget was $500. So if you or anyone thinks they can help pick out a better deal for the components be my guest. If no one posts anything by monday or tuesday i'll go ahead and order what i've picked. I also should mention that i'm not building this machine for just gaming, but I'm building a workstation towards my home studio and need a decent system to run everything on. But I do game also, which is why I choice the 7600gt, I know its not high-end, but being on a budget, I figured it would be okay.

See, it's my fault for assuming that when you said you ordered the parts, I took it to mean that you either went online or called it in, they already have your CC number or the PayPal is sent, or whatever...

I'm pretty sure that there will be some more folks checking this thread out, and chances are, you'll be able to get a couple nicer components, or at least the ones you ordered, at a lower price.

Wish ya the best of luck, and a Happy New Year, since that will be here before your parts will...

HAPPY NEW YEAR, FOLKS!!!

Honestly your best bet would be to hold off for a month or two. Wait for the new Nvidia 650i boards to come out along with the new 4400. Plus the 86xx and 84xx series graphics cards will be out which will wipe the floor with the current mid range parts. Prices will have dropped across the board, Vista will be out and you'll be able to build a far superior computer for far less.

The upgrade you picked really isn't all that much of an upgrade. You'll be wanting another upgrade in a year with those parts. Games like Crysis will soon be out will push today's best harware to its limits.

Why not save up until you can get something really nice? Upping your budget by $200 could get you a low end Core 2 Duo processor that would smoke an X2 any day plus a better GPU.

You could just upgrade to a Socket 754 Athlon 64 and 7800 series video card. Upping to 1.5 GB or 2 GB of RAM wouldn't be a bad idea either if you have room in your budget. This would be the best route to go for a quick, cheap upgrade.

I have a Pentium 4 3 GHz machine that originally had only 512 MB of RAM and an ATI x300SE video card. I upped the RAM to 1.5 GB and put in a 7800GT video card over a year ago and have had great results. Even with the weak processor (by today's standards), this thing will handle any game you throw at it.

Do you plan on running Windows Vista? If so, then the kind of upgrade you will need is a totally different story.

I actually thought I would see a nice difference in running programs,video editing etc. I'm not building the system just for gaming. Although I plan on adding another gig of ram and video card for sli, but not anytime soon. So nobody here thinks this will be a good upgrade from my current rig? Wow...I went from real excited about upgrading to confused by just reading these few comments lol.

Yes you would see an upgrade. Not much but it would be there. The reason we're saying wait is becuase within a month or two you'll be able to build a much MUCH better computer for about the same, not to mention that you'll also have more cash.

Quote: Originally Posted by eascarface Yes you would see an upgrade. Not much but it would be there. The reason we're saying wait is becuase within a month or two you'll be able to build a much MUCH better computer for about the same, not to mention that you'll also have more cash.

I really can't wait, due to this computer messing up lately, i'm in need of an upgrade. I'm actually running an amd athlon xp 1700 at the moment till I get a replacment on my socket 754 mobo.
Maybe you can suggest a better choice of components I should go with besides then current upgrade i'm looking at.

Well then I would recomend just trying to last out 1-2 more months. If you really really can't then I would pick up a E6600, some decent RAM and then a 650i motherboard. Then come Febuary pick up one of the new DX10 graphics cards.

Quote: Originally Posted by eascarface Well then I would recomend just trying to last out 1-2 more months. If you really really can't then I would pick up a E6600, some decent RAM and then a 650i motherboard. Then come Febuary pick up one of the new DX10 graphics cards.

I would like to get a E6600 Conroe, unfortantatly i'm on a budget which is $500. I need a new rig asap 'cause i'm constantly using the computer for work/recording music. Due to my current rig messing up like it has been, I rather not wait to upgrade my pc. Now as far as the parts i've picked, if anyone can suggest some I should keep or replace I'll appreciate it, thanks.

Newegg.com - AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ 2.0GHz Socket AM2 Processor - Retail
Newegg.com - GIGABYTE GA-M55SLI-S4 ATX AMD Motherboard - Retail
Newegg.com - OCZ 1GB (2 x 512MB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory - Retail
Newegg.com - eVGA GeForce 7600GT 256-P2-N615-TX Video Card - Retail
Newegg.com - Western Digital Caviar SE 160GB 3.5" SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - Retail

Total cost w/shipping: $535.50

Now if anyone can help me build a faster pc for the same price, I'll really appreciate it.

