64 bit processor worth buying?

[tomster2300]

Hey,

I started this thread awhile back and the answer was that we should wait until second generation 64 bit chips came out to buy one. Since then I've been seeing advertising for them everywhere. AMD's website has the athlon xp pushed all the way to the bottom of their list and they have numerous 64 bit models now. Is this just a marketing scheme, or is a 64 bit processor something we should begin paying attention to? Thanks.

Do they really affect gaming?

[Jester]

They do not affect gaming. There are not enough or no programs that take advantage of the 64 bit proccesing right now. I would say look at the programs. Wait till programs like windows longhorn come out the utiize the 64 bit proccesing.

[TwoRails]

Sorry, Radioactiveninja, but from the benchmarks I've seen, the 754 pin 64s kick some serious butt in games. Everybody seems to not notice they are a very fast 32 bit CPU. They are also the XP line replacements, so they are here to stay.

One good thing about the ratings for the 754s is that AMD is back to being accurate with their rating system, which fell short with the 3000+ and 3200+ XPs.

The 940 pin 64s are faster, but currently too much $$. I would build a 754 box today if I had the budget or a 940 pin box if I hit the lotto.

Also, a lot of people don't realize that Cray and other companies are building Super Computers with the 940 pin units. If they are good enough for Super Computers, they sure are good enough for me !

Yes, the 64s are here.

TwoRails

[Looneycooney]

true but Radioactiveninja has a point there ..the hardware isn't that much supported yet and there isn't a proper os yet for it either ..just like he said ..
ok they are good strong compu's but at the moment i won't advise them at all especially not for gaming ...it wouldn't be worth the money ..because when they are at their proper level of adchievement they cost a whole lot less and the end-produkt is far more reliable as they are now ...
i can know , i myself was fooled once and bought a so called 'supercompu' ..it cost me more then 2000 euro's back then , but i had a 1000mhz where all the other where still gaming with a 300 to 500 mhz ..but then again the mobo broke down after 2 years ...
i really wouldn't advise these for gamers
...unless u don't care about all that , money, stability blahblah

[James.M]

Well the AMD 64 3200 and 3400 have Hyper Transport and a 1mb L2 cache making them a very supirior processor compared to the Bartons not to mention the 64 bit which will be a good thing to invest in as the future will be 64bit.

[ddramz]

What about the FX series? they are pricy I see, around $700 at Newegg but I also here the socket is getting changed and basically the FX-51 is getting phased out, is this true?

[TwoRails]

Hi Looneycooney and Everybody,

Originally posted by Looneycooney true but Radioactiveninja has a point there ..the hardware isn't that much supported yet and there isn't a proper os yet for it either ..just like he said ..

We're talking oranges and apples. I'm talking about using the 64 as the sucessor to the XP in it's current state as a fast 32 bit chip. There already is a bunch of OSs (like XP) and proven hardware (like award winning Asus mobos) to support it. Let me ask this, how many people waited for a year after the T-Bird came out to buy one? Or the T-Bred? Or the XP? ... Not me. How many people waited for rev 2 of the now famous Asus A7N8X Dlx? Not many as it was one of the hottest selling motherboards from day one, and still is. So why does everybody want to wait to use a 64? Why buy an XP when they are already "lagecy" chips? (and I didn't hear anybody say "wait" when the PIII or P4 came out...)

ok they are good strong compu's but at the moment i won't advise them at all especially not for gaming

Again, the benchmarks say different. This is very typical, and shows they are strong in gaming:

http://www.tomshardware.com/cpu/2004...4_3400-16.html

...it wouldn't be worth the money ..because when they are at their proper level of adchievement they cost a whole lot less and the end-produkt is far more reliable as they are now ...

At $211, they start at way less money than when I purchased my 2700+ !!

http://www.newegg.com/app/Viewproduc...20&srchFor=754

If they were not stable, how do they complete benchmarks, burn-ins, floating point tests... etc...?? Again I ask how many people will wait a year when they want a P4 now?

i can know , i myself was fooled once and bought a so called 'supercompu' ..

