Upgrading on an A8N-SLI

[Krazeee]

So, I've been wanting to rebuild, but wont be ready for another 6 months or so. Last night I found this article on TomsHardware

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/08/23/how_to_spend_money_on_component_upgrades/index.html

In short it says that for less then $500 you can upgrade your CPU, GPU, HDD and have a system that should tide you over till the new line of technology comes out (new Intel and AMD socket types, next line of DX10 cards, DDR3 Ram).

I don't need a new HDD, so I'm thinking of using some of that cost towards more ram.

Two questions.

1. Will the A8N-SLI (not dlx or premium) support 2gb Ram using all 4 slots? I know it can handle 4gb ram, but I thought I had read somewhere that filling all 4 slots can cause issues. But if it will, do all four sticks need to be matching, or can I have two seperate matched pairs as long as they are in the corresponding slots? Reason I ask is, to get the same stuff I have now will cost $121, but I can pick up these Mushkin sticks for $65 which have the same timings as the Corsairs. And if it's better to just have matching pairs I might as well pick up a 2gb pair for $93 to $105 anyways.

Corsairs (I have these now) - $121
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820145450

Mushkin - $65
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820146310

Two 2gb options
A-DATA Vitesta 2GB (2 x 1GB) 184-Pin DDR 400 (PC 3200) (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820211014) - $93

G.SKILL 2GB (2 x 1GB) 184-Pin DDR 400 (PC 3200) (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231047) - $105

2. Contrary to my sig I now have a 7900GS. I felt like I needed to replace the 7800GT and knew I was getting pretty much the same card, but didn't do enough research to realize I could have had a much better card for nearly the same price, doh. Right now the best card for my pricepoint is an X1950XT (if I can find one). Will this be a conflict with an nVidia board, using an ATI card? And if it does conflict, does anybody have a good suggestion for a comparable nVidia card? I can adjust a bit on price if need be.

Other than that I'll be grabbing an AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+ Toledo 2.2GHz for about $80.

This puts me at $310 to $370 depending on the Ram situation.

Any suggestions or comments are appreciated.

[Krazeee]

36 views (3 of which are mine) and no responses...Maybe this thread would have been better in the Mobo section, but instead of starting a new thread I thought a bump would be appropriate. Please correct me if my forum etiquette is incorrect.

I was just hoping to find out if I'll have any issues filling all 4 slots with 512 sticks of DDR400 ram, and if I did, would they all need to be the exact same sticks, or could I use two different brands so long as the timings were identicle?

Also, can an ATI card be put on an nVidia based board?

I hope to get these parts fairly soon, any insight is welcome. Thanks.

[Chazell29]

Correct Me If I'm Wrong

As far as upgrading the RAM goes, it is not recommended to use different types of RAM, even if you have one brand for slots 1 and 2, and another brand for 3 and 4; all RAM should be the same.

For the Video Card, you can use an ATI Video Card on an Nvidia Chipset Motherboard without any issues. If you wanted to go Nvidia, you could get the 8600GT for a little less. The only reason to do this really is to get the Direct X10, which isn't that valueble at the moment.

[Cricket]

Two questions.

1. Will the A8N-SLI (not dlx or premium) support 2gb Ram using all 4 slots? I know it can handle 4gb ram, but I thought I had read somewhere that filling all 4 slots can cause issues. What I've heard happens in certain AMD based motherboards is when all 4 slots are used the motherboard will down clock the slots to a slower speed to maintain stability...but I'm not sure if this happens for that particular motherboard...it might only happen if you try to max out the amount of RAM (4GB total memory). For 2GB of RAM you should be okay.But if it will, do all four sticks need to be matching, or can I have two seperate matched pairs as long as they are in the corresponding slots? The best situation would be to have matching sticks in all 4 memory slots (brand, speed and timing). But you can use different brands of RAM and possibly even speed as long as the CAS timings are the same. The sticks will just be run at the speed of the slowest pair. Of the 3 brands you listed the Mushkin RAM is the best match. But sometimes different brands of RAM don't play nice together and I've never tried running Corsair XMS with Mushkin High-Performance RAM in the same computer before so I'm not sure if they'd work together or not...but since they're both high quality brands they might work together okay.Right now the best card for my pricepoint is an X1950XT (if I can find one). Will this be a conflict with an nVidia board, using an ATI card?No, it won't be a problem running a ATi video card in a NVidia based motherboard...you just won't be able to run ATi video cards in SLi (you need matching NVidia video cards for that).

:) Cricket

[Krazeee]

Awesome. Thank you so much for the insight.

I think I'll defiantely get a the x1950xt (there are a few floating around out there for about $180). I don't really see much of a point in running two nVidia cards in SLi on this board. At best SLi offers limited performance gain, and on this early SLi generation board, the two slots run at 8x when in SLi, so I'd rather have 1 more powerfull card than two gimpy ones runnin on crippled speeds.

Granted I probably wouldn't have issues with the RAM, but since I'm such a fan of doing things the "prefered way", I'll probably just buy 2gb of new ram and save this other stuff for....something....we'll see.

Again, thanks for the input.

[Krazeee]

By the way, am I going to have an issue with XP with new Ram, CPU and Vid card? I tried looking through the OS section and did a search but didn't find much regarding the same issue. Any thoughts?

[Chazell29]

By the way, am I going to have an issue with XP with new Ram, CPU and Vid card? I tried looking through the OS section and did a search but didn't find much regarding the same issue. Any thoughts?
If you install everything correctly, you shouldn't have any problems. When you start up after you install everything, it will bring up a message during the POST regarding the new CPU, you may have to click a few things. It will also give you a message regarding the new RAM. It won't say anything about the video card in the POST, just make sure you install the drivers for the video card and then restart your PC afterwards.