IMHO the biggest boost always comes from taking card of the biggest bottleneck. In your case I would say that the ATA HD is the biggest bottleneck. Using a RAID 0 array of SATA drives should make a huge difference. Using 2 80GB instead of one 160GB would cost a little more but give you superb HD performance.

Also I wanted to add i'll be using a 500 watt Ultra X Connect psu with my new rig. Will this be enough power?

7600GT, Cpt. Planet can tell you is a pretty awesome card. From a 6600GT, you gonna see a barely scratch of change. Say you wait for the new generation of cards, 8*** and the R600 cards, youll see a major difference in graphics, but the price difference, will be enough to buy a decent widescreen LCD.

Ohh and for ultra, (i didn't say this.) No. I would go with something on the lines of OCZ, PCP&C, or enermax, not that there aren't good brands outside of these, but i'd say if you go with these, and anything over 600w youll be set for a while a long while.

Quote: Originally Posted by s1ugh34d 7600GT, Cpt. Planet can tell you is a pretty awesome card. From a 6600GT, you gonna see a barely scratch of change. Say you wait for the new generation of cards, 8*** and the R600 cards, youll see a major difference in graphics, but the price difference, will be enough to buy a decent widescreen LCD. Ohh and for ultra, (i didn't say this.) No. I would go with something on the lines of OCZ, PCP&C, or enermax, not that there aren't good brands outside of these, but i'd say if you go with these, and anything over 600w youll be set for a while a long while.

Ya, I figured since I won't be gaming much, a 7600gt will be fine. I can always upgrade to a direct x 10 card later on, once the prices drop lol.

Quote: Originally Posted by coolerguy1984 what's up guys, I recently ordered some new computer parts from newegg and wanted to know what you guys think. Considering i'm on a budget and desperately felt I needed to upgrade from my current rig, I went with the best parts I thought would suit me as far my price range. I'm just wondering how much of a performance increase I will see, and what do you guys think about this setup. New PC AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+ AM2 GIGABYTE GA-M55SLI-S4 Socket AM2 OCZ Gold Series 1GB (2 x 512MB) DDR2 667 eVGA 7600GT 256mb PCI-E WD 160gb SATA 3.0Gb/s Old PC AMD Athlon 64 2800+ s754 GIGABYTE GA-KN8S Socket 754 KINGSTON HYPER-X 2X512 DDR400 eVGA 6600GT 128 8X AGP SEAGATE 80gb ATA100

I just recently bought a new setup very much like yours.
X2 3800
M59SLI-S5
G.Skill DDR2 800mhz 2GB
XFX 7900GS
The Gigabyte MB from what I've read is an awesome board, but I ended up having some problems with it and RMAed it...tbh honest I believe one of the DIMM slots was bad (2nd slot dual channel setup) . Both of my mem sticks tested fine when running them single threaded, although after I RMAed the board I realized that the MB bios might not have been auto sensing my memory timing and voltage correctly. Hopefully I'll know when I get the board back and it does the same thing.

If you're thinking budget dual-core, the AMD X2 3800+ and Intel E6300 are roughly the same price, and the E6300 beats the 3800+ at stock, not to mention when overclocked.

The gigabyte board I bought has 1.8v dimms and my ram is 1.9v, just wondering if I would have any problems.
p.s
I've already ordered everything, should have my new rig up and running sometime next week.

MB GIGA GA-M55SLI-S4 NF4 SLI AM2 - Retail Price=$79.99)
VGA EVGA 7600GT 256-P2-N615-TX R - Retail Price=$129.99)
CPU AMD|A64 X2 3800+ AM2 2x512K R - Retail Price=$139.00)
MEM 512Mx2|OCZ OCZ26671024ELGEGXT-K - Retail Price=$119.99)
HD 160G|WD 7K 8M SATA2 WD1600JSRTL - Retail Price=$59.99

Total Price=538.50 w/shipping

You should be ok...might want to consider hard setting your memory voltage and timing.