[Pc_Support] The Frugal BS ... I'm not going to go Socket-AM2 or LGA-775 ...

[Bryan J. Smith]

I've been holding off on upgrading my system since turn of the year.
First it was 1 month, then 2 ... now it's been a good 6 months.  I keep
holding off.

I was going to go Socket-AM2 -- get a new x2 AM2 processor, 4GB of
DDR2-800/PC2-6400 memory with at least 4-10-10-10 or similar timings and
maybe a 7900GT (which are $225 after rebate now) or whatever video card
was the best performance for under $250.  My wife would get the old one
with the 3200+ plus the 7800GTX which still isn't something to sneeze
at, 4GB of memory (combining our separate sets of 2GB of DDR into one,
even if it meant they could only run at DDR333/PC2700 for JEDEC
compliance) as well as my 7800GTX.  I was also considering Core 2 Duo
instead of Athlon 64 x2 AM2 too -- which also takes DDR2.

Well, 2 nights ago, that changed.

You see, I found that Foxconn has released a BIOS update for my 20 month
old nForce4 [standard] mainboard -- even though it's been discontinued
for over a year (not long after it came out, they came out with an
improved model) -- in February 2006.  It added support for x2 models,
even though they don't advertise it on the model's page.  But looking
under the CPU support for the exact mainboard, it's there -- virtually
all models.  The one thing that doesn't work in the new BIOS on this
older mainboard is the newer K8-PowerNow support for x2.  Not really
something I care about anyway -- but probably why they don't advertise
x2 support on it.

So now I'm just going to upgrade my CPU to an x2 for $150-175 or so when
AMD reduces prices next week.  I'm going to stick with my current
mainboard and video card until newer products come around in the fall or
winter.  My wife's not sneezing at her current 6800GT AGP either, which
still competes well with the 7600GT (higher clock, but only 128-bit wide
memory) that runs $150+.  So it won't be for at least another 3+ months,
maybe 6+ (2007), that I might upgrade the video card and mainboard for
$400 or so, giving my wife the 3200+ and 7800GTX.  I'm just going to
stick with the 4GB (2GB in each) investments I've made in DDR400 timed
at 2.5-3-3-6 (which is not value) and stay with Socket-939 until
sometime in 2007.

At the most, I might give my wife the 3200+ now, and buy a cheap, $35 or
so MicroATX nForce3 mainboard with AGP, so she can use it with the
6800GT (which is 2 years old now, but still quite capable -- 16/6
pixel/vertex with 256-bit wide of 256MB GDDR3 memory).  But that's it.
She's currently running an Athlon XP2600+ and runs in XP Home the most,
so dual-core, 64-bit and 4GB isn't going to buy her anything when Home
is only single-core (except for the new OEM releases for x2/Duo), 32-bit
and only supports 2GB (it doesn't even offer the 3GB memory model that
Pro does IIRC).

Yes, I've just been that frugal as of late.  I haven't upgraded my
system for almost 18 months now, and some of its components are much
older.  Except, of course, the 2GB memory, 7800GTX video card and
(overkill) 500W power-supply about a year ago.  Other than the video
card (but even then, I got my 7800GTX for around $400 after rebate
almost a year ago), I really wait and buy when the price is right.  Like
my 320GB SATA drives that are only maybe $20 cheaper today than they
were when I bought them over 15 months ago, $160+ DDR400/2.5-3-3-6 that
is still no cheaper a year later (in fact, I got it for sub-$150
on-sale), etc...


-- 
Bryan J. Smith          Professional, technical annoyance
mailto:b.j.smith at ieee.org    http://thebs413.blogspot.com
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