Start it up!

[docui]

Thanks EmilyB, joshvee, RWWolf, et. al.

So the 939Socket MoBO for the AMD 64 bit chips eh? Okay, lets go with that.

And for the sake of keeping my options open, maybe two suggestions? One with the PCI-e slot and one without?

Suggestions on make/model? Now for both the mobo and the CPU? Let's say a $400-500 budget for those?

~The Doc

[Rabidwerewolf]

CPU: s939 AMD Athlon 64 3500+, .130nm Newcastle Core @ 2.2ghz, $267 I would suggest the oem version, but it is $5 more so I guess you can sell the stock hs/f on ebay or here.

HS/F: ZALMAN CNPS7000B-Cu Copper CPU Cooler, $44.99

MOBO: Abit AV8, $111

Total is $422.99.

or with a pci-e MOBO, Gigabyte K8NXP-SLI, but cost is unknown. I am guessing around $200 for the board??? It is also not available yet.

[EmilyB]

Motherboard with PCI-E support: AX8

As a bonus, with this motherboard you get to keep DDR1 and not have to bother with DDR2.

[Rabidwerewolf]

Motherboard with PCI-E support: AX8

As a bonus, with this motherboard you get to keep DDR1 and not have to bother with DDR2.

All of the intial nF4 and K8T890 boards for socket939 use DDR1 memory. DDR2 memory want come to the the Athlon64, FX and Opteron platforms for a while yet, probably latter 2005.

[EmilyB]

Motherboard with PCI-E support: AX8

As a bonus, with this motherboard you get to keep DDR1 and not have to bother with DDR2.

All of the intial nF4 and K8T890 boards for socket939 use DDR1 memory. DDR2 memory want come to the the Athlon64, FX and Opteron platforms for a while yet, probably latter 2005.

Thats very true. I was just trying to avoid SLI, which in my own personal opinion is not worth paying for, and I think any SLI motherboard will be heavily priced, although that remains to be seen.

[Rabidwerewolf]

Motherboard with PCI-E support: AX8

As a bonus, with this motherboard you get to keep DDR1 and not have to bother with DDR2.

All of the intial nF4 and K8T890 boards for socket939 use DDR1 memory. DDR2 memory want come to the the Athlon64, FX and Opteron platforms for a while yet, probably latter 2005.

Thats very true. I was just trying to avoid SLI, which in my own personal opinion is not worth paying for, and I think any SLI motherboard will be heavily priced, although that remains to be seen.

You are probably right about the socket 939 with the nF4 and the VIA K8T890 boards being high in price. I'm estimating in the $200 US price range. We'll know shortly as I'm seeing dealers beginning to list them and are taking pre-orders.

[kltsin]

Hmmm I've heard this type of preaching before and I think your wrong.........little over a year ago ppl were saying there is no need for anything more than 64MB and a GF4 and wont be for many years. ppl felt 128MB was massive over kill.

As far as the 939 goes this socket type was released as the new socket to support the 64bit for the next 3 to 4 years or longer and was always planed that way. In fact the 754 was just a quick fix to get the 64 Bits on to the market till the 939 was perfected. The 939 was designed to meet the needs of future technology and faster chips for years to come and it's full potential has yet to be tapped.

Actually people were saying 256 was massive overkill not 128 a year ago.

Also if you look at the progression of cpus and gpus there is a fast swing do to competition and a leveling out period.

More recently some OEM manufactures now are breaking contracts and buying both gpus and selling them in their own cards.
Originally if one manufacturer had a contract their hands were tied.
A few years ago this would have been death but now its making great cards more affordable since a manufacturer like gygabyte can create cards for both nvidia and ati, and ati is supplying less cards and letting others build their cards.

Onto the cpu, yes I am very aware of the cpu market, but lets put it into perspective.
Yes I was critical, overtly so for the bottom line that buying for tomorrow is really expensive and not a sure thing.
Both Intel and AMD stopped under selling their cpus to create a influx of new users, then came the price war..
Things have leveled off since then and prices will be high as opposed to the last 5 years.

I expect nothing to change until 64bit based programs and the windows 64 os make an impact.

Basically put I dont expect a whole lot until mid 2005 and a price/tech war may again drive prices down.

Also other users do agree that the next big thing is usually a bust such as ddr2, look at rd ramm, its better than ddr etc..

Im not an analyst and do appreciate any comments regaurding my theories and opinions

But my advice is this, dont spend way to much money to get the best hardware that hasnt been proven, get what you need and screw benchmarks.

Actually most of you proved my point already, 754 was a stepping stone?
Wait no it was to prevent it used as being a server cpu wait no......

Intel will come up with something in the next 2 years forcing amds hand.... will it be the same socket type (939), probably, but you never know.
$700 is alot for just a top end cpu thats all

[joshvee]

Thanks EmilyB, joshvee, RWWolf, et. al.

So the 939Socket MoBO for the AMD 64 bit chips eh? Okay, lets go with that.

And for the sake of keeping my options open, maybe two suggestions? One with the PCI-e slot and one without?

Suggestions on make/model? Now for both the mobo and the CPU? Let's say a $400-500 budget for those?

~The Doc

Lets put it this way. There is no DISADVANTAGE to PCI-E so why not get it and have a motherboard you can upgrade for the future.

[EmilyB]

Lets put it this way. There is no DISADVANTAGE to PCI-E so why not get it and have a motherboard you can upgrade for the future.

I agree 100%

[docui]

We can all just get along.

Excellent. So just as I've noticed the AX8 is not really available anywhere. In reading some other reviews they're notiriously out of stock at the moment.

As such, are their any other boards that are available right now? Not that I'm buying this minute but just for comparison sakes.

Next. GPU.

*The Doc steps back and hands out boxing gloves and so forth* Hopefully there is something in the $300-$400 range? *crosses fingers* I know that ATI's PCI-e cards are wow expensive.