Socket 939 Upgrade Help... 4400+?

[Sportwarrior]

Hey everyone... I'm currently running a socket 939 rig with a 3700+, 7800 GTX, and 2 gigs of ram. I've been trying to figure what the best upgrade could be right now... I'd rather not purchase a whole new CPU/mobo/ram combo right now. What I'm really looking at is picking up a 4400+ online for around $130... If I'm not mistaken it would essentially give me a 2nd 3700+ core... I know there's much more to it than that, but the specs seem roughly the same.

My other CPU issue revolves around the Opteron chip... I know next to nothing about it. I have only been considering the 4400+ as an upgrade over my 3700+, but perhaps an Opteron would present a better option? I really just want to extend the life of my computer for another 1-2 years, as I have little desire to rebuild with a new CPU/Mobo/Ram combo right now. I could easily get an Opty 175 instead of the 4400+, or perhaps even the 180 if there's enough of a performance boost.

I'm also looking at picking up an 8800 GTS 320mb card sometime in the next few months as well...

Question 1 - Is it worth upgrading from a 3700+ to a 4400+? Or would it be better to ride out my current CPU/Mobo/RAM combo for another year or so?

Question 2 - What kind of differences are there between the Opty 165/170/175 and the 4400+? I probably wouldn't dabble all that much in OCing... I have an upgraded fan and heat sinc on my cpu right now, but I don't feel I know enough to safely OC.

Question 3 - If I indeed got the 4400+, would it improve the performance of the 8800 GTS once purchased over the 3700+? I've seen articles indicated that it would, but most of those had the 4400+ OC'd to 5200+ speeds, which is not something I'm prepared to do quite yet.

Thanks a bunch for the help, fellas.

 

[LeAd_Poisoning]

yeh you'd see a good performance boost from running that X2 4400. Getting an Opteron will depend on what motherboard you are using and whether you want to overclock or not. If the Opteron 175 is similarly priced to the 4400, then get that and overclock it a little. Its the 170 and 165s which require decent motherboards to overclock high given their multiplier limitations. the 175 should overclock nicely with its x11 multiplier without much stress on the motherboard. They are overclocking high on stock voltage these days aswell too. Its still a good choice if you want to do little or no overclocking, but if this is the case, the 180 @2.6ghz stock would be better if affordable. Im assuming you are running a 2gb dual channel kit, which one? This should be an acceptable basis to run an 8800, but you will be CPU limited a fair bit at lower resolutions if you dont want to overclock

 

[Sportwarrior]

Thanks for the info, man. It's already a big help.

I'm currently running on a eVGA nForce 4 mobo... I'm not entirely sure if it's the NF41 or the NF43. I'm also running OCZ PC3200 Dual Channel Platinum DDR400 RAM... I'd give you the response timing and all that jazz, but I couldn't tell you off the top of my head... It's been over a year since I've tinkered with this machine's specs.

Anyway, I see the Opty 180 runs at 2.4 ghz... does that really give a performance boost over the 175? Does it provide a higher ceiling for OCing? As I think I said already, I'm running an upgraded fan+heat sink... a Thermaltake Venus Series if that means much...

 

[Sportwarrior]

Also worth noting that I'm looking at around $137 for a 4400+ from Tigerdirect, while an Opty 175 or 180 would cost me $166 and $193, respectively. I think I could justify the $166, but the extra $60 for the 180 would probably need to come with some assurance of that much extra future proofing...

 

[LeAd_Poisoning]

At those prices you may aswell get the X2 4400 and it should overclock well enough in the future, as a measure of future proofing. The 175 for the extra $30 might be worth it tho, for the high overclocks at stock volts and likelihood of hitting 2.8-3.0ghz should you decide to overclock in the future.

 

[Sportwarrior]

Again, thanks. My gut told me to go with the 4400+ X2, but I'm intrigued by the Optys. I haven't really done much OCing on this machine at all, so I'm not sure what this mobo and RAM can handle. I'm so rusty with all this stuff that I may not even bother, although I know it can result in a nice performance boost when combined with an 8800 GTS.

I'd be tempted to get the Opty, but I'd need to figure out if I'd need any extra cooling in my machine to do so... In a perfect world I'd like to just drop the chip in, maybe OC it a little, and leave it at that. If it's gonna take anything more than my Thermaltake fan or the Opty stock fan to OC substantially then I guess I'd better just grab the X2.

I know I should look it up myself, but what's it gonna take to get a nice OC boost out of an Opty 175?

 

[LeAd_Poisoning]

a lot are getting quite high on stock volts, ive seen a fair few running at 2.6ghz/2.7ghz on the stock cooler/voltages. Id get the opty for the extra $30, it has a potentially higher ceiling for overclocking should you decide to play around with it in the future, which you invariably will a few years down the line to eek more life out of it.

 

[UBERCOOL]

I think the opty is the way to got. Without upgrading your cooler you should be able to go up a few hundred megahertz without any problems if you choose to go down that road. And if you need a little boost in the future you can get a better cooler and push it farther.

