I've been out of the loop for too long - N00b now

Ya, my current system is a Athlon 1.3ghz, back from summer 2001.

Ever since, I havent really payed attention to the world of "compooters" and well, remained satisfied because I couldn't afford anything new as a college student.

Now I got the opportunity to give my current system to my father and he gives me some cash to spend on a new one (he'd buy a new one anyways as business expense, but since mine is good enough for him...)



Anyways, yes out of the loop for so long, I don't even know where to start looking for what's decent nowadays, I dont even know what AMD64 is vs Intel P4 hyperthreading.. is that even what's new anymore?

And those S939 AMD64 vs just plain 64? wtf!



Ok, so Ill just say what I typically want

Cheap system, I just want to be able to play HL2 on it and maybe battlefield 2 when it's out. Im not too demanding.


So here i start on the CPU messageboard to decide what AMD64 to get (wtf is S939?) then Ill need help on the mobo, after that, I think ill be able to manage with the graphics card and HDD


THNX!

First of all the Athlon 64 is what replaced the athlon XP, and has 64 becuase it possess the capability to run x86 64 as opposed to x86 32 that almost all other cpus do. This is somewhat of a moot point right now becuase very few 64bit OS's or programs exist. The big news about the A64 is its on die memory controller and the performance boost it gives. I think one of the stickies gives a much more detailed description of the archetexture.

S939= Socket 939 which is the less valuey type of platform versus the Socket 754 which I think right now has better Mobo support. Anyway the reason S939 is coming so is AMD is releasing inexpensive 90nm(Thats die size) Winchester cored A64s on S939 and is not releasing them for S754(with the exception of the Sempron(=duron) eventually). For socket 754 the core is the Newcastle which is more mature and are doing fairly well as far as OCs go. However these are are still 130nm CPUs.

If you want a cheap, overclockable, and upgradeable system I would reccomend waiting a few weeks then buy a S939 a64 3000 and an Nforce 4 chipset with PCI-express(=agp replacement). Then about a gig of PQI ram with TCCD chips and a ATI x700 or Nvidia 6600Gt( they perform about same in HL2). However if you get a 6600Gt and a Nforce4 SLI motherboard you can run to 6600Gt in SLI for Uber performance.

Finally you are definetly going to need a heavy duty PSU. I reccomend the new Fortron 500 or the Fortron 530 for best value or the new OCZ PSU for the ultimate in power.

Hope this helps you some.

Edit: hope this helps with understanding A64s

I doubt Id run two graphics card in SLI It's a bit too much

Weird, I never noticed the X700 before, why is it cheaper than a 9800 256mb pro? yet its a pro and 256mb too?

and you said wait a couple of weeks. Im probably gonna buy it in end of december, around christmas time, is that.. a good time? what's coming out to make it worth the wait? (not like im NOT gonna wait either way)

Nforce4 chipset loaded motheboard with PCI express graphics card support. The beauty of SLI is you can buy a 6600Gt now and when they get down to about 125-175 then you buy another for about 80% more performance.

The x700pro is what I meant and it is about the same price as 9800pro yet is faster.

423563753636

nforce4, those are coming out very soon? what will be the price range?

Insthink said:

nforce4, those are coming out very soon? what will be the price range?

Click to expand...

We may begin to see some early Nforce 4 motherboards out by the end of this year. However, it is more likely that this chipset will begin to truly surface around the beginning of next year. One cannot truly speculate on exactly what the prices will be, but my guess is that 1x PCIe motherboards should run around $120-$130, and SLI (2x PCIe video cards) motherboards will be around the $150-$170 range.

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