New mobo and memory recommendations

[Summo]

I'm toying with the idea of getting nice new motherboard, processor and memory for meh PC and before I trawl through Google I wondered if there were any spinky new ones you peeps could recommend.

I'm after a mobo that has around 6 PCI and 1 AGP slot (for my GeForce 4 Ti4400), AMD or Intel (though I'm leaning towards AMD for cost) and I'd be looking at getting 512-1024MB memory.

Not fussed about onboard RAID as I have two SCSI disks and will probably replace them with a nice, large Western IDE drive soon. Likewise, I'm not interested in onboard graphics or sound.

Anyone?

 

[.Cask]

I just did an upgrade of those bits.

Barton XP2500+ £110 - £120. (30 quid cheaper than I paid )
Asus A7N8X Deluxe £115
512mb Crucial PC2700 £60

What sound card have ya got? As the onboard sound on that mobo is rather good - at least on a par with audigy 1. I've found that mobo absolutely fine apart from my speakers not working. I blame that on the speakers and not Asus though. Only has 5 PCI slots, don't really need 6 do you??

Also has 2 serial ATA ports if you wanted one of those new HD's =]

Thought I'd better get in before Jonty writes a comprehensive essay

 

[Deadmanwalking]

Wouldnt bother with a 2500+ barton if i were u everyone is buying them so they can say "Look barton" but im to cheap to buy a 2800/3000 with are fuckign expensive.

Depending on ur budget get a 2700+ or more if u can.

As for mobos atm the nforce2 chipsets are the only ones worth considering if u ask me in terms of AMD anyways.

 

[Summo]

Thanks for the info, guys. Much appreciated.

Cask, I have a Creative 512 PCI sound card. Nothing special but does the job. Maybe onboard sound would be better. Maybe I'm living in the past when onboard sound was choppy and shit.

edit: And yeah, I could live with 5 PCI slots.

 

[Deadmanwalking]

The full blown nforce 2 chipsets thats on both bridges has superb sound quality and would i can say surpass what u have in that 512 Creative

 

[Jonty]

Originally posted by Summo
Maybe I'm living in the past when onboard sound was choppy and shit.

hehe, things have thankfully improved The integrated audio solutions on nForce2 boards are simply amazing. It's effectively a full Dolby Digital 5.1 solution, with full EAX and A3D support. The Audio Processing Unit removes the stuttering and CPU load present on older onboard solutions. In terms of quality, it's as good as any dedicated card on the market barring, perhaps, Creative's Audigy 2.

Kind Regards

Jonty

P.S. nForce APU Details

 

[Summo]

Jonty, you rock.

I'm hearing support for the nForce boards and a little bit of Barton. Do I hear any others?

 

[Wij]

Take the money to the pub and drink your cares away.

 

[~YuckFou~]

Hookers.

 

[Summo]

Here's a first-draft list:

Asus A7N8X Deluxe nForce2 (Socket A) Motherboard £113
- 3 x 184pin DDR-SDRAM ports (Supporting up to PC3200)
- 5 x PCI slots
- 1 x AGP Pro (4x/8x) slot
- Dual Channel DDR400 support
- 2 x UDMA133 (supports upto 4 device)
- Serial ATA150 Controller
- 6 x USB 2.0 ports
- Firewire IEEE 1394 ports
- Onboard dual 3com & Nvidia LAN
- Nvidia SoundStorm / Dolby Digital Audio
- Nivida Nforce 2 Chipset

Corsair 512MB DDR XMS3200 Platinum CAS2 £107.87
This memory is designed to run at 200Mhz memory speed (400Mhz DDR).

AMD Athlon "Barton" XP2500+ 333FSB (Socket A) CPU - OEM £107.98
or
AMD Athlon "Thoroughbred" XP 2700+ 333FSB (Socket A) CPU - OEM £146.76

Barton or Thorougbred, peeps? As ever, please rip my choices apart.

I wonder if my flower heatsink and fan will still be sufficient.

