I define normal as someone using a computer for watching videos, doing
some office type work word processing and similar activities, and maybe
the odd game.
I upgraded a few machines from an older Athlon 64 x2
4200 (2.2 GHz Dual core socket 939, which was at the time a great
processor but fairly expensive.
In layman's terms this is roughly
twice as fast as the older Athlon 64 dual core possibly a touch more,
runs much cooler and consumes less power..and as the technology has
improved it's much cheaper too.
I've paired this processor with
some of the excellent budget ASrock boards, super combination and makes
for a very affordable update for folks running older more dated dual
cores, or even single core computers.
You have to decide what you
are doing with a computer to work out what type of machine to build. My
budget builds are usually this CPU, with the ASrock N68C-S-UCC (there
are other good models too) I add 4Gb of ram and an AMD 6450 (512Mb
normally) if they're likely to use or need a bit more 3D than the
motherboard has on offer. End result is a very decent performance for
most "normal" pc users, and the addition of a more up to date, but
inexpensive GPU helps with HD video decoding, flash playing, blu ray/DVD
playback..this is why even a low end GPU can be useful by offloading
processor intensive tasks to the graphics card. It is also useful for
folks who play the odd lighter game, though still capable of running
more modern ones if you are not pushing high resolution or don't mind
turning the settings down............
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