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bandydai · Joined: 27 Feb 2007 Posts: 56 Location: South Wales

I want to know if it's worthwhile installing a dual core processor. I have an AMD Athlon 64, 3000+ 160gb home grown PC. Running XP Pro with SP2... what are the advantages, and will I have to change the MoBo? ABIT KV8 PRO ...............Dai

NickAskew · Moderator Joined: 03 Nov 2006 Posts: 112 Location: Thirsk

Your Mobo will not support a dual core processor, this link provides the specifications of your mobo: http://www.abit.com.tw/page/en/motherboard/motherboard_detail.php?DEFTITLE=Y&fMTYPE=Socket%20754&pMODEL_NAME=KV8%20Pro

If you use multiple applications at the same time, then you *might* need a dual core processor.

[1] same time ~= playing a game whilst re-encoding a video into another format. OR watching a video overlay from a digital tv card whilst encoding a video or playing a game.
[2] same time != having multiple Microsoft word documents open at the same time as one or more Microsoft Excel spreadsheets.

[1] = modern computer games can only use a single processor at the same time, so if you primarily using your computer to play games, then installing a dual core CPU will give you no noticable speed improved (buying a modern single core CPU would make a noticable difference)
[1] = if you download a lot of videos and like to re-encode them into different formats, or perhaps you have a digital card for your PC to receive TV and you like to re-encode recordings into smaller files for permanent storage AND you want to encode these files AT THE SAME TIME as playing a game, then you *may* possibly need a dual core CPU. Some video encoders can use multiple processors at the same time, so that what would have taken 2 hours to encode can be reduced to 1 hour and 10 minutes (for example)

[2] Having multiple applications open at the same time will not be speeded up by having a dual core CPU, what you need in this instance is more RAM, much more RAM, you can never have enough RAM.

Why get a dual core CPU?

As a hobby, I transfer my VHS video collection onto DVD, which involves burning uncompressed video taken directly from tape into a modern digital format such as DivX - having multiple CPU cores vastly improves the encoding speed.

I also play MMOGS (massively multiplayer online games) and have multiple 'characters' open in there own game windows at the same time - the game renders virtual worlds in 3d which is fairly CPU intensive so I allocate 1 game window to each core so that each game is responsive when I alt-tab to it.

Typically though, if you use your computer solely for computer gaming, you absolutely do not need a multi-core processor, because multi-core processors are a little less efficient - some of the processing power of both cores goes towards synchronising the work that both processors are doing, another controller onboard dual core processors dishes out the workload to the processor that is deemed the most underutilised, this 'dishing out time' is less efficient that running a single processor on a single process because there is no middle man involved in this example.

Regards

Nick

bandydai · Joined: 27 Feb 2007 Posts: 56 Location: South Wales

Hi Nick. you have certainly baffled me with science now. Crying or Very sad

I'm the guy with the defrag probs, and I thought 'if I'm gonna do a complete install of windows, I might as well update the PC first'.
My missus uses this PC as well as me, and she has dozens of websites bookmarked. ie, Choice, Littlewoods,Tesco, etc, to name but a few, We are also hoping to sell up late August to officially retire from running our boarding cattery, so she has loads of estate agent sites b/marked too,
So.....I intend installing a dual core processor and have since found that I need to update the Mobo too. This is all new to me coz my son built this pc a few years ago and it's getting slow. plus I can't defrag or virus scan without it crashing..I hope to go to Carmarthen tomorrow to buy the processor and Mobo. I may even have to get a new graphics card, the one installed is ATI Radeon 9200 (RV280) Video Adapter
ATI Radeon 9200 (RV280) 3D Accelerator.. Your views would be GREATLY appreciated.....Dai...PS. I don't play games on the PC. [who does @ 70?] Embarassed

NickAskew · Moderator Joined: 03 Nov 2006 Posts: 112 Location: Thirsk

Hi Dai,

I didn't intend to get too deep with the reply, but there are a lot of parameters that would affect your decision to buy a dual core rather than stay with your existing PC and I thought I had better give you a couple of them! - Did you read my reply to your Defrag post? Have you tried it? Did it find errors and offer to correct them?

Ok, regarding a new pc:

Do you really need to buy a new PC? - If you were happy with the speed that your applications were running at prior to the issues you encountered, then reinstalling your operating system from scratch will bring it back to its former glory.

