- Joined
- Oct 16, 2003
- Location
- Beer Sheva, Israel
Well currently there is only ONE setup worth investing your money in right now, everyone knows it: DFI LanParty and a A64 Venice. Me and most of the people here are advising on this setup for a while now so how can I give that advice if I don't follow it?
Here in Israel we pay DEARLY for our hardware, yes we do have a large selection, more then other European countries BUT it is very expensive for example a 3200 Venice is 284$, that is almost 100$ more! ATI X800XL is 475$!!!! Yes that is the XL not XT.
So I was looking for someone to ship me this hardware from the US, Aaron stepped up, also known as mtb856. Hes got some GOOOD karma out of doing this, he really helped me out here and if any of the mods are reading this give him a good title.
Now lets see my shipping list:
1. DFI LanParty nF4 Ultra-D - best A64 mobo currently out IMO, if I would get anything else I would need someone to shoot me.
2. A64 3200 Venice - The OCing chip ATM, OCed to 2700Mhz this puppy beats the 3500@2700Mhz and 3800@stock meaning this one is the current best bang for the buck chip.
3. OCZ PC4000 EL Gold rev.2 - I already had these babies in my old AXP rig, they are actually made for Intel chipsets but they work great on this rig. I have them at 3V all the way up to 285mhz but I haven't tested them for more and their timings are 2.5-3-3 and I consider that more then decent.
4. RoseWill X800XL - Another value item, can't beat the performance on the price. This bad boy only cost me 259$ at NewEgg.
I have to admit that the chip is amazing, its running at 2700Mhz right now with the stock cooler at 1.6V. I messed up with the stock coolers mounting but I'll correct that later on.
That's 35% OC right out of the box, IMO that's amazing.
This setup is very good for the money and I'm more then satisfied with it.
I compared this setup to my old AXP using 3Dmark and Sandra 2k5.
AXP Barton 2500@2400Mhz
3Dmark 01 15332
3Dmark 03 8796
3Dmark 05 3216
Sandra mem Around 3000
A64 Venice 3200@2700Mhz
3dmark2001 - 24647
3dmark2003 - 10860
3dmark2005 - 4814
Sandra - 7225/7148
Well here it is folks, I'm going to PI it now and post in the PI thread.
Hope this is a good reference for anyone who is looking to upgrade.
As for the question why didn't I go with Nvidia?
For 260$ and less the best card I could have gotten was a 6600GT, while the X800XL is on the same level as the 6800GT. "But in a year you can get another 6600GT and do an SLi setup" you say, well in a year the G70 and its variants will be in my price range and they would kick some 2X6600GT in SLi ***.
Overall I like to belive I'm a very "smart consumer", I like to know everything about products I will buy. IMO SLi is just a gimic and has no real use. "Why? SLi will give 120412434 FPS in Doom 3." you think to yourself "So what?" I say. I don't need to play games at gazzilion FPS just so I can say that I can, it has no real world benefit.
When will SLi become worth while? When Dual Core CPUs go mainstream, so one card will work with one core to render X and calculate X and the other card will work with the other to work on something else. This is still VERY far away, years ahead of us.
Here in Israel we pay DEARLY for our hardware, yes we do have a large selection, more then other European countries BUT it is very expensive for example a 3200 Venice is 284$, that is almost 100$ more! ATI X800XL is 475$!!!! Yes that is the XL not XT.
So I was looking for someone to ship me this hardware from the US, Aaron stepped up, also known as mtb856. Hes got some GOOOD karma out of doing this, he really helped me out here and if any of the mods are reading this give him a good title.
Now lets see my shipping list:
1. DFI LanParty nF4 Ultra-D - best A64 mobo currently out IMO, if I would get anything else I would need someone to shoot me.
2. A64 3200 Venice - The OCing chip ATM, OCed to 2700Mhz this puppy beats the 3500@2700Mhz and 3800@stock meaning this one is the current best bang for the buck chip.
3. OCZ PC4000 EL Gold rev.2 - I already had these babies in my old AXP rig, they are actually made for Intel chipsets but they work great on this rig. I have them at 3V all the way up to 285mhz but I haven't tested them for more and their timings are 2.5-3-3 and I consider that more then decent.
4. RoseWill X800XL - Another value item, can't beat the performance on the price. This bad boy only cost me 259$ at NewEgg.
I have to admit that the chip is amazing, its running at 2700Mhz right now with the stock cooler at 1.6V. I messed up with the stock coolers mounting but I'll correct that later on.
That's 35% OC right out of the box, IMO that's amazing.
This setup is very good for the money and I'm more then satisfied with it.
I compared this setup to my old AXP using 3Dmark and Sandra 2k5.
AXP Barton 2500@2400Mhz
3Dmark 01 15332
3Dmark 03 8796
3Dmark 05 3216
Sandra mem Around 3000
A64 Venice 3200@2700Mhz
3dmark2001 - 24647
3dmark2003 - 10860
3dmark2005 - 4814
Sandra - 7225/7148
Well here it is folks, I'm going to PI it now and post in the PI thread.
Hope this is a good reference for anyone who is looking to upgrade.
As for the question why didn't I go with Nvidia?
For 260$ and less the best card I could have gotten was a 6600GT, while the X800XL is on the same level as the 6800GT. "But in a year you can get another 6600GT and do an SLi setup" you say, well in a year the G70 and its variants will be in my price range and they would kick some 2X6600GT in SLi ***.
Overall I like to belive I'm a very "smart consumer", I like to know everything about products I will buy. IMO SLi is just a gimic and has no real use. "Why? SLi will give 120412434 FPS in Doom 3." you think to yourself "So what?" I say. I don't need to play games at gazzilion FPS just so I can say that I can, it has no real world benefit.
When will SLi become worth while? When Dual Core CPUs go mainstream, so one card will work with one core to render X and calculate X and the other card will work with the other to work on something else. This is still VERY far away, years ahead of us.
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. I'd consider the DFI NF3 version if new BIOS versions fix the kinks. Right now it just doesn't seem worth the trouble. Anyhow, I plan to get a 3200+ Venice and I hope mine hits 2.7 GHz as easily as yours!
