A future upgrade, need help.

[Inanimate]

Hello there. I've been using the nf4 lanparty ut SLI-D with an opteron 170 dualcore for the last 20 months or so, and Im still very happy with the performance.

 

However, a bit before christmas, Crysis, Half Life 2 EP:2, Far Cry 2 etc etc, will be out, and some of them will be best played with DX10.

 

Im getting an Asus 8800 GTX in time, once the games are days from being released.

 

Then I came to think about the rest of the computer, having 2x1024 OCZ rams and somewhat old components.

I figured it might be time to upgrade mobo/cpu/ram again.

 

During the past 3 days, I have not been able to reach the DFI-homepage at all, no matter which browser or computer in my home. Thats why I have no idea what new motherboards are out there, and since I haven't been into the whole computer-scene since I last upgraded, I have NO IDEA what to look for now.

 

 

So, having a ut nf4 SLI-D.. is it even neccessary to upgrade to another motherboard?

Opteron 170 dualcore, still strong, not overclocked, I browsed some local sites for CPU's, and all I can see is "AM2"-sockets. Does my opteron, which is s939 work in a AM2-mobo at all? If not, what should I go for?

 

 

Another question that arises is the whole "will my enormous GFX-card fit onto this motherboard", since todays GFX-coolers take up at least 1 PCI-slot.

Is there a chart available to see which CPU-coolers/GFX-cards that fit onto what DFI-board?

 

Thanks in advance, would appreciate some backup on this

 

Regards

[Angry_Games]

and some of them will be best played with DX10.

 

no, they won't

 

the only reason to move to a DX10 card is for the power of the card, not the DX10 features.

 

No games will have native DX10 features. Crysis will be DX9 as well as DX10 and like Lost Planet, you won't see much in the way of difference. Nothing built on the HL2 nor Unreal3 engine will be DX10 at all. They are both native DX9 engines.

 

Not to mention you have to have Vista for DX10 which is an entire reason within itself (especially gamers) to avoid DX10.

 

Do yourself a favor and get a DX10 video card but get it for the power of the card + future compatibility (when DX10 is actually prevalent instead of at about 2.5% penetration like it is now).

 

Always remember game companies code for the lowest common denominator, and that is about 1 billion users that have DirectX 9 operating systems like WindowsXP/2k. Compare that to the 5 million or so Vista users if there even is that many. Out of that 5 million that have Vista, consider that MAYBE 50% of them have a DX10 card...

 

Then I came to think about the rest of the computer, having 2x1024 OCZ rams and somewhat old components.

I figured it might be time to upgrade mobo/cpu/ram again.

 

no, there's no reason to spend any money on new mobo/cpu/RAM. What you have right now is still considered kick-butt and when it comes to gaming, the only thing that would make your gaming better is the 8800 card. Moving into brand new mobo/cpu/RAM won't make a bit of difference. Sure a core2 cpu might rip that movie in 2 minutes less time. Sure a core2 might let you do superpi in 3 seconds less time. Sure a core2 might give you a couple percent points better performance in cpu-intensive tasks, but in video games, it's all about the gpu, and having a dual-core + 2GB + 8800 = you should sock your money away and wait for a REAL upgrade sometime later on like second quarter 2008 or later when quads are all very very low in price and we see the next gen gpu's coming.

 

During the past 3 days, I have not been able to reach the DFI-homepage at all, no matter which browser or computer in my home. Thats why I have no idea what new motherboards are out there, and since I haven't been into the whole computer-scene since I last upgraded, I have NO IDEA what to look for now.

 

follow my above advice and worry about a vid card.

 

but when it comes time to look for new hardware, forget DFI and go with a company that actually has a website not on a 56k line, has real support techs that can actually help you instead of running off doing their own thing while pulling a paycheck, but most importantly, buy from a real company that will actually support their boards with proper bios updates that are official and proper like Asus, Abit, Gigabyte, MSI, Foxconn, eVGA, etc. DFI is no longer a real company who cares about customers. They only care about showing some benchmark record that means nothing in the real world then maybe a couple of beta bioses when you customers get the boards and find out they don't work like Oskar Wu's record-setting board does.

 

So, having a ut nf4 SLI-D.. is it even neccessary to upgrade to another motherboard?

no

Does my opteron, which is s939 work in a AM2-mobo at all? If not, what should I go for?

no. stick to what you have for now

 

Another question that arises is the whole "will my enormous GFX-card fit onto this motherboard", since todays GFX-coolers take up at least 1 PCI-slot.

Is there a chart available to see which CPU-coolers/GFX-cards that fit onto what DFI-board?