If you do want to buy one, regardless of the facts Wink

presented to you, then you must consider:

If you buy a new Mobo, http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/ProductInfo.asp?WebProductID=518610 (£33) then you will certainly need to buy

A new CPU: I would recommend you purchase a "Core 2 Duo" which is an Intel (not AMD) processor if you do choose to buy a new PC. Specifically an E6320 or better (as this processor is the cheapest one to use a 4MB cache) http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/ProductInfo.asp?WebProductID=572215 (£100)

New RAM: The RAM in your current Mobo will not be compatible with a new mobo (of either the AMD or Intel type), and if it is then you wouldn't want to use it in your new mobo because it would defeat the point of buying a new mobo/cpu. http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/ProductInfo.asp?WebProductID=121624 (£31) - ideally two of these to make 2GB RAM.

Not very necessary:

A new graphics card would be essential if you use high performance graphics applications (like games) but as you said you don't play them (aww, go have a look at www.eve-online.com) the motherboard I link to above features 'integrated graphics' which means you do not need to purchase a graphics card. If you did decide to purchase a mobo without integrated graphics, I would assume your existing graphics card is of the AGP variety, modern motherboards do not have an AGP port on them, they now use a slot called PCI-E.

Sound Card:
The above motherboard has standard PCI slots (only 2 of them though) so if you have an existing sound card, you couldl move it to this new PC, although the motherboard above has integrated 5.1 channel sound so it would probably be better to use that one (unless you have a Creative X-Fi or similar high priced sound card)

Power Supply Unit (PSU): You existing power supply may suffice for a new mobo, if you buy a modern graphics card I would imagine you would need to purchase a 'bigger' power supply to run it correctly though.

ESSENTIAL:
Hard disk: If you feel your computer is old enough for an upgrade, then you most certainly need to buy a new hard disk - hard disks do not last forever, I would *never* trust a hard disk over 2 years old with any files that I could not afford to lose.
If you buy a new Mobo, you will have a choice of AMD or Intel. Intel currently have the best prices and speeds of CPU's (dual core) at the moment, and Intel chips operate cooler than similar spec AMD's processors (so you can get away with smaller cooling fans that do not make lots of noise).
Take Note: DO NOT PRESUME YOU CAN USE DATA RECOVERY SOFTWARE ON A DISK TO RECOVER DATA WHEN IT GOES BAD. The majority of hard disks that have 'died' on me have been mechanical faults, such as the drive motor has failed.. which means the disk is extremely dead, it doesn't spin, so no amount of software or PC World can get it to spin again to get the data off.. there are specialist companies out there that have the technology to remove the individual platters inside a hard disk case to extract the data in extreme cases for extreme amounts of money!

Personal Opinion Ahead: Alternatively, take a look at prebuilds to save you the trouble (I personally swear by Scan Computers, never let me down yet, two items they delivered to me that were dead on arrival were returned free of charge via their courier and replaced within 1 week- great service)

By all means post a shopping list of items you may have already looked at and I'll try to give you a considered view of why you should or should not purchase them.. buying a new PC has to be one of the biggest mine fields out there!

Good Luck Dai,

Nick

bandydai · Joined: 27 Feb 2007 Posts: 56 Location: South Wales

G'morning Nick. Just tried to format the harddrive and message says Windows cannot format................oops! Rolling Eyes

NickAskew · Moderator Joined: 03 Nov 2006 Posts: 112 Location: Thirsk

Are you trying to format the 'C' drive of the PC you are currently using? If so, the reason it cannot format is that it is still in use - you will need to boot up your computer with your Windows XP installation CD and then choose to DELETE PARTITION, and then RECREATE PARTITION and then to FORMAT DRIVE using NTFS (do not check the 'quick' format option - that way any physical disk errors will be identified before the operating system is installed)

bandydai · Joined: 27 Feb 2007 Posts: 56 Location: South Wales

Hi Nick. Thanks for that reply....Yes, it's this PC that I'm working on. I did what you said and re-booted with the windows CD in, and this message came up. Windows could not start, file missing or corrupt....... file; root.system.32\hal.dll
Please re-install copy of file.

bandydai · Joined: 27 Feb 2007 Posts: 56 Location: South Wales

When 'er indoors gets off the dog, I will fone u. Cheers.