I was actually referring to real supercomputers with 10 to hundreds of CPUs...

...but then again the mobo broke down after 2 years ...

Sorry you had a problem, but if it worked for two year, then it sure was not a deffective mobo.

Whew... too much typing for my fingers Time for a break

TwoRails

[imbest123]

The 64 bit processors are great for 32-bit applications also. I dont think they will be so remarkable once 64-bit applications and os come out because of drivers issues but that will be fixed over time.

[glc]

I said "wait" when the P4 came out - and I was proven right - the early P4's on Willamette socket 423's were furnaces, and dogs compared to the Tualatin P3 platform. My sister has a Dell with a P4-1.3 and my P3-800 feels snappier.

[Looneycooney]

Originally posted by TwoRails Let me ask this, how many people waited for a year after the T-Bird came out to buy one? Or the T-Bred? Or the XP? ... Not me. How many people waited for rev 2 of the now famous Asus A7N8X Dlx? Not many as it was one of the hottest selling motherboards from day one, and still is. ..i did and so did almost all my friends , just for 2 simple reasons ...first : price .. i paid just a 100 euro's for the mobo and another 100 for cpu , where u paid it 200 each just 4 months before! and second : my mobo has 400fsb and can support 3200+ without any bios-upgrades ...so the mobo is far more quality for it's money then your mobo of 200 and u still need to upgrade before u can even up the score just 4 months later ... third : a friend (grasshopper) had a abit board just like the asus a7n8x del and it had rev1.00 .. after just 1 month he had to return it ..it had bad bios or something ..now he has been given a newer one and this one works perfect ...that proof enough for me At $211, they start at way less money than when I purchased my 2700+ !! => i paid mine 100 euro/dollar ! If they were not stable, how do they complete benchmarks, burn-ins, floating point tests... etc...?? Again I ask how many people will wait a year when they want a P4 now? wanting one and having the money is one thing ...waiting for a good quality finished product is another and btw i didn't mean to say that those first ones are bad , all i wanted to say is that the specs can go higher for less money in just a few months... Sorry you had a problem, but if it worked for two year, then it sure was not a deffective mobo. => it sure was ...it has been resend to manufacturer but it was out of garanty so ...and believe me we've tried it all it just was a dead mobo TwoRails

[Blakhart]

I would wait for ddr2 mobos and the 64bit cpus that will use them. Might as well wait for pci express too.

[pam123]

My reason to wait is price, the cutting edge is expensive.

[Looneycooney]

Originally posted by Blakhart I would wait for ddr2 mobos and the 64bit cpus that will use them. Might as well wait for pci express too.

C thats exactly what i mean , so the hardware isn't yet fully supported ! ok, it'll work fine but when u wait you'll get cpu's using ddr2 mobo's for less the money
and indeed also pci express is on it's way ...so why spending money on new technology which can be improved by (not that much/few months ) time just as the price can improve

[Alfie]

If I could afford it,I would go with the 64.
If one is building a new system,why not?
DDR2 motherboards?
Wait 'til you see the price,think it's going to be a bargain basement special?
PCI express is new,will it show a tremendous increase over agp,not at this time.
I suspect as it matures it will,but that's a couple years away.
similar to agp2x,4x,etc.
As far as "new" hardware the 64 has been around for awhile,beta boards were released a year ago.
It appears the Via chipsets has the upper hand for now,as the Nvidia chipsets seem to be problematic.
The AMD 64 is a very fine cpu and offers the best performance.
The price of the motherboards and cpu aren't that far out of reach.
Where 64bit programs gain an advantage is what can be designed,in games it will be more in visual quality and rendering.
As the cpu is designed to be backward compatible,why not get the fastest available in a set price range and have some future built in?

[TwoRails]

If we wait for this to come out, or that to come out, we'll all be skeletons by the time we have a new computer.. And while we are waiting.... why not just wait for the 128 bit CPUs to come out??