 

no chart necessary. Every gpu will fit into the DFI board. All graphics cards are manufactured to the ATX spec which means they MUST fit all motherboards. While some cards might not fit, it isn't because of the specs of the video card. It is always how the motherboard maker decides to put fans, sinks, capacitors on the motherboard. I can assure you that every single card on the market will fit the DFI motherboard unless you've modded it in some way as to make it impossible.

 

All cpu coolers (following the same ATX specs that video cards, pci cards, etc do) will fit on the motherboard to my knowledge. I have never heard of a single heatsink for cpu that would not fit.

[Guest Lavell]

Well said Angry!

 

To this day, I can't see why people are considering leaving the Socket 939 platform. With Vista still in the repair shop, DirectX 10 still immature and little or no games built on DirectX 10, Socket 939 is still an excellent platform for high-end gaming. As of right now, we are just starting to get software that will take advantage of dual-core processors.

 

I have 4 desktops and 1 laptop in my home. In 2002, all of them were on the Socket A platform. Back then, Socket A ruled! As time went on, Sockets 754 and 940 were developed. Neither platform lasted long enough to be considered a solid platform because Socket 754 didn't support dual channel memory and Socket 940 required the use of ECC memory. If you were to invest into either of these platforms, you would have spent more money and got litte to no performance gains in return. In short, it was a waste of time, energy and money to deal with these platforms.

 

I continued to stay with my Socket A platform until Socket 939 was release. This new platform supported everything that a hardcore gamer wants in his gaming rig as well as the improved release of dual-core processors and the introduction of PCIe video cards. After all the research and testing of these platforms, performance gains nearly doubled. That's when I made the decision to upgrade all of my computers to Socket 939. To this very day, all of my computers are still on the Socket 939 platform!:nod:

 

Now we have Sockets F, AM2, 1207 FX, 771, and LGA 775 in the market. None of these platforms have impressed me to the point where I would consider upgrading. Quad-core processors are here and I'm pretty sure that people want to jump on that bandwagon with no software to take advantage of that power. Right now, it's just a waste of time and money. This might change when supported quad-core software is released. I worked very hard for my money and I have no intention of wasting it! No one should!!

 

Inanimate,

 

My recommendation is to follow Angry's recommendations, especially if you're on a tight budget. You didn't mention what kind of video card you have. If you have a GeForce 7900 series card(s) and are running SLI, there's no reason to upgrade the video card. The only exception to this is (you didn't mention this either) the size and kind of monitor you have. If you have a regular 17" - 21" LCD or CRT monitor, there's no need to upgrade the video card. If you have a 19" - 24" widescreen LCD monitor, then I would recommend upgrading to a single GeForce 8800 series video card.

 

I'm assuming that you're running Windows XP. I would not recommend moving to Vista right now as it still has bugs to fix. Wait until the release of Service Pack 1, then go online and research the performance and compatibility gains or losses with the service pack. That way, you can make a sound decision as to whether you will upgrade the operating system or not.

 

As far as you RAM is concerned, you have plenty of RAM to fulfill Windows XP. When you move to Vista, that same RAM will fulfill the requirements needed to run Vista smoothly.

 

In short, keep what you got. The only upgrade I would make at this point is the video card. But like I said before, that upgrade will depend on what size and kind of monitor you have. Computer technology is getting more expensive these days, so save your hard earned money!

[Angry_Games]

the quad core cpu's that Intel have are destroying benchmarks that are cpu-intensive like 3d modeling, dvd/movie encoding, etc.

 

games however...still aren't taking advantage of even dual core cpu's so if you are a gamer, you already got a nice dual core AMD that isn't being taken advantage of yet in games (soon though!).

 

also I'd like to sorta correct Lav about screen resolutions

 

1600x1200 or 1680x1050 widescreen is the cutoff point for 8800GTS and GTX. If you are under this resolution, stick to a cheaper GTS (even the 320MB version rocks at 1600x1200).

 

higher than this resolution, grab a second GTS for SLI or a single GTX (the only real resolution after 1680x1050 widescreen is 1920x1200 on the 24" monitors...the big 30" LCD's have something like 2560x1920 or something but crap that's about .001% of the population so forget that lol).

 

If you are 1280x1024 (1440x900 widescreen) or lower, the 8800GTS 320MB is all you need (I have 1440x900 19" widescreen myself and a 320MB).

