R
RWhite
Well-known member
I'd been flirting with the idea of upgrading my primary general-purpose computer from PIII to Athlon for some time now. I want to do this prior to replacing that system's Windows 98SE with Windows XP. I'll probably keep my primary studio system as PIII and Win98 for now (my Gadget Labs card in that box doesn't work with W2000 or XP). My upgrade cost has been helped out due to a friend giving me a good deal on a Athlon 1.4 chip as he is upgrading to an Athlon XP 1.8.
So I spent part of the weekend motherboard shopping at a big computer swap meet. I have not made my choice yet. Because I am trying to do this upgrade as cheaply as possible, and because I already have plenty of PC133 SDRAM on hand, I looked at motherboards that supported SDRAM rather than DDR RAM. Now I don't want to re-ignite the SDRAM vs. DDR debate. I've heard everything from "the difference is no more than a 10% speed increase" to "the difference is HUGE". Suffice to say I'm going to stick to SDRAM for now and do a heftier CPU/RAM upgrade at the end of the year.
One thing quicly became apparent - the vast majority of SDRAM Athlon motherboards out there use the VIA KT133A chipset. Now, I also don't want to re-ignite the usual "lets bash VIA" sentiment. Both of the systems I record on now are ASUS PIII P3V4X boards using the VIA Apollo Pro 133A chipset, and they have worked well for me. But at the same time I have seen more than enough anti-VIA sentiment, with particular mention of the KT133A, that I am feeling a bit cautious about board using these chips.
Now with the ground work laid out, below are some of the motherboard choices I found. I believe all of them have on-board audio, which I don't like, but they all claim it can be disabled. We shall see. Any comments about the boards and/or their chipsets are much appreciated.
Matsonic 8137CP board, VIA Apollo KT266A chipset - This is probably my top choice. I've heard repeatedly that the 266 chipset was a dog, but the 266A set fixed all the problems. This board has 2 SDRAM DIMM sockets but also 3 DDR sockets for later upgrading (of course you can't use both at once).
ECS K7AMA board, ALIM1645 chipset - Don't know much about this chipset. I believe this one also has both SDRAM and DDR slot so you can use SDRAM now and upgrade later.
ECS K755A board, SIS735 chipset - SIS have collected the rep of having weak chipsets in weak boards. However I've heard comments that this set has been a decent one. One negative (in my book) is that it has an on-board NIC - hopefully it can be shut off so as to not interfere with my 3COM card. Anyone have one of these?
ABIT K77A board, VIA KT133A chipset - this seemed like a solid board, if I remember correctly it allowed the largest total amount of SDRAM of any board I saw. The chipset is the big question mark.
Gigabyte GA7ZXH, VIA KT133A chipset - Actually Gigabyte has several boards based on this chipset. Gigabyte generally stands next to ASUS as my favorite motherboard maker, in my experiance they make good products. Again the chipset is the big question mark.
I need to make a choice in the next few days. The Matsonic on paper seems to be the best choice, but what very little I have heard about this manufacturer has been unflattering. So, having laid that all out.... comments, anyone?
So I spent part of the weekend motherboard shopping at a big computer swap meet. I have not made my choice yet. Because I am trying to do this upgrade as cheaply as possible, and because I already have plenty of PC133 SDRAM on hand, I looked at motherboards that supported SDRAM rather than DDR RAM. Now I don't want to re-ignite the SDRAM vs. DDR debate. I've heard everything from "the difference is no more than a 10% speed increase" to "the difference is HUGE". Suffice to say I'm going to stick to SDRAM for now and do a heftier CPU/RAM upgrade at the end of the year.
One thing quicly became apparent - the vast majority of SDRAM Athlon motherboards out there use the VIA KT133A chipset. Now, I also don't want to re-ignite the usual "lets bash VIA" sentiment. Both of the systems I record on now are ASUS PIII P3V4X boards using the VIA Apollo Pro 133A chipset, and they have worked well for me. But at the same time I have seen more than enough anti-VIA sentiment, with particular mention of the KT133A, that I am feeling a bit cautious about board using these chips.
Now with the ground work laid out, below are some of the motherboard choices I found. I believe all of them have on-board audio, which I don't like, but they all claim it can be disabled. We shall see. Any comments about the boards and/or their chipsets are much appreciated.
Matsonic 8137CP board, VIA Apollo KT266A chipset - This is probably my top choice. I've heard repeatedly that the 266 chipset was a dog, but the 266A set fixed all the problems. This board has 2 SDRAM DIMM sockets but also 3 DDR sockets for later upgrading (of course you can't use both at once).
ECS K7AMA board, ALIM1645 chipset - Don't know much about this chipset. I believe this one also has both SDRAM and DDR slot so you can use SDRAM now and upgrade later.
ECS K755A board, SIS735 chipset - SIS have collected the rep of having weak chipsets in weak boards. However I've heard comments that this set has been a decent one. One negative (in my book) is that it has an on-board NIC - hopefully it can be shut off so as to not interfere with my 3COM card. Anyone have one of these?
ABIT K77A board, VIA KT133A chipset - this seemed like a solid board, if I remember correctly it allowed the largest total amount of SDRAM of any board I saw. The chipset is the big question mark.
Gigabyte GA7ZXH, VIA KT133A chipset - Actually Gigabyte has several boards based on this chipset. Gigabyte generally stands next to ASUS as my favorite motherboard maker, in my experiance they make good products. Again the chipset is the big question mark.
I need to make a choice in the next few days. The Matsonic on paper seems to be the best choice, but what very little I have heard about this manufacturer has been unflattering. So, having laid that all out.... comments, anyone?