[largosama]

Everything that came out had a purpose of being bought and to serve the buyers. Of course, due to competition, products will get better. There has to be a point where the waiting stops and buy one. If 64 bit sounds good, then go for it. By the time that the price goes down enough for 64 bit, there's gonna be 128 bit, like tworails said

[TwoRails]

Hi Looneycooney,

I didn’t catch your comments above until now, as it is buried in your post as a complete quote from me. I hope that others aren’t also confused and think I stated everything in your post...

I said:

Let me ask this, how many people waited for a year after the T-Bird came out to buy one? Or the T-Bred? Or the XP? ... Not me. How many people waited for rev 2 of the now famous Asus A7N8X Dlx? Not many as it was one of the hottest selling motherboards from day one, and still is.

You said:

..i did and so did almost all my friends , just for 2 simple reasons ...first : price .. i paid just a 100 euro's for the mobo and another 100 for cpu ,

And both are selling for even less, now. A 2600+ is now, for example, about 68 Euro / 85 USD. And prices will continue to drop. And you continue:

where u paid it 200 each just 4 months before!

I didn’t mention what I paid, so you assumption that I paid about $248 USD for the motherboard is a bit of a stretch. My first build with one as $148 USD, and my 2nd build was $124 USD. When I purchased my 2700+, it was about $260, down from about $450 – which is just about like the price drop now showing for the 64. They were in the $400 very recently, but have starting dropping in price, with the least expensive going for, as I mentioned, about $211 USD. And just think, now you can get the A7N8X Deluxe for about $103 USD / 82 Euro. And the 2600+ for $85 USD and the 2700+ for $99 USD. And they will be even cheaper as time goes on. I also didn’t mention when I purchased my stuff. The A7N8X Deluxe in this computer was purchase right after they came out, about a year and a half ago.

and second : my mobo has 400fsb and can support 3200+ without any bios-upgrades ...so the mobo is far more quality for it's money then your mobo of 200 and u still need to upgrade before u can even up the score just 4 months later

Oranges and apples again. Have you ever turned a 266 mobo into a 333 mobo? The original A7N8X mobos were indeed 333 mobos and were never advertised as 400 mobos. I knew exactly what I was buying. The fact that they can be turned into a 400 is pretty neat in my opinion. Just because a 266 is not a 333 does not make one a more quality product than the other. And neither does going from a 333 to a 400. By that logic, then the 64 mobos must be really fanatic quality as they are 1600.

... third : a friend (grasshopper) had a abit board just like the asus a7n8x del and it had rev1.00 .. after just 1 month he had to return it ..it had bad bios or something ..now he has been given a newer one and this one works perfect ...that proof enough for me

How is grasshopper, anyway? Haven’t seen him around for a while... OK, he had a bad mobo. Stuff happens. Even a Mercedes Benz can have probelms...

i paid mine 100 euro/dollar !

Already covered above.

I said

Sorry you had a problem, but if it worked for two year, then it sure was not a defective mobo.

You said

it sure was ...it has been resend to manufacturer but it was out of garanty so ...and believe me we've tried it all it just was a dead mobo

I guess we have a different definition of what defective means. Sounds like grasshopper’s board was defective, but a board that runs for two years, long after the warrantee is out, is not defective. I agree that they should run forever, but sometimes they don’t.

TwoRails

[grasshopperbe]

I have to put something straight here. My first abit board had nothing wrong with the bios. i returned it because there were some problems with the sound. it was because of a build error in the audio connections. so it was a bad board yes, but that had nothing to do with bad bios.

My idea on this thread. If you want a new pc now anyhow and you can afford it and want the newest of the newest, go for it. i would not advise these systems myself yet to most people , because for most of them they are a bit too expensive (as for me). and prices will drop like they always do. another thing is i do absolutely not like xp, which is i thought the only 64bit os out now?
If you keep waiting for the next new thing you might be waiting forever.

btw Tworails, i've been online less lately because i started working in a real estate agency last december.

[ceh4702]

At Univ of IL at Champaign, IL, some students built a super computer with some Play Station 2 consoles. This is just a matter of things like parallel processing and writing a customized OS.

