Confusion with Motherboards and CPU's

Hello chaps,

I am going to upgrade my PC bit by bit so naturally my first component to upgrade will be the motherboard.

I think I'm going to go for the DFI LanParty but I'm stuck on what model to get so it fits my CPU.

I currently have an AMD Athlon XP 2000. Does anyone know what socket motherboard I need?

Many thanks.

Toby

 

The Athlon XP's are all Socket A or Socket 462--same socket, two different names. Which LanParty board are you looking at? The LanParty NFII will work, but the NF3 and NF4's won't since they're for the Athlon 64/Athlon FX.

While I don't see anything inheritly wrong with sticking to the Socket A platform, it's a dead horse. For the money you'll spend, I'd highly recommend you start with the nForce 3 or nForce 4.

I don't know what your current setup is, but for best results, you're going to want to upgrade the CPU, motherboard, RAM, and probably video card at once. Depending on the power supply, you may need to upgrade that too.

 

Hey BB,

Cheers for that mate. I was going for a Socket A as I can't really afford a new CPU atm. So I was just gonna overclock my existing XP 2Ghz.

But your probably right to upgrade my platform completely as i'll be spending a lot more in future upgrades.

So if I went for an NF3/NF4 i will need to look for an Athlon 64 chip?

What the difference between Socket 939 and Socket 754 ?

The LanParty provides excellent overclocking options so I wont need a top Mhz chip. Do you have an idea what's the best value for money nowadays?

Thanks

Toby :good:

 

If you went NF3/4 you'd need a speedy 64 chip like you thought. The very basic difference between skt 939 and 754 is 754 has a 64-bit memory controller while 939 has 128-bit controller I believe. Also 939 offers dual-channel memory while 754 doesn't. Currently the cheapest 939 skt chip is the 3000+ as I have, the over all best bang for the buck chip is the 3500 which is real nice, around 150 pounds or so?

 

Thanks,

I'll prolly go for the NForce4 chip and upgrade my processor.

Urrrggghhh the costs. That has gone well over my budget

 

S939 is more expensive that S754 but its worth it. With better performance, having 1000MHz bus and a better upgrade path by supporting 90nm CPUs.

For your AMD AXP, you need socket A. (s462 i believe).

 

Cheers fella,

I've got a budget of 300 squid. Thats got to include:

board
mem
processor and cooling
case

With the bits I picked it ended up over 500!

Bah, maybe i'm being too greedy and choosing all the high end components

 

There's a good deal here http://www.scan.co.uk/todayonly/ with an Asus A8N-SLI.

The memory and processor looks good but I need to investigate the MB more before I decide.

Has anyone had any experience with this board?

 

Hmmm I don't need dual GFX.

 

£102.21 inc - AMD Athlon 64 3000+ 939 - Retail
£81.08 inc - Abit AV8 3RD Eye (Socket 939) Motherboard

I can say from experience that processor is a beast, and that price is very good.
And my mobo is an asus AV8, so same name, same quality . And my board is awesome.

 

Waffles is right, excellent deals for both, what I've got to. I didn't know DD2 would work with that mobo, thought it was mostly an Intel thing as of now, oh well, cool.

 

DDR2 will not work with any AMD-based system at this time. There's talk of it happening down the line, but it's a new technology that needs to hit higher clock speeds to be effective. The second part is that the memory controller is integrated into the CPU on Athlon 64's/FX's/Opterons, and right now, they only support DDR.

Yeah, while the Asus A8N-SLI is a pretty good board, SLI is still in it's early stages. It's getting better, and is much improved over how it was a few months ago, but unless you can't sleep if you don't have the highest frames you can get out of your system---and a fat wallet---SLI probably isn't for you. Now, this isn't to say most geeks don't dream of a tricked out SLI system, but it's either too costly or simply more than they need.

I'm not a big Epox fan, but I've been hearing some good things about their 9NPA+ Ultra (non-SLI) and 9NPA+ SLI boards. They tend to have stuff that's a bit cheaper than Asus and Abit, which you might want to look into (as well as some reviews before you buy).

 

Great advice guys,

I just need to decide between the ASUS A8V Deluxe and the Abit AV8. I'll let you know what I get.

 

Prolly go with this lot:

ASUS A8V (look for revision 2) - 73.44 Dabs
Athlon 64 3000 - 93.00 Dabs
GeIL Value 2x512 - 76.32 - Overclockers
HeatSink ThermalRight XP-90 - 26.44 Overclockers (might be a bit too much for what I need)
Panaflo (MMM) FBL 92-L1A 7.29 www.dorothybradbury.co.uk
Antec P160 Case 72.97 Amazon
Tagan TG480-U01 480W 58.69 - Overclockers

What do you lot think?

 

Well, if you want to go for lots of overclocking, that may not be the best board to go for. Don't get me wrong, Asus makes great boards to get up and go, but if you're serious about overclocking, you really might want to look at DFI if they're available. Otherwise, you might find the Abit to be a little bit better for OC'ing.

For overclocking it's:
-Abit
-DFI
-Epox

Personally, I am not a big fan of Epox due to some piss-poor quality Socket A boards. If you're going to stick with an AGP motherboard, then I'd say go with Abit's AV8.

Everything else looks pretty good, though.