AM3 and AM2

[_-..zKiLLA..-_]

They're backwards compatible right? so basically i can put an AM3 socket processor in my AM2 socket?

how does this look for an upgrade?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819103680

 

[Joel~]

Yes, you can put an AM3 CPU in to an AM2 board because the AM3 CPUs have both a DDR3 controller and a DDR2 controller onboard. Of course, AM2 CPUs won't work in an AM3 board (and to make sure you don't put one in, the AM3 CPUs have two pins less than the AM2 CPUs).

I'm thinking of getting a Phenom II X2 as well. My plan is to sell this rig and use the spare parts in my box of junk to make a lower-spec machine that I can upgrade incrementally.

 

[_-..zKiLLA..-_]

How well do the new dual cores perform?

 

[Atomic Rooster]

The X2 Phenom II should perform very well. If you read the reviews, many have even enabled the third and fourth cores on them.


EDIT:
I know the AM3 Phenom II is backwards compatible with socket AM2+ motherboards, but not so sure with socket AM2. The main drawback I see of running the new Phenom II X2 AM3 on your ASUS M2N-SLI Deluxe is the Hyper Transport speeds. Your board will bottleneck the CPU as it runs at only 2000 MT/s. The Phenom II runs double that at 4000MT/s. You may even need a BIOS update to run it, if it will support it at all.

 

[Joel~]

They should perform very well. If you read the reviews, many have even enabled the third and fourth cores on them.

AMD have actually started restricting this, though the good folks at Gigabyte are apparently going to allow users to retain the feature (by making clever use of the dual BIOS system that they implement on their motherboards).

http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/gigabyte-motherboard-amd-phenom-cpu,news-31293.html

It was an interesting read I stumbled across earlier in the week.

 

[_-..zKiLLA..-_]

Well i doubt im gonna unlock them. i'll probably just OC the hell out of it and go to town

 

[worshipme]

AMD have actually started restricting this

I thought AMD said that they wouldn't be restricting it. At least that's what I've been reading lately.

 

[Joel~]

I thought AMD said that they wouldn't be restricting it. At least that's what I've been reading lately.

So did I, when I originally heard that you could unlock the extra cores. However.

AMD announced that it would release new microcode for motherboard BIOS updates that will disable the core-unlocking feature, preventing people from going to 4-cores if they purchased say a dual-core Phenom II.

 

[Atomic Rooster]

There's an easy work around for the "new microcode". Use an older BIOS that allows the unlocking of the extra cores.