Chips -the latest greatest

[Reality]

When we last left off in Jan 2007,
http://forums.phillyarena.net/index.php?topic=3503.0
westkoast:  Right now the best chips on the market are the newer Intel Core Duo chips.  This is a perfect example of why competition is important.  AMD put out a better chip then Intel did, that teamed up with them forcing Intel to stop bullying their way around in the industry with legal action, they grabbed market share.  Intel responded by going back to the work bench and pumping out a very nice product.  I run AMD at home, I love AMD chips.  They are reliable and I've never had a problem.    If you want the best, top of the line chip then go with the new Intel's.

LFD:  My absolute choice if you run an AMD (is there another chipset?) is Asus for a motherboard, and it isn’t much more of an investment to go with a 64 bit capable chip, especially since hardware assembled today is powerful enough to be around when 64 bit really takes off. Plus, my experience is that AMD responds better than Intel to tweaking such slight overclocking (slight, not like these idiot gamers who burn the chip out by way overclocking) AMD runs hotter so cooling is critical, Thermaltake makes the best copper heat sink fan I have ever used. I would put an AMD/Asus combo against anything Intel can come up with, the Opteron 180 and Athlon 64 X2 are both dual core and support hyper transport which ASUS offers at 1000MHz.

JoeV  I've always gone (and recommended) Intel chips

*editors note i am catagorically not pitting anyones views against anothers, as indeed ie: LFD went on to say he simply is not familiar with Intel.  Rather just loved all the input you guys gave on not only chips but Motherboards, monitors, doddle daddles and razzle dazzles.
It's been 10 months, so any new thoughts on the industry?

[westkoast]

Intel is still making the better chips as you can tell by the shift in market share.  AMD is lagging behind a bit.  They have a new line of  chips coming out but Intel really has stepped their game up in response to people shifting away from them for a while.  IMO (others may disagree)   AMD makes the better lower end chips and Intel makes the nicer higher end chips for the desktop/laptops.  If you are looking to build a lower end system because you don't do much on your home PC outside of basics, go with AMD.  If you travel a lot and are looking for a powerful laptop I still think the core duo chips in the laptops are by far the best.   The quad core xeon process are especially nice.  I just put in a new server for a client that has one of those chips and it runs flawless.  Even if you put a substantial load on them they still perform well.

Almost a year later and Windows Vista still is Windows Millenium 2k7.  Just to remind some of you Microsoft is going to stop shipping Windows XP to be purchased at local retailers  and to manufacturers in the 1st qt of next year (I believe in March).  So if you are thinking about buying a PC but don't want one that is all flash get one loaded with Windows XP.  If you want something flashy like Windows Vista you should probably be on a MAC anyways.   If you are a super geek chances are you've heard about all the advances they are making in the Linux desktop realm.  They have some cool visual effects being built for many distributions.  I've been running Ubuntu Linux as my primary OS at home and have yet to have any problems.  I made a post about using it a while ago and I am still very pleased with it.   In fact I miss it when I have to go to client sites that have Windows Vista.

I am hoping by mid 2008 that the blu ray and hd dvd media has dropped dramatically.  I'd love to have access to burn 30+ gigs of information on a single disk for backup of my home network.  Or better yet my music collection!

Also it looks like the whole media center, content server in the home idea is taking off.  I've seen a lot of articles and heard a lot of chatter about people wireless streaming pictures, home video, and music all around the house.  I myself have already setup one using my playstation 3, an open source (aka free) piece of software on my Linux computer, and a little bit of basic networking.  Now I stream everything through my playstation 3 that is hooked up to my home entertainment system.   They have some really expensive equipment and there is a lot of ways to set it up cheaper.  If anyone is thinking about it I suggest asking some of the guru's around here first.  The whole computer controlling everything in the house always interested me.   I've been waiting for the 'computer controls the house' idea for years now.  Always reminds me of that one Simpson's episode......

[rickortreat]

I don't see too many people running to Vista- I don't think that Microsoft has done enough to make Vista an attractive alternative to XP!  There's no good business reason to migrate from XP to Vista, even if Microsoft stops selling it and supporting it.

There's nothing critical that you can do with Vista that you can't do with XP.

As far as chips go, most of them run XP fine so I'm not concerned with spending more for a top-end chip, and there aren't any must-have applications out there that demand greater performance than what I have anyway.

I spend more time on the internet, and trading than anything else- my concern is a reliable-high speed internet connection and adequate graphics to display one minute charts.  It doesn't take too elaborate a set-up to get that done.

If you need more, either you are a developer, a webhosting service or a gamer.  If you're that much of a gamer, you need a life!

[Reality]

I am hoping by mid 2008 that the blu ray and hd dvd media has dropped dramatically.  I'd love to have access to burn 30+ gigs of information on a single disk for backup of my home network.  Or better yet my music collection! 

Even when blu ray price drops will it require replacing all current dvd movies and ancient VHS tapes?
So now we'll have to buy a "blu ray" movie dvd to make it work?

Intel Core Duo chips

  are these Core Duo chips still the latest greatest?

[westkoast]

I am hoping by mid 2008 that the blu ray and hd dvd media has dropped dramatically.  I'd love to have access to burn 30+ gigs of information on a single disk for backup of my home network.  Or better yet my music collection! 

Even when blu ray price drops will it require replacing all current dvd movies and ancient VHS tapes?
So now we'll have to buy a "blu ray" movie dvd to make it work?

Intel Core Duo chips

  are these Core Duo chips still the latest greatest?

Nope..all the blu ray players play older DVDs.  They just don't play HD DVDs.  You can however buy a combo drive that plays both formats of HD movies.   VHS...well I dont know anyone who still buys those lol.

I still think the core duo chips in the laptops and the desktops are still the best.  However they are not technically the latest and greatest as both Intel and AMD are working on new processors as we speak.  There are quad core chips out there right now.  The technology is always moving in that sector so there really is no such thing as latest and greatest.  For 98% of the people who purchase PCs the core duo is the best to go with if you are looking for higher end desktops or top of the line laptops. 

Streaming media around the house wirelessly is very cool btw. 

[Reality]

Running the cable tv into the computer and storing tv shows on yet another hardrive is one of the things i would like to accomplish.  Not that chips and motherboard figure that much into that equation, or do they?  I could then record Spurs games and show for example, W.O.W., Jomal and Skandery how accurate Tony Parker is in the 4th qtr of playoff games.  Or how complicated is getting it from hardrive to this board?

quad core chips

  So no need to wait or spend extra money now on the quads?  The Core Duos are fine?

[westkoast]

Running the cable tv into the computer and storing tv shows on yet another hardrive is one of the things i would like to accomplish.  Not that chips and motherboard figure that much into that equation, or do they?  I could then record Spurs games and show for example, W.O.W., Jomal and Skandery how accurate Tony Parker is in the 4th qtr of playoff games.  Or how complicated is getting it from hardrive to this board?

quad core chips

  So no need to wait or spend extra money now on the quads?  The Core Duos are fine?

If you got a video capture card you could do that and then upload small clips to youtube.  Anytime you are recording or editing video you should have a higher end machine.  Dell has some alright Core 2 duo desktops that I have used that are nice.  Video editing, to break down clips and plays, is very resource intensive so if your machine is not farily new it may not be worth it.  Streaming media around the house requires one computer to act as the media server.  Other pieces of equipment access it from around the house.  Real cool.