Also at www.mini-itx.com there was recently an article on connnecting 12 Motherboards together using parallel processing.

The Processors are still a bit expensive for Athlon 64. If you could afford them you could also afford a 800Mhz P4.

[ric449]

It would be a good idea to wait. This is because prescott with 64-bit extentions is on the way (not sure if its meant for p4 or xeon), and this may bring a pricing war between intel and amd, meaning lower chip prices!

[glc]

If you have more money than sense and want cutting edge, go for it. My advice to most people, however, is buy at the trailing edge of front line technology where the price is real low, most people won't be able to tell much difference, if any, and the technology has been around long enough to get all the bugs out.

To *me* this means a P4-2.6C or 2.8C, or a 2500+ or 2600+ Barton.

Same with video cards - most people, even hardcore gamers, will be plenty happy with a 9600XT.

[DragonNOA1]

Originally posted by Blakhart I would wait for ddr2 mobos and the 64bit cpus that will use them. Might as well wait for pci express too.

PCI Express comes out this summer and will be pushed onto consumers by Intel so that it can be adopted quickly and become the standard. DDR2 comes out at the end of the year or next year and will be 50% more expensive and you will not even see any performance increases with it compared to DDR. Wait for PCI-E if you must but don't wait for DDR2.

[TwoRails]

Originally posted by grasshopperbe .... My idea on this thread. If you want a new pc now anyhow and you can afford it and want the newest of the newest, go for it. i would not advise these systems myself yet to most people , because for most of them they are a bit too expensive (as for me). and prices will drop like they always do. another thing is i do absolutely not like xp, which is i thought the only 64bit os out now? If you keep waiting for the next new thing you might be waiting forever. btw Tworails, i've been online less lately because i started working in a real estate agency last december.

I agree I can't afford even the $211 '64' right now as I had unexpected, and major, unpleasent family expenses recently. If it weren't for that, I'd like to think I'd have a 64 by now as I do feel that the 754 pin models and supporting hardware have been out long enough.

I also don't like XP a lot, even though I do like some of the features, because I find it far less stable than it claims to be.

Grasshopperbe, are you an agent yet? (or do you even want to be?) It sure does take a lot more time and effort to be a good one than most people realize. Lotsa long hours, and weekends too... I wish you the best at it

TwoRails

[morriswindgate]

First generation is always high priced and buggy. If you wait not only will the price be down, but the bugs will be worked out and the performance will increase.
It is kind of like SATA hard drives, at first they were very expensive and did not perform that much better than 8 MB cache IDE drives, now the price has fallen to the same as IDE drives, but they still have not reached the full potential of the promised performance.

[Looneycooney]

well two rails u got a point there ...

but i find it hard to buy a computer for let's say 2000 euro/dollar with high-end materials , knowing most of these things will go cheaper in a few months wth few extra features..but indeed then u have to wait ..
maybe it also because i don't earn an income yet and look in the economic way of buying those things ...
so yes, you all may be right
also the 64 isn't that high priced anymore i see now , my bad ...
i'll certainly think about this thread when i buy my next one hahahaa

[TwoRails]

Yes, it's been a good thread, Looneycooney - I'm not rich, but do have an income (thankfully), however I do have to be very "frugal" (read: cheap) in many other areas so I can save up money to by my stuff.

TwoRails

[Mac Medic]

but what if I want to build the machine today. Do I compromise and get an already obsolete processor (32bit), memory, mobo etc... and then have to replace it all again in 6months for the sake of saving a few hundred dollars today? Surely if you are going to spend the money you would be better off paying a bit extra now rather than a lot extra later to upgrade everything. Just my thoughts is all.

[largosama]

Didn't apple have 64 bit processors a long time ago?

[Mac Medic]

Yes, Apple released 64bit G5's last april, they still don't have a 64bit OS but everything runs fine in 32bit just like the AMD's. I think if you are going to build a PC today you should go with the newest technology you can afford to avoid the trap of short life cycles. 64bit is the future, why not adopt it now and save money in the long run.