Un-confuse me!!

[Scotty]

OK here goes.. I have been reading for hours trying to decide which ddr mobo to get. These are my choices: ASUS,ABIT,EPOX or JETWAY. I have decided from reading that I don't want to do the raid thing but I want the system to render as fast as possible [3D Art thing] unless convienced otherwise. I have decided on the Radon 8500 and have a 1.2 Athlon(but would upgrade) Any thoughts?? Thanks to all, Scotty

Athlon 1.2
663aspro
512 pc133
Maxtor 30gig 7200
voodoo3
Richo cd r/wr
56x cdrom
XP pro (but will run win98se)
etc.etc.etc.

[Xayd]

You don't want Jetway.

My vote at this point would be the Epox KT266A board.

[Scotty]

What about Gigabyte?? The only reason I ask is the choices that I have around here are limited to a few unless I want to order online! Living in AK is not living in the USA if ya know what I mean... Here are few choices: Asus A7M266 at $181.oo, Abit K7G at $170.oo and the Gigabytes are GA-7DX and VTX at the same price. Even DFI which I was broke in on in my first two PCs and have heard nothing but BAD stuff about also. I'm just cautious of ordering on line cause I got burnt by Ability Wholesale last summer. Thanks again, Scotty

[glc]

You can order from Mwave or Newegg with confidence. Who the heck is Ability Wholesale? Never heard of them.

Asus, Abit, Epox, Soyo, MSI = good
DFI, Shuttle = ok
Gigabyte, ECS, Jetway = ugh

Your opinions may vary. I happen to agree with Xayd here.

[Xayd]

I am and always have been an Abit supporter. I have two of their boards now (one BX and one KT133A) and both are superior to any competition in overclockability and 'tweakable-ness', IMHO.

That said, Abit will never be the first to release a mobo with a 'new' chipset. They skipped over the KT266 chipset completely, and have just recently announced the production of a KT266A board. Their only current DDR offering to date for AMD has been the KG7 which is an AMD/Via hybrid chipset.

Initial pricing on the KR7A (Abit's KT266A board coming out this month) with RAID looks to be about 155 dollars. If history holds true the non-RAID version should be 120 to 130 dollars initially.

If you wanna wait, Abit rarely disappoints, the KR7A should be a great board, and maybe even rival the Epox KT266A board as the best out there. It will be more expensive, but that goes without saying. Then again no other mobo out there will let you lock your PCI and AGP bus speeds and allow you to tinker with the bus timings between RAM/Chipset/CPU manually in the BIOS without a single jumper to worry with either ;). Abit boards won't ever be cheap, but they WILL be the most overclockable, if you're into that. If you're buying right now, get the Epox, if you're buying a month or two from now, the decision isn't as clear.

[Scotty]

OK another ? or 2! If I buy a board with raid can I still use it without doing the raid thing? If I decide to do the raid thing later I mean.. I can wait but you know how it is. Ability Wholesale is a company that I ordered a tower from that ended up in Kansas! I had to resort to PCMagazine to get that one fixed and they credited my old account that I shut down months ago.. hmmmm I don't know who won on that one ;) Thanks again!! Scotty

PS: Here is two choices

http://direct.mwave.com/mwave/doc/A13241.html

http://direct.mwave.com/mwave/doc/A14521.html

The Abit has 4 slots for ram but the Epox has 2 that is the only difference that I saw. I think they both will take up to 1.9 on the cpu??

[Xayd]

Question-

Why an AMD 761 board? The Via KT266A chipset is the first to make DDR really worth while, IMHO. Take a look at the Epox 8KHA+

[Scotty]

I'm still a newbie!! I did see that 8KHA+ when I went to the Epox site. That looks impressive. Is that one on the market yet or is that the one to wait for?? Thanks again, Scotty

Nevermind! It's out there... ;)

Oh yea! How bout the raid now for later thing???

[Xayd]

If you want it, fine, but it's not a necessity. If you were working with critical data on your machine (i.e. a home business or something), you could use RAID for real time backups to multiple drives, or you could stripe the drives for better performance, but it's not a necessity.

If you want RAID later on, you can get PCI IDE RAID controllers for 30 to 40 dollars, so I wouldn't get it on the mobo if I didn't have to.