 

[Sportwarrior]

You're probably right about tweaking down the road... I take it the FSB/HT difference between the 4400+ and the Opty 175 isn't a big deal? Or am I reading these specs wrong? Are there any big differences at all?

 

[Sportwarrior]

One last note before I get going... The Opty would be a Denmark core, and I believe there are newer cores out there (although I'm not sure)... I'd be getting it from Newegg.com.

Anyway, keep the info coming, fellas. I really appreciate the help I've already gotten, and any additional info is only gonna help more. I want to figure out the differences between the 4400+ X2 Toledo and the Opty 175 Denmark before I commit either way.

 

[LeAd_Poisoning]

i think the Denmark is the older core, it doesnt overclock as consistently as the Toledos. i have a Toledo core 165. Have a look at Denmark and Toledo 175 overclocks

 

[GunnerMan]

Where can you find a Toledo 175?

 

[Omsion]

SportWarrior, what's your mobo/RAM? You can defenitly save some money by getting a 165 or 170 and OCing it with a high FSB if your mobo can take it (the current cores out of Newegg seem to wall at 2.7 or 2.8).
Also, the opties have 1MB of L2 cache compared with 512k on the X2s, but cache isn't a major effect on AMDs.

 

[Dan0512]

I would recommend you an Opteron chip. I replaced my 3000 Venice with an Opty 170, and so far it has gone up to 2.8 ghz on stock volts.

I'd get the 175 if your board doesn't like running high HT frequencies (above 280).

dan

 

[Sportwarrior]

Is there anywhere I can find info on my mainboard's performance? As I said earlier, it's an eVGA nForce 4 mobo... either NF41 or NF43... The ram is OCZ PC3200 Dual Channel Platinum DDR400 RAM, but I can't remember the specific response timings.

Also, I've searched for an Opty Toledo but I really can't find one. The Denmarks on Newegg.com probably offer the best price/performance combo anyway.

I will admit, however, that I'm slightly confused over some of the spec differences between the Opty Denmark and the X2 Toledo... According to Newegg, the 170 Denmark has the same L1 and L2 Cache specs as the X2 (2x128 and 2x1mb, respectively) while the HTB for the 170 is rated at 1000mhz, half that of the X2 Toledo at 2000mhz. Again, I haven't been looking this intently at processors since I built this machine in August of 05, so I'm not too fresh on how accurate these specs are or how important they are in performance.

Anyway, if anyone knows anything about how my mobo/RAM will perform while OCing my CPU, any info would be appreciated. Any OCing I did would probably just consist of running the CPU at stock voltage and cranking up some other settings a tad... I don't really want to physically mess with anything else in my machine, and would rather just keep the cooling setup I have now (which is fairly close to standard with some upgraded fans)...

 

[LeAd_Poisoning]

overclocking on stock volts and coolers etc, id say go with the 170, more potential to OC on stock cooling/volts etc. The OCZ ram will overclock well and run fine with the Opty. The board should be fine, but check to see what FSB people have managed to run on it

 

[Sportwarrior]

I would probably rather grab the X2 or 175, simply because that gives me a chip with stock speeds equivalent to my current 3700+ San Diego... I know that's kind of dumb, but if I decide not to OC all that much for the time being I'd like something with a fallback point similar to what I have now.

Over on TomsHardware forums I'm hearing that I can probably crank the X2 up to 2.6ghz... is that gonna require serious OCing? Or could I get it there with the same near-stock cooling and stock voltage?

 

[QuietIce]

I'd go with the Opty 175 instead of the 4400 - chances are you can OC the Opty a little just fine w/the stock cooler. My 180 went to ~2700 on the stock cooler and decent case flow. The newer ones should do even better as many of them will OC that far w/out extra vCore, which mine needed ...

 

[Omsion]

Sportwarrio, the HT specs are equivelent (one measures 1-way, the other multiplies it by 2 to get 2-way).
If you don't want to OC at all, get a 4400 over the 175, as it's currently cheaper.
However, I reccommend a cheaper 165 or 170 and OC. Even if your mobo is not a OCer capable of FSB>300, it can probably still get to 220x10 or 244x9 to match a stock 4400/175 without any trouble.

 

[Sportwarrior]

I was just posting in another thread about my OC experience with my current 3700+ and mobo... I'm able to get it up to 2.54 ghz, but only by raising the vCore to 1.5v... anything else and it starts getting wacky with blue screens, freezes and restarts. I'm not sure if that has to do with the stepping I have, or if it has to do with the BIOS/mobo, or the RAM (doubt it's the RAM)... I've been going through trial runs to test everything out, and while my mobo definitely appears plenty capable of overclocking, my current results just aren't that encouraging...

In any event, I'm probably gonna spring for the Opty 170 sometime soon. From what I can gather it's a much better OC chip, anyway.