Hardware decision

zeus

zeus

out of date
Ive got a query on what would be the best setup now Intel has brought out a new chipset, 875. Its for playing games on.

I had it all planned out what I was gonna buy.
A Gigabyte Granite bay board with dual ddr400 and a P4b cpu, with a 9700pro.

Only now there is this Intel 875 chipset supporting pentium 4 but with an 800mhz fsb. To get the 200mhz fsb you gotta get an expensive £350 3ghz cpu, as opposed to the £145 2.4ghz I was gonna get.

Is it worth £200 extra for an 800mhz fsb and an extra 600mhz cpu power?

Also is the 9800pro worth the extra cash?I could leave the better cpu and get this instead.

The budget is a grand on the box, but could sqeeze the extra £200 to get the better cpu. As for the 9800pro, Ill leave that and just get the 9700pro.

Basically.....
Abit Intel 875
2.4ghz P4b 533mhz
Radeon 9700pro
about £940
,
but then.....

Abit intel 875
3.0ghz P4 200mhz with hyper threading
9800pro
about £1250
,

Abit intel 875
3ghz p4 200mhz with hyper threading
9700pro
about £1150

all with dual ddr400, Corsair xms3200 none the less :)

This is getting long, sorry. :blah:

Am I gonna see a massive improvment in my gaming by getting the new pentium 4?
And will I see an improvement by getting the 9800pro over the 9700pro?

I know I will see an improvment but is it worth the extra money for either or both?

Many thanks! :) :)
 
Ah I love a good hardware showdown.

The Gigabyte board is THE BEST BOARD! Its AMAZING. I was going to switch over to Intel this summer, and that was the board I wanted. The Intel 875 Is AMAZING. Gigabyte Is AMAZING. Now thats the board you should get, for sure.

Next up Is processor. Yes the 3.06GHz is very nice, But hell, NOBODY ever needs 3GHz, not even close to it. They jack up prices and speeds so people are tricked into believing they need some crazy ass high end processor. The 2.4 Will do you fine. Nobody will ever need a 3.0, not even me. The processor will do fine in that board. Dont worry.

Now, the Preformance difference between the Radeon 9700 PRO and the 9800 pro is not much. You dont need to spend money there at all. The 9700 PRO will do you awsome. Its a great card, and the 9800 PRO is a little overpriced.

So the setup should be as followed.

Gigabyte Board Intel 875
Intel Pentium 2.4 NORTHWOOD With Hyper Threading.
Corsair XMS 512MB PC3200 Dual DDR (2 X 512 not 2 X 256)
ATI Radeon 9700 PRO.

It'll be awsome for gaming, trust me.
 
Thats the trade off, ht isnt on the 2.4, just the 3ghz 533bus and the 3ghz 800bus.

I have read how you can apparently turn ht on on a non ht p4 but you need a mobo supporting it to do so, so I cant check.

Im just curious about the 800mhz bus. Any opinions here?

Cheers for the reply dude!
 
O yeah, the other reason for the 3ghz 800mhz board is the fact that the graphics card has gotta scale above 3ghz.

I might not use 3ghz or the bandwidth but my graphics card will benefit from it.

ht and clock speed isnt really my query, a 200mhz bus is :)

I cant wait to see the clock speeds thier gonna get out of this!
 
3rd post in a row! sorry!

Ive just found out that the ht cpus got choked up cos of hyperthreading.
The 200mhz bus solves that so now you can have a p4 running fine cos of the fast, high bandwidth dual ddr and a good ht cpu cos of the extra fsb speed.

It also makes full use of the 6.4gb/s from the dual ddr.

Its final
Gigabyte w i875
p4 3ghz 800mhz
2x256mb Corsair xms3200
Western Digital 40gb 8mb cache SE hdd
ATI Radeon 9700pro
The biggest psu I can find!
and a Chieftec Dragon
sound.... just SB 5.1 Digital with the 5.1 speakers!

For about £1100, :)
 
Yes, all Pentium chips have Hyper Threading, its just disabled on the lower clocked ones.

You have a nice rig, although, games will always need more ram, I suggest what you do is get a 400W PSU, isntead of some crazy 550. Nobody needs 550, Id say 350, but your running a bunch of Radeon and crazy motherboards. DO NOT GET HIGHER THAN 400W!!! Me, i'm runnign 350, and i'm fine. I didnt knwo they made the 40 GB WD SE's. I Only have one of the 40GB 7200. None the les,s the second best choice you could ahve done besides the WD Raptors :)

The 3.06GHz Chip is awsome. i was just tryign to cut soem corners for you to get mroe ram. :D I Love ram!

Bets of luck with the Rig, Well apreacited the post, I hope you stick around to tell us whats going on, and tell us how it all went, and maybe post some very sexy pictures :)
 
The problem that's being run into now with such fast chips is that they're being capped by the video card...like the Radeon 9700Pro (and likely 9800Pro as well). Hyperthreading can slow things down in some cases (you can disable it however)--particularly when the app is not made for multiple CPU's or HT.

If you want to be in the top rung and not have to buy newer equipment for a little longer than other people (depending on how fast you like to upgrade), it could be advantageous to buy the fastest you can afford right now. An 800MHz FSB is one fat pipe.

PSU-wise, bigger is better, but there is a point where it's excessive. Buying a good brand is better than getting a the most wattage, since not all companies are equal. I personally swear by Sparkle. My main box is powered by their 350W unit, and I 've got a fairly full system. I've yet to have stability issues due to it. Antec is another brand that's pretty good. The main thing you want to look for in a PSU is the weight: the heavier the better (unless you get a hernia or back problems from it) since there are more components in these ones and that results in a cleaner supply of power to the system. Obviously, if you see a good deal on a 550W or better, I wouldn't turn it down, but otherwise, 350W is about the sweet spot.
 
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