 

[.Cask]

Would have thought your fan and heatsink be fine. My 2500+ doesn't get very hot at all, and I got the boxed set and am just using the default AMD cooler.

CPU at 28'C now according to asus probe, although I have had the window open most of the day. Never seen it get over 36'C.

Might wanna check out some board reviews to make sure it fits tho.

 

[Will]

Bah Summo, you've made me start looking at getting a new system. I had a mate ask me to build him a system or acquire him one for around about £500 for music editing work. I could build a Shuttle system for about £570 with the parts I already have spare, and sell him my old box for £500.

And I swore I wouldn't be upgrading this year.

 

[Jonty]

<twoCentsWorth>

That has the makings of a pretty sweet computer, Summo I took the liberty of checking the prices and, give or take a pound or two, they seem okay

The motherboard you've selected is one of the most popular on the market. It has had its fair share of bad press too (concerning the drivers and the audio mostly) but, not withstanding, it's still a brilliant board.

The Corsair RAM is without doubt just about the best money can buy (it should be at almost twice the price of its mainstream rivals ). My advice, though: consider purchasing two modules instead of one. Ordinarily one stick of RAM is better, but the nForce2 has Dual-DDR capability. This effectively means 2x256Mb of RAM will outperform 1x512Mb. Don't get me wrong, the difference isn't mindblowing, but having 2x256Mb will yield better results every time.

As for the CPU, it's a tough call. The Barton has 640KB of cache memory (512Kb L2 cache, 128Kb L1 cache (64K instruction and 64K data)). This increased cache memory allows more information to be stored closer to the processor, leading to greater performance. The Barton chips also feature QuantiSpeed Architecture for Rapid Execution of Applications. Now whether this will 'make up' for the Thoroghbred's raw power is anyone's guess. My own feeling is that the two will be perform fairly similarly, but that the Thoroughbred would remain on top (but I'm only guessing ).

Anyway, I'm rambling. In short, that looks like it would be a cool system. As you rightly say, Intel's kit is far more expensive, especially the new 800Mhz FSB products they're rolling out. That said, with that extra cost comes the performance boost. But to be honest, you shouldn't be disappointed with the kit you've wisely selected

</twoCentsWorth>

Kind Regards

 

[Deadmanwalking]

I had the tbred 2700 then got a 2800 barton free followed by a 3000 baton free (Lifes good)

Anyway built me m8 a shuttle with a 2500 barton (Hes a benchmark geek ) he wanted it so he could say LOOK barton..

Performance wise the 2700+ kicks the barton 2500 to hell the only reason i could see getting a 2500 is if heat is a big problem Ala Shuttle or if u want silent cooling yada yada all that and u cant afford a 2880/3000.

 

[xane]

Originally posted by Jonty
Ordinarily one stick of RAM is better, but the nForce2 has Dual-DDR capability. This effectively means 2x256Mb of RAM will outperform 1x512Mb. Don't get me wrong, the difference isn't mindblowing, but having 2x256Mb will yield better results every time.

More importantly if one stick goes pop its easy to detect and you can run on 1/2 RAM for a while, whereas if your only stick has zapped and you have nothing to test it against it can be a right pain (speaking from experience).

Out of interest, I've been mulling over a A7N8X for a while now, does anyone know if I can run a regular Athlon 1.3Gb in it with PC2100 RAM ?

 

[Jonty]

Good point xane!

As for your question, I *think* you can use that processor and RAM with the A7N8X Deluxe/non-Deluxe board. I know from other nForce2 boards that a wide variety of configurations are supported (helped by 'A-Sync' modes in the BIOS, which can let you happily run, say, a 333Mhz FSB processor with 266Mhz RAM etc). The official board specifications can be found on the ASUSTek website.

