Worth upgrading/importing from US?

Hi all, looking at upgrading my old XP palomino 2100+ with 512mb pc2700, to
an athlon64 3200+ with 1gb pc3200, and i like the look of the DFI lanparty
board. A few questions:

1) Is there going to be a significant improvement in performance? I do
everything with my computer, from software development to video encoding to
gaming.
2) Is it worth spending the extra on a 3400? this would be stretching my
budget to the absolute maximum though so i'd rather not for a small
improvement.
3) How about dual channel memory, does that make a noticeable difference in
the real world? I know the DFI doesnt support it and i'd need to get the
more expensive 939...
4) Anyone got this mobo (DFI lanparty 250gb) and have any feedback?

Thanks for any suggestions, it has to be the A64 really, the P4 i could get
on my budget is pretty poor. I have a budget of 350gbp and want to get a
160gb/200gb SATA drive too.
Seeing as most of you guys are probably in the states, would i save much
importing the stuff from over there? My budget works out as about $680US...
any comments on what i could buy for that over the pond?

On Sat, 18 Dec 2004 18:51:49 +0000, Iain Dingsdale wrote:

Hi all, looking at upgrading my old XP palomino 2100+ with 512mb pc2700, to
an athlon64 3200+ with 1gb pc3200, and i like the look of the DFI lanparty
board. A few questions:

1) Is there going to be a significant improvement in performance? I do
everything with my computer, from software development to video encoding to
gaming.

About 50% cpu wise.

2) Is it worth spending the extra on a 3400? this would be stretching my
budget to the absolute maximum though so i'd rather not for a small
improvement.

Not if you just oc the 3200+ to 2.4GHz. Then it will be the same clock
speed and have 1M cache. ( 3700+)

3) How about dual channel memory, does that make a noticeable difference
in the real world? I know the DFI doesnt support it and i'd need to get
the more expensive 939...

939 provides less than 5% performance inrease over 754 cpu of the same
clock speed and cache size. You be the judge.

4) Anyone got this mobo (DFI lanparty 250gb) and have any feedback?

Haven't looked at it, but assume it's the newer chipset with the PCI lock.
If not forget it. BTW, get faster ram. PC4000 should give you room to OC
and still run the buses in sync.

Seeing as most of you guys are probably in the states, would i save much
importing the stuff from over there? My budget works out as about
$680US... any comments on what i could buy for that over the pond?

I would think import taxes would kill you, but don't know for sure.

--
Abit KT7-Raid (KT133) Tbred B core CPU @2400MHz (24x100FSB)
http://mysite.verizon.net/res0exft/cpu.htm

"Iain Dingsdale" wrote in
:

Hi all, looking at upgrading my old XP palomino 2100+ with 512mb
pc2700, to an athlon64 3200+ with 1gb pc3200, and i like the look of
the DFI lanparty board. A few questions:

1) Is there going to be a significant improvement in performance? I do
everything with my computer, from software development to video
encoding to gaming.
2) Is it worth spending the extra on a 3400? this would be stretching
my budget to the absolute maximum though so i'd rather not for a small
improvement.
3) How about dual channel memory, does that make a noticeable
i have the dfi lanparty nf3 250gb ut, with a amd64-3000+ chip.
it's a nice full sized atx board, my only cripes are, the nf3 heatsink
is only passive and the aux audio link does not have a connector on it,
for a top of the range lanparty nf3gb, i would have expected these as
default, it has just about every thing else on it.
there are many many user overclocking settings in the bios and if you get
2 double sided pc3200 memory chips the default setting will be 333mz but
can be changed in the bios, so better off getting 2 single sided chips
instead or 3.
i wish i had got the 3400+ cpu instead as it comes out as good as the 939
dual channel boards, in the benchmark reviews i have read and better than
most intel of the same or higher speeds in most things, apart from the
usual things intel comes ahead of the amd chips but not by much.
hope this helps,
good luck and don't bother importing.
p.s... if you shop around on the net you can get some good deals, i paid
£76 for my dfi and found it at £65 else where after buying it and i got
my chip at £5 dearer than some other places i looked at after buying it
but got my corsair value 2x256 single sided chips cheaper than most
places i could see.but take in postage aswel when buying.
i ran prime95 for 6 hours 20 minutes and no errors or warnings came up,
so i'm pleased about that.
once again good luck in your search and purchase.
phil...