Venice core or SanDiego core?

[Jeff]

I am wondering if I should get the 3800+ Venice core or the 3700+ San Diego Core.

The San Diego core has a 1mb l2 cache, but the Venice has a 200mhz clock advantage.



SanDiego Specs:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819103539
Venice Specs:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819103530

[zooYork]

go with the sandiego, if you have good memory you could just simply oc it up to the 3800. san diego's are better overclockers too.

[AMDave]

:!: All hail the on-die cache :!:

My recent experience with differences in cache sizes at work has been both telling and (grrr) very trying.

If the machine is going to do anything repetative at the low level like calculations or database transactions then you want as much cache as you can get. Otherwise if you are looking at streaming media or manipulating big images then you want faster Hz and more RAM. Of course the ideal is a huge cache and lots of RAM.

In DC terms, I'd go the large on-die cache and speed things up by adding more RAM as required every time.

I found a great deal of frustration in a machine with lots of RAM and a fast CPU but minimal cache, recently. Although outside of my control, it was an experience that I do not intend to repeat if I can help it.

[Jeff]

I will have 1 gig of dual channel memory.

I think I will go with the SanDiego.

I can't decide if I want to do SLI or not

[vaughan]

SLI is expensive and ONLY helps the games that are optimized to use it. There is a list at nvidia somewhere.

[Empty_5oul]

rather defeats the point of SLI but you could get 1 for the moment and see what the graphics performance is like.
What games do you play (or will play) i can't imagine you would need really amazing graphics power?

THen if in a few months you need extra power for games get another and connect them together.

[vaughan]

Read this:

http://www.bleedinedge.com/reviews/processor_reviews/3700sd/3700_San-Diego_01.html

[Jeff]

I think I will be playing Half-Life 2

[Jeff]

Also which memory?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820146890#DetailSpecs

http://www2.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820-145-450&depa=0#DetailSpecs

[Empty_5oul]

looking at the timings OCZ is much more agressive. depends what you plan on doing, the other is just as good for normal use. But for overclocking you would want the lower timings.

[Jeff]

Another thing about SLI:

Nvidia has certified like 4 power supplys for SLI. They are all 175-200 bucks.

[Jeff]

Should I go with the Asus SLI board if Im not going SLI?

[Empty_5oul]

which borad are you tempted towards atm?
can u post a link.

if you are not going for SLI then you dont really need it on the board, if it comes as an extra then fine but it is another thing there to go wrong (if you see where i am coming from).
you could always go PCI express rather than AGP if you wanted better graphics.

[Jeff]

This is what I had selected:

http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16813131517

But, I don't think Im going to do SLI.

I need a good PCI-Express card and power supply and new mobo I think.

Any suggestions?

[Jeff]

Bump

[Empty_5oul]

geforce 6600 is pretty quick, i think you can get it with DDR3 which is currently the fastest available as well.

after deciding the graphics and everything else find a motherboard that matches all of this and will allow i to run optimally.
power supply - just make sure it has watts to power everything (and anything you may plug in e.g. USB devices).

[zooYork]

if you are a mega serious gamer then sli is for your, but for more conventional use just go with one card. even in some benchmarks ive seen on nvidia cards, sli provides barely any performance gain.

asus boards are great and all, but if your looking to overclock get a gigabyte or msi board. and really if your not going sli, then save alot by not getting an sli board. ;)

you want higher speed ram for overclocking on the 64 chips, to compensate the fsb. go with something higher like pc 4000(ddr 500)