Kind Regards

 

[Embattle]

Current support

CPU - PCB BIOS

Athlon 700 - ALL ALL
Athlon 750 - ALL ALL
Athlon 800 - ALL ALL
Athlon 850 - ALL ALL
Athlon 900 - ALL ALL
Athlon 950 - ALL ALL
Athlon 1000 (200 MHz FSB) - ALL ALL
Athlon 1000 (266 MHz FSB) - ALL ALL
Athlon 1100 (200 MHz FSB) - ALL ALL
Athlon 1133 (266 MHz FSB) - ALL ALL
Athlon 1200 (200 MHz FSB) - ALL ALL
Athlon 1200 (266 MHz FSB) - ALL ALL
Athlon 1300 (200 MHz FSB) - ALL ALL
Athlon 1333 (266 MHz FSB) - ALL ALL
Athlon 1400 (200 MHz FSB) - ALL ALL
Athlon 1400 (266 MHz FSB) - ALL ALL
Athlon XP 1500+(Model 6) - ALL ALL
Athlon XP 1600+(Model 6) - ALL ALL
Athlon XP 1700+(Model 8) - ALL ALL
Athlon XP 1700+(Model 6) - ALL ALL
Athlon XP 1800+(Model 6) - ALL ALL
Athlon XP 1800+(Model 8) - ALL ALL
Athlon XP 1900+(Model 8) - ALL ALL
Athlon XP 1900+(Model 6) - ALL ALL
Athlon XP 2000+(Model 6) - ALL ALL
Athlon XP 2000+(Model 8) - ALL ALL
Athlon XP 2100+(Model 8) - ALL ALL
Athlon XP 2100+(Model 6) - ALL ALL
Athlon XP 2200+ (Model 8) - ALL ALL
Athlon XP 2400+ (Model 8) - ALL ALL
Athlon XP 2500+(333 MHZ FSB)(Model 10) - 1.04 1002
Athlon XP 2600+(333 MHz FSB)(Model 8) - 1.04 1001C
Athlon XP 2600+(266 MHz FSB)(Model 8) - ALL ALL
Athlon XP 2700+(333 MHz FSB)(Model 8) - 1.04 1001C
Athlon XP 2800+(333 MHZ FSB)(Model 8) - 1.04 1001C
Athlon XP 2800+(333 MHZ FSB)(Model 10) - 1.04 1002
Athlon XP 3000+(333 MHZ FSB)(Model 10) - 1.04 1002
Duron 600 (Model 3) - ALL ALL
Duron 650 (Model 3) - ALL ALL
Duron 700 (Model 3) - ALL ALL
Duron 750 (Model 3) - ALL ALL
Duron 800 (Model 3) - ALL ALL
Duron 850 (Model 3) - ALL ALL
Duron 900 (Model 3) - ALL ALL
Duron 900 (Model 7) - ALL ALL
Duron 950 (Model 7) - ALL ALL
Duron 950 (Model 3) - ALL ALL
Duron 1000 (Model 7) - ALL ALL
Duron 1100 (Model 7) - ALL ALL
Duron 1200 (Model 7) - ALL ALL
Duron 1300 (Model 7) - ALL ALL

 

[Testin da Cable]

I have that with a barton2800 Summo. it rocks, really it does.

*flutters eyelashes*


didn't I say I wasn't going to upgrade this year? hmmm

 

[xane]

What about the PC2100 (266Mhz) RAM or is that a different pin configuration to PC2700 ?

 

[Jonty]

Hi xane

Yes, that RAM will be fine.

Kind Regards

 

[Testin da Cable]

get the fastest ram you can though

 

[Summo]

Second draft...

Asus A7N8X Deluxe nForce2 (Socket A) Motherboard £113

Corsair 512MB DDR XMS3200 TwinX (2x256MB) Platinum CAS2 £132.89
A matched pair of 256MB XMS3200LL Low Latency memory modules

AMD Athlon "Thoroughbred" XP 2700+ 333FSB (Socket A) CPU - OEM £146.76

Being able to play Mafia on top detail with no slowdown... Priceless.



