Upgrade?

I am using Vista 64bit and I know that a lot recommend 2G for playing games,
so would 4GB be good or overkill.
The reason I'm asking is that I dont need a MicroATX mobo and I know Asrock
is just a vanilla board manufacturer (nothing fancy just get the job done).
I would like to O/C to get the maximum out of this or any other processor
for that matter.
But at that sort of money it seems a bargain. The next best I've seen is an
AMD 6000+, Asus M2N Plus mobo and 2Gb of Corsair DDR2 ram for £275.
I know the price drop brings AMD back in line but a lot of stories say that
the core2 duo is the dogs B*(£"$ks.
Is it worth the risk or should I wait for a while.

Robin
 >> Stay informed about: Upgrade? 

"Robin Gordon" <robing RemoveThis @gotadsl.co.uk> wrote in message
news:ddmdnYJdYbS94PvbnZ2dnUVZ8qKvnZ2d@pipex.net...
>I am using Vista 64bit and I know that a lot recommend 2G for playing
>games, so would 4GB be good or overkill.
> The reason I'm asking is that I dont need a MicroATX mobo and I know
> Asrock is just a vanilla board manufacturer (nothing fancy just get the
> job done).
> I would like to O/C to get the maximum out of this or any other processor
> for that matter.
> But at that sort of money it seems a bargain. The next best I've seen is
> an AMD 6000+, Asus M2N Plus mobo and 2Gb of Corsair DDR2 ram for £275.
> I know the price drop brings AMD back in line but a lot of stories say
> that the core2 duo is the dogs B*(£"$ks.
> Is it worth the risk or should I wait for a while.
>
> Robin

I took the plunge and installed Vista Ultimate (32bit) and find no
difference at all as far as overclocking stability. The main difference I
have found is that if you turn on all the bells and whistles benchmark
programs like 3DMark etc. fall a bit. No biggie. As far as gaming (mostly
flight and racing simulations is about it for me) I see no real-time
problems at all. Outlook in Office XP has some problems in Vista like
lockups and such but the rest of the suite runs fine. My A/V and music
editing/mixing programs surprizingly work just fine contrary to what I had
heard previously. I have an E6600 @ 3.2ghz and it is completely stable in
both XP Pro and Vista Ultimate. I even did away with the dual boot and am
running Vista exclusively now. I beta tested Vista from the get go until the
final RC and the actual release was a bit better as far as compatiblilty
with older programs. HW compatibility is a bit different. I have an older HP
5300c scanner and HP flatly said they were not releasing any Vista drivers
for it. A little Googling found a work around using the XP drivers and I got
it going fine. I highly reccomend the NV 680i chipsets with the Core 2 Duos
right now. It isn't much more money in the long run and most folks are
getting good results from them.


Ed
 >> Stay informed about: Upgrade? 

With the extra information, your Vista 64-bit CAN use 4 GBytes of memory.
However, you state "I would like to O/C to get the maximum out of this or
any other processor...'. Give the Asrock motherboard a pass. It is 'plain
vanilla', does not support a 1333 MHz FSB, the 'micro ATX' form factor will
likely be a problem for temperature control, you will not have the ability
to run two display adapters in SLI mode, does not take advantage of 'SLI
Ready' memory' and it probably will not support a quad core. Get an nVidia
680i based motherboard; the price difference between the Asrock and a
moderately priced 680i full featured motherboard (at least in the USA) is ~
$80 vs. $200 US (EVGA

I have a system based on the ~ $200 US EVGA 680i motherboard and an E4300
CPU with DDR2-1066 memory - it runs quite merrily at 2.7 GHz; FSB of 1200
MHz, memory bus of 1200 MHz, CPU voltage of 1.21 v, and stock cooling (26 C
ambient.) Unlike 'Ed Medlin' I have, at present, only a single 8800 GTS 320
MByte video card (that overclocks quite nicely with GPU at 650 MHz and
Graphics Memory at 850 MHz (vs. stock frequencies of GPU at 512 MHz and
Graphics Memory at 792 MHz.) The 3DMark06 for my system with CPU 2.7 GHz,
memory at 1200 MHz (2:1 Memory Clock : CPU Clock ratio), GPU at 850 MHz and
Graphics Memory is ~ 10,600.



Click on 'User's Guide: NVIDIA nTune' at
http://www.nvidia.com/object/sysutility.html
and be amazed at the overclocking parameters that can be custom set with
this chipset.

