Socket 775 Pentium 4s revisited.

[The_YongGrand]

Okay, I really want something a little bit more than my Celeron D 331+ since it's so lagging when playing the Half-Life 2 and it performs much lower than my old Athlon XP 2400+. On top of that, I am an average comp user - more interneting and heavy usage of listening to music, music and more music and even more of uploading of my camera images to my comp.


I have a few choices, but I don't want to seriously burn my wallet for all these. I just want that machine to perform HL2 quickly (like faster load games and more responsiveness).

1.) Pentium 4 506 (that one doesn't have any EM64T but I won't bother so much about it.)

2.) Pentium 4 511

3.) Pentium 4 524 (with HT)

4.) Pentium D 805

So I have to think - the clock speed for my Celeron D 331+ is 2.66 and the Pentium 4 506 is also 2.66ghz, but the cache for the P4 is much more (four times).

And then I can have my 511 too. But I have to fork out another 20 dollars for adding another 0.2 ghz.

Or I can have my 524, but that thing doesn't always exist in M'sian comp shops.

Or I can have the Pentium D 805 and I can do more stuff at the same time.

Which one should you recommend for a budget P4? I am thinking of the 506, but will it perform much faster than my Celeron D 2.66? Or just a marginal performance gain?

[Cricket]

If you're looking for better gaming performance you should consider adding more RAM and getting a better video card.

Cricket

[The_YongGrand]

I see, but I thought the processor is the main thing in the gaming?

Is there a huge difference in performance if I compare Celeron D 331 (2.66GHz, 256K cache) and Pentium 4 506 (2.66GHz, 1MB cache)? The clock speeds are totally the same, but only the cache is four times the amount of the Celeron D.

Or I should go and get a Pentium 4 with Hyperthreading? I mean, is the HT actually make stuff runs faster or become more responsive only?

[Alaron]

In today's games, the video card is most important. Upgrading to that P4 506 will help a bit, but not nearly as much as a new video card and some more ram. A Radeon 9250 is very weak for todays games. Pick up something like the Radeon X1600Pro or the X800GTO (great budget cards) and get at least another 512MB of RAM. You'll notice a huge difference in games.

[The_YongGrand]

Hmm... I see.

Bad news - I checked the MSI website for the Processor Support for my PM8M2-V - it doesn't have Pentium 4 506, 511 and 524 in the list.

But they are all LGA775 and they have the same characteristics as these P4 630, 640 and the others?

Will it support or will it refuse to work with my motherboard?

[Cricket]

The CPU has to be supported by the motherboard. If it isn't, the CPU may work but not at it's full performance potential...or it may not work at all.

You really should consider getting more RAM and a better video card if you want to play today's games. Even if you did get a P4 to replace your Celeron your video card and the small amount of RAM in the system will still keep the computer from playing games well.

Cricket

[blue60007]

Yeah, a while back I had a video card just a bit better than yours...upgrading it only and adding more RAM allowed me to play any game out there (and still does) at max settings. I kept the same processor; while mine is a couple notches up from your Celeron, you'll see something similar.

[The_YongGrand]

I'm not so much into gaming, and the only thing interests me is still HL2 and maybe Doom 3. I played HL2 in my current Celeron machine - and it performs worse than my Athlon XP 2400+. The game kept on lagging and it's not the low frame rates - it's like when the player walks and then turns around, more hard-disk activity kept on coming eventhough I've defragged my HDD. I didn't have this problem when I have my Athlon XP.

So it could be the paltry amount of the Celeron's cache or something else. Am I right?

As for the m/board - I checked the Features list - what's even more confusing was they say that they can support Celeron 3xx series, Pentium 4 5xx and 6xx where xx denotes any number?

But in the processor support list they said the other way around.

[Cricket]

Originally Posted by The_YongGrand So it could be the paltry amount of the Celeron's cache or something else. Am I right?

If the hard drive is thrashing a lot that's a sign that you need more physical RAM in that system. Having a little more L2 cache on the processor will help some, but the difference won't be as noticeable as having at least 1GB of physical RAM to keep the system from going to the swap file so much.

Cricket

[The_YongGrand]

I know - but before that - I have a similar configuration before:

Athlon XP 2400+
MSI KM4M series motherboard
512MB RAM
20GB HDD (old one)
ATi 9250 videocard

and that thing runs so well with so less thrashing of the HDD.

But unfortunately my Athlon XP's always overheating and all the VPU issues haunt my comp so I have to hastily change my configuration - I changed the board and the processor:

Intel Celeron D 331
MSI PM8M2-V board
the same 512MB ram
80GB HDD (new one)
same video card

... and that thing runs poorly with too much trashing of HDD and lagging and more lagging.

Now I know that maybe that Celeron D is lacking of 3DNow instructions or whatever it is needed to run some modern games.

Will more cache size significantly reduce load times when starting Windows?

Or should I get a P4 with a Hyperthread to make things run better?

Or must I get a P4 630 with 2MB cache to lessen the amount pain the comp has to do HL2?

[glc]

If you feel you need to upgrade the processor, you would be best served by upgrading to something with a 800 FSB - what you have now is 533 FSB.

[The_YongGrand]

If you're looking for better gaming performance you should consider adding more RAM and getting a better video card.

If the hard drive is thrashing a lot that's a sign that you need more physical RAM in that system. Having a little more L2 cache on the processor will help some, but the difference won't be as noticeable as having at least 1GB of physical RAM to keep the system from going to the swap file so much.

These statements are very correct.

I played HL2 on my Sempron 2500+ PC and changed my RAM into 768MB instead of 512MB. Well, still got a little bit trashing on my HDD and Anistropic Filtering must have to turned down to the lowest. I have that Geforce FX5200 - and HL2 is quite fine except the filtering and the trilinear thingy must have to keep it down lower. The rest of it like reflections I have to change it to simple, and shadows too. But the best thing is I can max out the textures and model quality there compared to my Celeron.

What's the best for my Celeron/Sempron combo for gaming? A gig of RAM? Or must I pair it up with a gig of RAM and also a Radeon 9500 or a Geforce 6600?

Or I don't really have to change my processor if I have 2GB RAM and a very very good videocard?

[glc]

You are trying to game with "budget" components - and you have to accept a lot of compromises no matter what you do. A FX5200 is a low end video card for any kind of gaming - it's better than onboard video, but not by much. A Celeron-D is a decent budget processor, but it's hampered by the bus speed and the low amount of cache. Anything less than 1gb of ram these days for gaming is not enough. You need to try to achieve a balance within your budget.

[The_YongGrand]

Now I'm trying to game with the Sempron (socket 754) and surprisingly, Sempron works quite well with my HL2. I don't know much about the Sempron, but the bus speed is 800MHz or 1600...

[glc]

Yes, the 754 Sempron has a good fast bus - it's just a bit shy on cache.

[The_YongGrand]

So I've been thinking of boosting up my Sempron rig a little bit more - I don't know whether a truck-load of RAM and a better graphics card will do a HL2 or Doom 3 with High settings (not maxed out)

What's your recommendation? Should I get a stick of 1GB RAM and displace my 256MB so it become 1.5GB? (I have two slots - 512 + 256)...

[glc]

More ram and a better video card would do more for you than a faster processor.