Processor advise?

[Trey]

I was thinking about tinkering with my machine and was thinking about slapping a better processor in there. The board I have can handle:

Intel® Core™2 Duo processor in an LGA775 socket with a 1066 or 800 MHz system bus
Intel® Pentium® D processor in an LGA775 socket with an 800 or 533 MHz system bus
Intel® Pentium® 4 processor in an LGA775 socket with an 800 or 533 MHz system bus
Intel® Celeron® D processor in an LGA775 socket with a 533 MHz system bus

Anybody really knowledgable about this processors? Any advise? (besides buy a new computer...)

[Virgil]

Get Intel Core2Duo E8500 if you got money, it's still have some resource for the upcoming games, but of course if you got built-in video it would be pointless.

[Trey]

Nope, I 've got a graphics card. It's not the best but it gets the job done.

So these Core 2 Duo CPUs, they're 2 32bit processors running in tandum. Is the architecture 32bit or 64bit? If it is 64bit, aren't there some issues with software designed to run 32bit?

[Trey]

What do you think of these? Not as great as a Core 2 Duo, but at just over $30US including shipping, I don't know if it's beatable.

sSpec Number: SL7Z8
CPU Speed: 3.20 GHz
PCG: 04A
Bus Speed: 800 MHz
Bus/Core Ratio: 16
L2 Cache Size: 2 MB
L2 Cache Speed: 3.2 GHz

Package Type: LGA775
Manufacturing Technology: 90 nm
Core Stepping: NO
CPUID String: 0F43h
Thermal Design Power: 84W
Thermal Specification: 67.7°C
VID Voltage Range: 1.25V-1.388V

[Virgil]

Core2Duo built on 64-bit architecture, but unless you're going to use 64-bit edition OS you won't notice any compatibility issues(excluding performance growth). But as far as I know, there are not much issues on 64-bit Vista. It was a problem with 64-bit XP, which lacked drivers and compatible software.

they're 2 32bit processors running in tandum

It is one CPU with two cores built on the same chip.

What do you think of these? Not as great as a Core 2 Duo, but at just over $30US including shipping, I don't know if it's beatable.

I would say that these hyper-threading CPUs are quite outdated. See this chart for comparison. The one you posted is Pentium 4 640.[/url]

[Meddle]

The P4 640 that Virgil has explained about is probably not much better than the socket 478 P4 3.0Ghz (it also has HT) thats in my machine, and I would say it would be a worthless upgrade since you are probably planning to game on it. My advice would be to save up for a decent Core2Duo unless you want to upgrade your motherboard too. If you don't know about it, www.pricewatch.com, is a decent place for deals.

[hfric]

or get a amd x2 6000+ works well here

[Trey]

Believe me when I say even the P4 would be a big improvement, this is what I'm running now:
Name Intel Celeron 331
Codename Prescott
Specification Intel(R) Celeron(R) CPU 2.66GHz
Package Socket 775 LGA (platform ID = 4h)
CPUID F.4.9
Extended CPUID F.4
Core Stepping G1
Technology 90 nm
Core Speed 2666.6 MHz (20.0 x 133.3 MHz)
Rated Bus speed 533.3 MHz
Stock frequency 2666 MHz
Instructions sets MMX, SSE, SSE2, SSE3, EM64T
L1 Data cache 16 KBytes, 8-way set associative, 64-byte line size
Trace cache 12 Kuops, 8-way set associative
L2 cache 256 KBytes, 4-way set associative, 64-byte line size
FID/VID Control no
Features XD

[Meddle]

Unless that is about to fail, I'd still save up for a better cpu.

[otiscrusher]

Get yourself 386 and be happy. The best CPU ever made.
Investing more then 400 bucks on a CPU is a nonsense if you're just a gamer. Better get yourself a hi-end GPU. All these Dual Cores suck, actually. For some serious work buy some other hardware (ALL CPUs developed for personal comps suck as hell, no matter of there price) . Though I doubt a guy like you can afford such stuff.