There are somewhat cheaper versions of the nVidia 6xx series for Intel CPUs
that leave out a few features and that are priced below $200 US. I would go
so far as to recommend that, if you wish to keep the total price down, that
you consider a cheaper CPU (E4400, E6320, or E6420) just to be able to get a
nVidia 680i motherboard. Your overclocking experience will be that much
better. Especially since you are changing from an AMD platform to an Intel
platform.

If you go back in this newsgroup to about March 23, 2007 you will see that
the Core 2 Duo overclocking discussions got quite active. 'Ed Medlin' and I
have motherboards by different manufacturers, but have been exchanging
information since then. You will read about the problems we have had, and
the successes.

If you wish to go into this further, then please post your questions. Some
of the problems I have had include the lack of any reliable way of
displaying and logging temperatures, voltages, and fan speeds (MotherBoard
Monitor, the old favorite, hasn't been updated for years, and is useless for
the newer motherboards.) The system monitoring chips have gotten much more
complex and capable. The Winbond 83627DHG used in the EVGA 680i
motherboards can monitor voltages, temperatures, and fan speeds (some ADCs
are 8-bit, some 9-bit, some 16-bit), control at least three fan speeds,
provide floppy drive interfaces, serial interfaces, a parallel interface,
and other functions - as far as I know, no one has developed a application
to read ALL the measured parameters correctly (and I've tried nVidia's
nMonitor, SpeedFan, CPU-Z, CPUCool, and a few others.)

It may be that ASUS Probe (for ASUS motherboards only) does a better job on
Ed Medlin's ASUS 680i motherboard; that would be a real plus for ASUS over
EVGA.

Many 680i motherboards are manufactured to nVidia's reference design and in
fact are produced by a single mnufacturer (Foxconn, I think) under nVidia's
direction, then rebaged as EVGA, etc. One thing to consider is the
available expansion slots and drive connections. My EVGA 680i has two PCI-E
x16 slots, one PCI-E x16 (physical x16, electrical x, two PCI-E x1, and
two PCI slots. BUT the first 8800 class video card (two slot width) loses a
PCI-E x1 slot, the second 8800 class video card (two slot width) loses a PCI
slot. The drive connectors are one parallel ATA IDE connectors, six serial
ATA connectors, and one floppy connector. I had hoped to reuse a 300 GByte
parallel ATA drive with this system, but adding an expansion PCI parallel
ATA/RAID adapter would reduce air intake for video card number one or
require using on-motherboard audio; I ended up by installing the 300 GByte
hard drive in a USB 2.0 case and using two new 500 GByte 7200 RPM 16 MByte
cache serial ATA drives.


Please post your experiences with Windows Vista; many of us are still
waiting. Information on the performance of Vista 64-bit would be a first
here; I think there have been no posters who use the 64-bit version. By the
way, why did you choose the 64-bit version?

I am sure you will find a lot of help with your decision here; my vote is
can the Asrock and go with a 680i.

Good luck.

Phil Weldon


"Robin Gordon" <robing.RemoveThis@gotadsl.co.uk> wrote in message
news:ddmdnYJdYbS94PvbnZ2dnUVZ8qKvnZ2d@pipex.net...
|I am using Vista 64bit and I know that a lot recommend 2G for playing
games,
| so would 4GB be good or overkill.
| The reason I'm asking is that I dont need a MicroATX mobo and I know
Asrock
| is just a vanilla board manufacturer (nothing fancy just get the job
done).
| I would like to O/C to get the maximum out of this or any other processor
| for that matter.
| But at that sort of money it seems a bargain. The next best I've seen is
an
| AMD 6000+, Asus M2N Plus mobo and 2Gb of Corsair DDR2 ram for £275.
| I know the price drop brings AMD back in line but a lot of stories say
that
| the core2 duo is the dogs B*(£"$ks.
| Is it worth the risk or should I wait for a while.
|
| Robin
|
 >> Stay informed about: Upgrade? 

'Ed Medlin' wrote, in part:
| I took the plunge and installed Vista Ultimate (32bit) and find no
| difference at all as far as overclocking stability. The main difference I
| have found is that if you turn on all the bells and whistles benchmark
| programs like 3DMark etc. fall a bit.
_____

Ed, could you post information on how ASUS probe is working for you?
Particularly how MANY and WHICH voltages, temperatures, and fan speeds you
can display and log? I still have not found a reliable way of displaying
and logging all of the voltages, temperatures, and fan speeds that I'd like.
CPUCool comes the closest to doing the job, but three or four parameters are
still lacking. I especially want a third fan speed, as I wish to use this
to display and record the output of a liquid flow meter I bought to place in
the water cooling loop.