Good point on the RAM, Jonty! I'm heading for two strips. Thing that bugs me is that I currently have 1GB of RAM in my system. Admittedly it's PC133 and no, I didn't notice any difference when I upgraded from 512MB to 1GB. Even though this new RAM is stupidly fast compared to my current, it still feels odd 'upgrading' to a smaller number. Not a problem, though.

Deadmanwalking, you've persuaded me to fork out the little extra for the Thoroughbred. To be honest, I hadn't even heard of Barton before I read this thread. :/ Unless someone says "Barton 2500 over Thoroughbred 2700 every time!" I think I'll stick with this.

This is all rather expensive stuff at nearly £400. More than I've paid for an upgrade before, but this should future proof my PC at least for a few years. Maybe. That said, I'm probably going to build a PC for my dad, so my 1.4GHz CPU and Gig of RAM should satisfy his web/email/photo needs quite nicely and help me finance part of this upgrade.

I've been getting these prices from Overclockers UK. Does anyone know of a reason I shouldn't buy from them? I'm going to check prices and availability of these items in my local PC World, too.

Keep any opinions coming, peeps. I was alone and in the dark before I posted, NOW I HAVE A SHOPPING LIST, FS!

 

[Summo]

Gah! I've made an error! Price-wise I should be comparing the Thoroughbred XP2700 (£147) with the Barton XP2800 (£188).

Does the raw power of the Thoroughbred still do the thrashing, or does the next-gen Barton take a sly lead? The £40 price difference is negligable, I suppose.

 

[old.LeitMotif]

Corsair is nice ram, but, and this is wholly my personal opinion, I wouldnt spend the extra £60-£70 quid on it. Think of what the spare cash could go towards?.

I have had no problems with my TwinMOS in the A7N8X-D.. I would go for 2x256 unless you really need the 2x512 modules.

TwinMOS - 2x256 PC3200 = 62 quid.

http://www.komplett.co.uk/k/ki.asp?action=info&AvdID=1&CatID=17&GrpID=9&p=30892&s=fp

yes all arguments, and points of view about the overclocking, and low latency qualities of Corsair are very valid, however if you arent the absolute hardcore enthusiast then i personally think its more of a luxury, especially if price is a concern .

Remember, the A7N8X has never been been sold with the ability to go to 400FSB (although the nforce2 clearly should) so the older revisions of the hardware may not be able to have that sort of support.

Another note, be sure that you are confident with buying the A7N8X board. I have built a few systems based on it and have experienced niggles, but nothing that I cant, and havent Ironed out.

Personally I the board is excellent

 

[Deadmanwalking]

The 2800 barton has a slower clock speed iirc

but performance wise it is faster ...

if u can do.. ur mem will love u more for it

www.theoverclockingstore.co.uk

Free del on EVERYTHING thats where i got me gear from

Edit: They dont have your motherboard but i wouldnt buy ANYTHING from ocuk let alone memory

 

[Summo]

Good point with the memory. I'm not hardcore and I value £60 in the pocket over a performance gain that I'll probably never notice.

I'm torn between the Thoroughbred and the Barton now. Someone decide for me and have it delivered tomorrow?

Having read the other thread, I'll make sure to get the latest mobo revision, too.

I can never remember which Overclockers/ing/Store/UK variant we're supposed to avoid. Free delivery from store.co.uk sounds just swell, though.

 

[Embattle]

Corsair is the memory to go for if you're planning overclocking, otherwise I find it a little bit too much.

Deadmanwalking, it is different horses for different courses so while you may of had a bad experience many have not.....although it does seem that many people have had trouble with scan

 

[Deadmanwalking]

AHAH But free delivery??

And not complete knobs ?

AND!

RMA that works

Edit: Get 2700 ram instead of the 3200 and put the saving towards a 2800

 

[Embattle]

Yes free delivery but general a little bit more expensive, although I do like OCS....most RMAs on any company is a shit experience.

Go for the AMD Athlon "Thoroughbred" XP 2700+ 333FSB it is faster than a Barton 2500+.

 

[Summo]

But is it faster than a Barton 2800?