Which Athlon chipset?

[HarryW]

Some Athlon boards use the Via KT266 chipset, some use the AMD 761 chipset... any thoughts on which is preferable? Both seem to support PC2100 DDRRAM. What's the difference?

[JungleMan]

761 for now. Although i hear Via's new revision of the KT266 is supposed to be a lot better.

Ask these kinds of questons at www.pctsonline.com ;)

[HarryW]

Can you give any reasons?

[JungleMan]

It's faster and more compatible than the KT266. I can't find links right now but I've seen a ton of benchmarks with similar configs, and the 761 always performed faster. And there are no Creative/VIA nightmares to deal with either.

Good 761 boards are the Epox 8k7a(+), Abit KG7, or the gigabyte 7dxr.

[HarryW]

What about the Asus A7V/A7M ?

[JungleMan]

I never liked the A7M because you can only overclock via FSB increases

A7V is based on the VIA chipset and it's $199, and only one person seems to sell it on pricewatch. For the price i can get an Abit kg7, with AMD 761, 6 PCIs, and 4 DDR slots. (Some people think Abit boards are iffy though, so you may want to go with one of the other two i mentioned.)

Also, remember, nForce is just around the corner...:)

[HarryW]

Is nForce going to be better than, say, GeForce 3 though? I've seen some news coverage of it and I got the impression it wasn't intended for the the high-end market, except in laptops.

[JungleMan]

the nForce is a *good* integrated board, but you can still add on stuff. Say you want a GF3. no there is no nForce board planned at the moment with a GF3 onboard but it has an AGP slot, so you can pop one in. (it'd be cool ifyou could use the other onboard video as a 2nd monitor) And since you won't have to install sound (onboard sound is better than most), LAN, etc, you'll have more PCI slots.

Also it has this new bus technology, i forgot what it's called, its supposed to go 30% faster, and that's the main thing attracting a lot of people.

[HarryW]

I don't really care whether it's on a card or onboard, I'm just wondering about price/performance. Is nForce intended to be a way of getting cheap, good 3D performance or is it intended to be better performance-wise than previous products?

Or is the bus tech transferable to forthcoming high-end products?

[JungleMan]

It sort of combines both..all the hardcore guys seem to be excited about it so you may want to look at it...

I have to head out to school now, you might want to post this on pctsonline.com

[plenderj]

Would I get a thump if I *acchemed* the P4 processor ?

[HarryW]

If you want to pimp for Intel feel free, but you'll notice that the question isn't "Which P4 chipset?" :rolleyes:

What I'm most interested in is what the differences between the two chipsets are. Or if there are other alternatives.

[denniswrenn]

(onboard sound is better than most)


Give examples of what it's better than... I bet my SB Live! MP3+ 5.1 will beat the **** out of it :D

[JungleMan]

back on topic..i don't want to even hear P4 :D :D

[SurfDemon]

Sorry I'm late into the discussion.

I just built a system with an ASUS A7A AliMagic board (It takes both SDR and DDR ram). I'm very impressed with it. It's incredibly stable and runs quite happily at 1.4ghz with a 1.2ghz Athalon. It won't go to 1.5ghz, but I haven't tried anywhere in between yet.

SD

[scoutt]

Originally posted by jpbtennisman
It's faster and more compatible than the KT266. I can't find links right now but I've seen a ton of benchmarks with similar configs, and the 761 always performed faster. And there are no Creative/VIA nightmares to deal with either.

Good 761 boards are the Epox 8k7a(+), Abit KG7, or the gigabyte 7dxr.
that is right. the 761 is capable of overcloacking the FSB higher than the VIA chipset.

for the 761 chipset
http://www.amd.com/news/prodpr/asus.html

for the kt266a chipset (new one)
http://www.via.com.tw/jsp/en/products/apollo/kt266a.jsp

for the kt266 chipset
http://www.via.com.tw/jsp/en/products/apollo/kt266.jsp

[JungleMan]

Originally posted by SurfDemon
Sorry I'm late into the discussion.

I just built a system with an ASUS A7A AliMagic board (It takes both SDR and DDR ram). I'm very impressed with it. It's incredibly stable and runs quite happily at 1.4ghz with a 1.2ghz Athalon. It won't go to 1.5ghz, but I haven't tried anywhere in between yet.

SD

You didn't ... *gulp* sell the ZX-80 did you? :eek: :D :D

[SurfDemon]

Nah! - Nothing can compete with my ZX-80. I only use the Athalon for playing MP3 and surfing porn (it doesn't look that good in the zx-80 hi-res mode of 256x200x2)

SD