I've noticed that as summer approaches I have more difficulty with
overclocking using just air cooling. Once the room ambient (and system case
air temperature) goes into the 80s F ( above 27 C) my 50% overclocked E4300
at 2.7 GHz and 1.21 v is no longer stable under heavy use B^( When I run
the numbers, a watercooling system is FAR cheaper than turning the
thermostat down, and deep into the second driest year on record for Georgia,
a mid-80s F ( ~ 30 C ) inside temperature is still comfortable. Global
warming is rushing toward us!

Phil Weldon

"Ed Medlin" <ed.TakeThisOut@edmedlin.com> wrote in message
news:wHB9i.25544$JZ3.20528@newssvr13.news.prodigy.net...
|
| "Robin Gordon" <robing.TakeThisOut@gotadsl.co.uk> wrote in message
| news:ddmdnYJdYbS94PvbnZ2dnUVZ8qKvnZ2d@pipex.net...
| >I am using Vista 64bit and I know that a lot recommend 2G for playing
| >games, so would 4GB be good or overkill.
| > The reason I'm asking is that I dont need a MicroATX mobo and I know
| > Asrock is just a vanilla board manufacturer (nothing fancy just get the
| > job done).
| > I would like to O/C to get the maximum out of this or any other
processor
| > for that matter.
| > But at that sort of money it seems a bargain. The next best I've seen is
| > an AMD 6000+, Asus M2N Plus mobo and 2Gb of Corsair DDR2 ram for £275.
| > I know the price drop brings AMD back in line but a lot of stories say
| > that the core2 duo is the dogs B*(£"$ks.
| > Is it worth the risk or should I wait for a while.
| >
| > Robin
|
| I took the plunge and installed Vista Ultimate (32bit) and find no
| difference at all as far as overclocking stability. The main difference I
| have found is that if you turn on all the bells and whistles benchmark
| programs like 3DMark etc. fall a bit. No biggie. As far as gaming (mostly
| flight and racing simulations is about it for me) I see no real-time
| problems at all. Outlook in Office XP has some problems in Vista like
| lockups and such but the rest of the suite runs fine. My A/V and music
| editing/mixing programs surprizingly work just fine contrary to what I had
| heard previously. I have an E6600 @ 3.2ghz and it is completely stable in
| both XP Pro and Vista Ultimate. I even did away with the dual boot and am
| running Vista exclusively now. I beta tested Vista from the get go until
the
| final RC and the actual release was a bit better as far as compatiblilty
| with older programs. HW compatibility is a bit different. I have an older
HP
| 5300c scanner and HP flatly said they were not releasing any Vista drivers
| for it. A little Googling found a work around using the XP drivers and I
got
| it going fine. I highly reccomend the NV 680i chipsets with the Core 2
Duos
| right now. It isn't much more money in the long run and most folks are
| getting good results from them.
|
|
| Ed
|
 >> Stay informed about: Upgrade? 

"Phil Weldon" <not.disclosed DeleteThis @example.com> wrote in message
news:0WF9i.14126$296.8451@newsread4.news.pas.earthlink.net...
> 'Ed Medlin' wrote, in part:
> | I took the plunge and installed Vista Ultimate (32bit) and find no
> | difference at all as far as overclocking stability. The main difference
> I
> | have found is that if you turn on all the bells and whistles benchmark
> | programs like 3DMark etc. fall a bit.
> _____
>
> Ed, could you post information on how ASUS probe is working for you?
> Particularly how MANY and WHICH voltages, temperatures, and fan speeds you
> can display and log? I still have not found a reliable way of displaying
> and logging all of the voltages, temperatures, and fan speeds that I'd
> like.
> CPUCool comes the closest to doing the job, but three or four parameters
> are
> still lacking. I especially want a third fan speed, as I wish to use this
> to display and record the output of a liquid flow meter I bought to place
> in
> the water cooling loop.
>
> I've noticed that as summer approaches I have more difficulty with
> overclocking using just air cooling. Once the room ambient (and system
> case
> air temperature) goes into the 80s F ( above 27 C) my 50% overclocked
> E4300
> at 2.7 GHz and 1.21 v is no longer stable under heavy use B^( When I run
> the numbers, a watercooling system is FAR cheaper than turning the
> thermostat down, and deep into the second driest year on record for
> Georgia,
> a mid-80s F ( ~ 30 C ) inside temperature is still comfortable. Global
> warming is rushing toward us!
>
> Phil Weldon
>
 >> Stay informed about: Upgrade?