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Scan's 'Today Only' page have an interesting and enticing 'no brainer' deal. I have the motherboard and have no gripes with it at all.

Socket A is dying out but this CPU, mobo and Ram bundle looks to be exceptionally good value for those whom this represents a significant upgrade. A good stop gap till the competing socket standards, video interfaces and whatnot have sorted themselves out and come down in price and are actually implementable as worthwhile new technology maybe?

APPLIES TO SATURDAY/SUNDAY 21-22nd AUGUST 2004 weekend DEAL ONLY

A most impressive offer - but could you elaborate on the 'Socket A is dying out'? I'd just like to know more about this, if you'd be so kind...

Looks a good offer..

:o PIG, you didn't know? And you call yourself a geek. Just curl your tail in shame!

:P

Perhaps he's referring to things like the PCIe slot, and does this new fangled 64bit cpus take a different slot.....pardon my lack of terminology but I am not a geek. In the least.

Of course not Dan but you got it right all the same, eh? ;) Hee hee. Socket A is what you stick a (32bit) duron or athlon into, at least as high as the currently available Barton 3200+ (400MHz FSB) core. I don't know if there are any higher rated Bartons coming out but due to the production and availability of 64bit Athlons I doubt it.

Currently, socket 754 is the successor to our socket A processors and is a 64 bit platform. The highest rated socket 754 I think is 3400+ and starts from 2800+ speeds. It iself has been superseded somewhat by the recent introduction of socket 939, a new 64 bit standard that allows for both dual channel memory (ram) configuration whereas socket 754 did not and will be upgradable for the near future whereas the latter will not be. Hence, by the time Windows 64 bit edition comes out, socket 939 processors will be well past 4GHz in some cases whilst socket 754 stops at 3400+. The highest available socket 939 chip I believe is 3800+ or FX53 which has jumped over from a socket 940 platform (see below).

The other 64 bit AMD socket for multiple processor setups is socket 940, the 'opteron', sounding like some kind of transformers robot. They are available in single, dual and multiple configurations, up to 8 I believe - you need the right matching models for corresponding multi-setups (ie - there are a glut of single setup processors designed to perform alone that are incompatible with multiple setups). These start from around 1400+ and appear to be suceeded by the FX chips, FX53 being the fastest with 1MB of level 2 cache (the Barton has something like 512k and old palamino core 256k). They require ECC registered memory (same as for server setups) but are dual channel enabled. They're hideously expensive also, all things considered.

I see that Intel have a new socket 775 out that is beginning to include PCI Express and that the highest card available in terms of performance seems to be the ATI X600 XT. Only older Geforce models (FX 5900) appear to be available in PCI-X format. Mind you, depends where you look I suppose. PCI Express cards for X800 and GF 6800 and the like are just on the horizon and are weeks away at most. From what I've read there appear to be very little advantage to this new card type performance wise (real life). It will be useful for HDTV (high definition TV) due to its simultaneous two way data size. HDTV is available in this country from satellite - I presume you'd need a new type of DVD drive for when films are released on this format? Blu ray maybe? It looks likely to be some time before PCI Express reaps the advantage of its superior data bus, as there is currently no need for it (as I understand it). I've only seen one AMD mobo with PCI-X, and it was socket 940 (dual opteron) with 6 DIMMs (up to 12GB of PC2700 memory) and retailed at £260 or there abouts (ouch).

Well, I thought maybe this info would be wasted here for most people as they seem to have decent enough systems. If Scan put it all together for you (properly), then I think it's a better deal. Socket A might not be dead but it's clear it's been obsoleted somewhat as no future developments for it are likely. Mind you, it depends on what the market wants to an extent, I wouldn't be surprised to see this now budget low-mid range sector getting PCI Express all the same. Hope it's a little clearer - sorry to go on so.

Nerd, moi? 15.38% of me might be.... :rolleyes:

Crikey Spook :huh:

You see this is just the kind of thing to put a person like me off self building. So many different names, so many different configurations......it's so confusing!

(Not that I'm currently planning a self build - just debating it in a year or two when I break this one, perhaps by then this will all be sorted out.)

Yes Dan, it is very confusing. Simply put, right now for Intel platform, the 775 socket looks good with PCI Express though doesn't have 64bit support but you don't really need it (yet). For more longevity, the socket 939 64 bit AMD platform is the way to go if you're planning to stick with AMD for a while - but I have yet to see any PCI-X boards (they're all AGP at present). Intel have decided to rename their latest processors of course and have dropped sole reliance on core clock speeds as a guide to performance which makes it even more tricky deciding what represents good value. Mind you, they've probably got further developments up their sleeve which are due out soon which will bugger all this up even more...

What surprises me is just how hard it is these days to choose a graphics card. The model numbers are very hard to make head or tail of and hence price and performance differentials are hard to fathom. I spent hours and hours finding out what graphics card I should get for upgrading a GF 4 Ti 4200. I was looking on a stop-gap for when PCI-X cards are worthwhile value. Choices were ATI Radeon 9800 Pro at around £140-150 inc VAT + Del. You can soft-mod most of these to XT provided it has R360 core and 256 bit memory interface, that is if the heatsink/fan can handle the increased clockspeeds.

So, for a better stock cooler I opted for the HIS IceQ model at around £157 which would save me having to source and fit a better cooler. Though, before this, I noticed there was a 9800 XT for £197 or so which would save all that hassle as well as having double the memory (and faster also) to 256mb. Then I thought, well if you are spending close to £200, why not get the new Geforce 6800 card at £210 which is bound to be a lot faster and supports DX 9c.

And then of course, you look at what an extra £10 can get you and it goes on, ad nauseum up through standard GF 6800 models to GT, with 128MBs, 256MBs, faster core speeds, Ultra versions etc etc. By then, you're talking about major bucks. So I just bit the bullet and stuck with the HIS ATI Radeon 9800 version. Oh, I forgot to mention I also considered GF FX 5900/XT versions for their availability etc... No exaggeration to say I could have beaten my head on my desk for all the choice and confusion.

By the way, Overclockers are good for deciding on graphics cards and CPUs as they have it all laid out nicely, with relevant information. I ordered from them in the end. Prices not bad either. Just hope delivery will be okay. Doom III here I come... :D

I call myself a geek? I don't remember that one... I just know the odd thing (and normally it's very odd), and have yet to even consider 64-bit hardware... Then there's that SATA, Raid, and more than a few other funny sounding words that I'm not overly sure of... I intend to learn more at some point, but with it never being essential for me to know, I've never known...

Cheers for the information Mr.Tooth!

Perhaps it was Mrs Pig who said it post geek test.

Perhaps I'm remembering wrong post dementia.


Whatever, it's a ton of daunting info and confusing changes spilling over from Spook.

Thanks for that Spook, interesting read.

I can identify with your frustrations regarding graphic cards. I recently upgraded to a Radeon 9600 Pro 256MB but my head was in a spin researching all the different choices. Settled on the 9600 Pro as a stop gap to buying a whole new system hopefully next year.

:D

Yes, thanks for that Spook, not that I understand much of it, :blink: but a nice read anyway. :)