AM3 in a AM2 Motherboard?

[TommyC]

Hi,

Would there be any advantage in putting something like an AMD Athlon II X4 3 GHz (Or Better) Processor into a AM2 Motherboard that uses integrated graphics and sound, or would you be just as well off sticking to a good AM2 chip such as the Athlon 64 X2 3.1GHz?

The MB in question is an ASRock N68PV-GS and as I've said will be using the integrated graphics chip. ASRock state, as do other manufacturers, that the FSB will be reduced to that of AM2 specs if AM2+ or AM3 chips are used!

Quote... "If you use AM3 / AM2+ CPU on AM2 chipset motherboard, the system bus speed will downgrade from HT3.0 (5200 MT/s) to HT1.0 (2000 MT/s), but the CPU frequency will not be influenced".

The fried chip that I pulled out of the MB was an Athlon II X2 2.8GHz, but because its not my machine I have no idea how it performed, and I have no idea how another AM3 would perform over the AM2!

The PC is mainly used for social networking/Playing/Recording music/Laughing at Youtube and the occasional AVI/DivX 700Mbs CD/DVD played through Media Player Classic runing on Win Xp SP3 fitted with 2Gbs of DDR2 800Mhkz.

I maybe answering my own question, but I'm tempted to fit the cheapest chip I can get my hands on, which would be an OEM Sempron 145 (AM3 Single Core 2.8GHz)

What do you think?

TommyC

[vezhlys]

It will perform ok (but you must to check for BIOS support). I used one on ASUS M2A-VM. It was a marginally slower on some tests than on AM3 board. You can't unlock cores or overclock it on such board too.

[gg1978]

One thing i might worry about is that the old CPU was fried.. How do you know the motherboard won't just destroy your new chip? Actual CPU failure is quite rare, fwiw..