Stupid purchase?

[El_Brio]

OK. So I got a new job so I now have some money to upgrade my comp. I had a kt133 w/ 1gig tbird. I decided it was a good time to get a nforce2 w/a barton.

So I ordered a Barton xp 3000 w/400mhz FSB.

Then I realized.... "I just spent $260 on a processor!"

So I did a little more research and decided that a 333mhz barton xp 2500+ would probably be alot more BANG for the buck. Sure I probably wouldn't get to run a 400mhz bus but for difference in price I could get that new 19 inch flat screen crt monitor I have been jonesing for.

So now I have to refuse delivery on the 3000 xp+ 400mhz and wait for the 2500 xp to come in (and hope my girlfriend refuses delivery on the correct cpu hahahaha).

My question is:

Was this a good decision? I have been kinda regreting dropping down to a 333mhz bus and lower clock instead of the 400mhz barton 3000. I have heard that the 2500 will OC pretty good. Is that true? What are the chances of getting that proc to run at comparable speeds to the 3000/400 barton?

Please comfort me!

(BTW I went with an EOPX 8rda3+ mobo and 2x512 pc 3500 ram)

[widget2003]

well for starters the XP 3000+ has a FSB of 333 anyway.
The only 400FSB out is the XP 3200+.

but yeah the barton XP 2500+ is still a good buy and if later on you are looking for a few extra mhz the 2500+ is great as it overclocks to XP 3200+ (400FSB) quite easily you will just have to drop the multiplier a bit to get it to 400, take my 2400+ for example (266FSB) i couldn't get past FSB of 300 until i got me a nForce 2 board that allowed multiplier changing so i dropped the multiplier to 11 and raised the front side bus to 400 so now im running the CPU @ 2200mhz with 400 FSB which is exactly the same as a XP 3200+, but the 3200+ has 512K cache and i only have 256K cache.

hope i helped in some way

[El_Brio]

HUH!?!?! Well the proc I ordered (from newegg) was sold to me as a xp3000+ 400mhz ?

[El_Brio]

So you have a t-bred right? That's why you have less cache. Barton has 512 right?

[bushmaster]

There is an XP3000 barton that runs at 400mhz fsb and considering it's $190 less than the 3200 and only 100Mhz slower, I'd stick with it.

[El_Brio]

Yeah but why not go with a 2500+ barton. From what I understand it will do 400FSB and OC probably to at least 3000 levels. At it is $178 cheaper than the 3000 400MHZ.

[Bigjakkstaffa]

Originally posted by El_Brio

Was this a good decision? I have been kinda regreting dropping down to a 333mhz bus and lower clock instead of the 400mhz barton 3000. I have heard that the 2500 will OC pretty good. Is that true? What are the chances of getting that proc to run at comparable speeds to the 3000/400 barton?

Please comfort me!

Yes, because as it starts at 333Mhz the XP2500+ has a lot more headroom for FSB overclockign than the XP3000+, also bear in mind it will overclock to roughly the same speed as the XP3000+ and cost you a fraction of the price. So in a word, yes you made the right choice.

And widget2003, the XP3000+ comes in both 333 and 400Mhz varieties

--Jakk

[Mm9004]

Don't spend too much money. Wait til things are cheeper. Right choice!

[bushmaster]

The newer components never become cheaper simply because there is always something newer. Only outdated products become cheaper.

[causticVapor]

Your purchase pales in comparison to those who decided to get a 3.0C and canterwood motherboard.

That price is a steal for a processor, considering that's what intel's SX (value 486) cost in the old days.

[bushmaster]

ahh, the 64's are out anyway. 1MB onboard L2 cache.

Only a piddling $751.00 for the FX51

[gjimene2]

watch out for the 8RDA3+ some have known to have weak capacitors and will freeze your machine durins a small "stress"

I found a place where you can get an 8RDA+ still

[Someone Stupid]

Sounds like you made the right choice. The 2500's currently are overclocking quite well and I don't see a 3000 clocking that much higher than a 2500 for the most part. You might squeeze an extra 100 or so megahertz more out of it, but when you can hit 2.2-2.4 ghz fairly commonly (even higher with good select chips or excellent cooling) with the newer core 2500's (which you will most likely get) with good memory and motherboard then why worry about the extra 100 mhz, it isn't going to be what makes or breaks your computer in terms of when your going to need to upgrade. Wise choice, save the cash for the monitor or whatnot.

[widget2003]

lol well thenwe here in Australia are CPU deprieved then cause we dont get the XP 3000+ with a FSB of 400 the on 400 chip we get is the XP 3200+, oh well my bad,

[Bigjakkstaffa]

Yeah verdicts still out on the 8rda3+, top AMD Boards ATM are the Abit NF7-S v2.0 for the o/c'ers amongst us and the Asus a7n8x Deluxe for the rest

--Jakk