 

If you plan on upgrading to a bigger monitor then choose the next step up in vid cards...but if you already have a 7900, then you can just find another 7900 to run SLI as SLI isn't for low res (below 1600x1200). SLI is really intended to be run at 1600x1200 - 1920x1200...if you are running at 1440x900 or 1280x1024, you'll barely take advantage of SLI, and it's actually a waste of money. 1600x1200 though and start cranking up the eye candy, and you'll get your money's worth from having SLI

 

also...2GB doesn't seem to be enough for Vista. My Vista loads always run pretty sluggish even with 2GB + 1GB USB2.0 flash drive for caching etc. Once I drop 4GB in, it runs like a champ (however 32-bit Vista still won't recognize all 4GB for some reason, which means you'd want to use 64-bit, and that's a complete nightmare all unto itself that needs to be avoided for another year or two)

[Guest Lavell]

Roger that, Angry. Excellent points. I stand corrected (a little).

 

That's good to know about Vista 64-bit and how much RAM it requires. I was under the impression that 2GB of RAM would get you by running Vista just like 1GB of RAM did when Windows XP was first released. But if you say that 2GB is barely making it, I have to conclude that it's pretty expensive to upgrade to Vista 64-bit. Now I have to wonder if it's really worth the money to upgrade to Vista at all. :confused:

 

Angry, I ask that you please keep me informed on this because by the end of this year (Service Pack 1 is scheduled to be released by then), I might make the move to Vista 64-bit and I want to be prepared to incur the expenses.

[Angry_Games]

might just be me, and it might just be that i hate vista with a passion so I look for every performance fault I can find, but after about 100 loads of Vista, it still sucks and it still underperforms heavily compared to XP (and has a shitload of bugs that devalue it even more)

[Guest Lavell]

Does this include all the recent updates? I'm told that the recent updates have fixed alot of performance and compatibility problems. I'm very curious now, especially after reading this thread: http://www.diy-street.com/forum/showthread.php?t=79633

[OsamaBinAthlon+]

crysis is said to be multi threaded

[Inanimate]

Hey again, thanks for the inputs!

 

Im using a 32" (yes.. 32") samsung widescreen-monitor, and the maximum resolution I can use is 1360x768, because the monitor is in fact originally a TV-monitor, but you can plug in a DVI-cord and use it as a PC-screen. Working excellent, except for games which boot in lets say, 1280x768, then I get a blue screen saying "mode not enabled".. which happened when I played Lost Planet, so I had to use another monitor :/

 

 

I am in fact using XP SP2, and the GFX is an ASUS 7800GTX, however, it's a limited model that I have, and the availability of it is 0 here where I live nowadays.. I got it by cheer luck from a vendor here in sweden, who actually got it by mistake.

 

I will do as you said, and stick to the gear I have, but I have decided to upgrade my GFX-card anyway. The ASUS 8800GTX is what I've been looking into, and I will go for that one unless I discover that there's another 8800GTX out there which doesnt make as much noise, since Im allergic to it noise

 

The only "modding" I've done to my mobo, speaking of the whole "will my gfx fit the mobo"-thing, is to exchange the NB-fan, since the stock one broke after 1 year. I replaced it with the NB-fan which you recommended here, dont remember its name, and I got it from an english retailer through the internet.

It's the same size as the stock one so it shouldnt be a problem

 

 

BTW, I didnt actually know you had to have Vista to install DX10. Ty for that.. I thought I could use it on XP, which made me wonder.

I haven't actually seen a DX9 vs DX10 comparison for Crysis tbh, but if you read about what DX10 enables visually, it sounds like it is superior?

[Angry_Games]

but if you read about what DX10 enables visually, it sounds like it is superior?

 

no

 

DX9 can do the same things DX10 can do, DX10 just goes about it differently (somewhat more efficiently they claim, but i don't believe it yet). DX9 CAN do everything DX10 can do (or, another way of putting it, is that DX10 CAN work in XP but Microsoft refuses to allow XP to have it, so as to force you into an OS that no one is buying).

 

there's nothing superior about DX10 except Microsoft's attitude. DX10 won't be worthy for another 18+ months when they've hammered out the bugs and matured the code and maybe by then more than 2.3% of the pc population is running Vista. While 97%+ of us are not using Vista, then pc game developers are going to continue focusing on DX9 (especially since the Xbox360 uses the same DirectX9c that PC's do...)

[Smoken Joe]

Right now DX10 is a joke MD backed down on the things that would pull it together because no one could get it all working in time.

 

It is possible Crysis will work better in DX10 soem of the time but it will be the only game for a year or three. It is unlikly though there is too big of a hit just from using Vista. Maby when everyone has a DX10.1 card...... of cource they are not makeing any yet. That is what DX10 cards should have ben like the first time.

 

The hardware makers must love MS you have to upgrade to get lower performance.

[Angry_Games]

the one good thing is USUALLY the DX10 cards kick total butt and take all names in DX9 on Windows XP lol (but DX10 hardware with DX9 driver support is why drivers really suck though they are maturing nicely)