[Scotty]

Cool that is all I need to know! I was wondering if the extra hassle was worth it. I think in my case it would not be a need anyway... I just heard that is was something to make your PC faster but like I say "not worth the hassle" in my opinion... Thanks!! Scotty

[Xayd]

For a gaming machine, hard drive speed matters very little. If you were photo/video/audio editing and needed the extra swap file performance, it'd be a different story.

Good luck with your new build ;).

[Scotty]

OK mabey it is what I want!! I plan on doing the 3D art thing and was wondering if it was what I needed. I guess I will do it anyway. I do want the fastest possible rendering and all that goes with it. Any other suggestions on mobo's?? I been lookin at the EPoX 8KHA+ seems inexpensive though. I had not put a limit on the money that I was gonna spend on this PC but high $$ parts isn't always the answer and I am open to any suggestions. What ya think?? Scotty

[Scotty]

What do ya think of this deal and also the company??
http://www.newegg.com/app/shoppingcart.asp?submit=SHIPPING
Just checked it out a little more on the reviews and it looks real good except only 3 ram slots but other than that I think it is ok.. Scotty

[Xayd]

Link doesn't work, it's to a shopping cart.

Epox was a very 'average' mobo manufacturer up until the Athlon/Duron line, but for whatever reason they decided to compete with Asus and Abit on the AMD side of things, and they've done quite well.

Any Epox Socket A board should do you nicely, but the KT266A chipset boards will be the best performers.

[LawyerRon]

Scotty,
The Epox 8KHA+ is a really nice board, you can't go wrong with that choice.

[Scotty]

OK Thanks! I really want a good foundation mobo so I don't have to do another upgrade to soon (I said that six months ago too) and I agree with you it looks like a good one by the reviews I have read. Thanks again :) :) :) Scotty

[Scotty]

One more ? My buddy says that I need "registered" 2100 ram and nothing else!! I ordered the Epox 8KHA+ mobo so give me an idea of what I need for memory please.. I went to Crucial and got more confused... :) Thanks again! Scotty

[Xayd]

Your buddy's wrong ;). Unless I'm mistaken the AMD 761 boards could run either ECC or unbuffered memory, and required ECC if you had over a certain amount (a gig maybe?). The KT266A will run as much regular ole unbuffered RAM as you wanna put in them, though.

If you're ordering from Crucial, just plug in the manufacturer and mobo model and it'll only show you what's compatible to ensure you don't make any ordering mistakes.

[Scotty]

He just mentioned it cause I guess he is having a problem or something! He has a Asus A7M 266 I think that is what he said he has. I remember it is a ddr with raid anyway... Oh yea the mobo deal fell through :( They said they can't service Alaska!!! Scotty

[Xayd]

His Asus is the 761 chipset, so he may need registered RAM over a certain amount, that's why.

[Scotty]

OK so that is one of the reasons to stay away from the AMD 761. How come the Jetway mobo's are no no's. They seem to have all the same stuff like KT266A and all. Just wondering! Thanks, Scotty
PS Any one wanna give up their Radeon 8500 yet?? Just wondering again!

[Terrorbyte]

There are several that go well with that cpu, when you say might upgrade, to what ?? as some motherboards will cover nearly all up to XP1800+ while others do not go so far.
But for the 1.2;
Aopen AK77 Pro - to xp1800 and DDR "my board"
Gigabyte GA7DX - up to 1800 and DDR
Gigabyte GA7VTXE - up to 1800 and DDR
MSI K7T266 up to 1900 and DDR
MSI K7T up to 1900 NO DDR
Biostar M7MIA up to 1800 and DDR
Epox 8KHA+ up to 1900 and DDR
DFI AD70SC up to 1800 and DDR
but there are many others, good luck.:)

[Scotty]

When I said upgrade I ment go to a faster cpu cause I went to a 1.2 and my wife's mobo is a DFI and it will take up to a 1.2! That way I don't have to waste the money :) Thanks, Scotty
PS So any ideas on the Jetway mobo??? I think I have decided on the EPoX 8KHA+..but was wondering why the Jetway mobo's haven't gotten a good review! I have been using one for about six months and no problems yet but I don't do any OCing!

[Terrorbyte]

Sorry, we dont get the Jetway boards here, but from what I read they are only an average board at best.
Probably obvious but don't forget that the Epox will need DDR memory as against the sticks you have at the moment, and the price has gone up here 50% in the last week, so some good shopping will be handy, if the budget is tight

[Scotty]

You mean the price of ram??