On Mon, 10 Jan 2005 23:23:53 +0000, Midnight Moocher wrote:

Hi,

I'm in the market for a new PC with a AMD processor. I will be buying in the next 6 days and need a little advice on the processor
type I should get. So I have three questions.

I've narrowed down my options to a socket 754 and the 939 (Winchester, I believe).
My main concern is upgrade options in the future (whilst on a tight budget).

1. Would I be correct in saying that the 754 socket won't be around for long, and therefore it would better buying the slowest 939 I
can get my hands on (such as the 3000+ or possibly the 3200+)?

2. Would I also be correct in saying the 939 socket should be around long enough to see around double the speed the 3000+ is capable
of?

3. If I went with 754 socket, I would have to buy a new motherboard as well as new processor to upgrade in the future to the 939
right?

Thanks.

939 is the better choice because it can support more memory, twice as much
at PC3200. The 754 can support three DIMMs at PC2700 but only two at
PC3200. The 939 pin part has two data channels, each with two DIMMs so you
can have four at PC3200. The one thing that you are sure to upgrade in the
future is the amount of RAM in your system.

Don't worry about the ability to upgrade the CPU. By the time that you can
buy a 2X speed CPU the motherboard will be obsolete. The dual core Athlon
64s are going to use DDR-2 rather than DDR memory so you will need a new
motherboard and new RAM anyway.