When should I upgrade?

[Karl04]

I mean, when? like in January or february or June? or what?

I am looking into, the 64bit CPUs. But i dont know anything about them.

I just think, that going from 850 duron with geforce 3 to XP2200+ and Radeon 9700Pro wont give much performence increase will it?

I want something new, like new technology. any ideas?

Should i be getting Clawhammer or the Intels Itaniam?
i mean, not any time soon. but when


Karl:eh?:

[BaldHeadedDork]

This is always a tough question.

But part of it is easy. You shouldn't lose too much sleep wondering how much performance you will lose if you don't get a 64 bit CPU, because for all but a literal handful of home users there will be no difference. Programs have to be specially written to take advantage of 64 bit processing, just as they do with SMP (multiple) processor systems. Eventually we will see programs like games being written for 64 bit systems, but this is a long, long way off. (Last year John Carmack said he expected the shift no sooner than 2010.)

Now to the hard part: The first question you should ask is, what do you use your computer for and what performance bottlenecks are you running into now? Or are you wanting to upgrade just to get something new?

In the next six months you'll see a large move towards Serial ATA drives, more AGP 8X chipsets and cards, and a growing number of DDR400 chipsets. In a year you'll probably see full implementation of S-ATA and the establishment of Dual DDR on motherboard chipsets. And of course there will be a new nVidia card by then, too.

Will any of these solve a problem you can't fix today? If yes, then you should wait. For me, the existing technology will cover what I need, so I'm buying now to take advantage of the mature technology (read fewer crashes and RMA's) and falling prices.

And about the performance increase between a Duron 850/GF3 and a XP2200/Radeon 9700 Pro: It depends on what you are doing with it. If you run a lot of CPU and graphics-intensive programs like flight simulator games, then you'll see a huge improvement. But if you play older games like Team Fortress Classic and do a lot of websurfing and MP3 stuff, you won't because the new hardware you are considering would be massive overkill.

Hope this helped.


BHD

[Captain Slug]

Here are some things to consider...

Game Performance: Largely video and CPU based but is also greatly effect by RAM speed and capacity.

Windows Performance: Largely Hard Drive peerformance based with dependancy on RAM speed/capacity and a small amount of processor speed

MP3: Sound Card, RAM, and Hard Drive performance

You currently have a very capable video card which I don't think you should really consider upgrading until next year. You'll get the largest performance gain from upgrading your Motherboard, Hard Drive, RAM, and Processor. Along with those new items you will need a much more efficient cooling setup (I recommend the Thermalright AX-7 and a 40CFM or more fan on-top).

I also recommend a new case and power supply.
If you have any specific questions or would like me to help you decide on parts just send me a PM

[kooshball]

u do realize that itanium is REALLY expensive...
maybe hammers will be a good transition step for homeowners.

koosh

[Karl04]

hmm, guess we'll have to get Pentium 4s than eh?

karl