Athlon chipsets

[JoosMan 0]

At the moment i have an athlon system with a via chipset and would like to stay with AMD but away from via. I want to get one of the 266 fsb mobos and was wondering if you guys had anything good to say about the amd 760 chipset or the Ali chipset, especially about the agp. any help is appreciated.

[Brian Frank 0]

Stay away from ALi chipsets. The Magik chipset is worthless even with DDR capabilities. Go with AMD chipsets if you're not going with Via. Via is the most common, but AMD's chipsets will probably be whipped by Via. You do realize that the 760 requires DDR and thats another added cost. SiS would also not be up your alley.

AMD just puts out chipsets to push technology they'd like to see Via, and other chipset makers utilize. Plus, AMD is not as big as Intel.

If you're going to stay away from Via, get a PIII and an 815EP based motherboard, otherwise stick with what you got.

SiS and ALi are targeted more for bare minimums in computing, like low end integrated systems.

If you do switch to an Intel chip, I recommend looking at a Tyan board-the Tomcat i815e. I have a Via based Tyan board, and it is very stable. Tyan started off as a server board manufacturer, and seem to have very solid boards.

I dont see a lot of 760 boards out right now. I wouldnt buy one just because, AMD has a much less stellar performance chipsets than what would come from Via.

If your gonna switch boards, your either going to have to buy new memory, or a new processor.

Whatever way you go, stay clear of the Pentium 4 and RDRAM, prices are the only thing that increases dramatically in that area.

[PsychoSword 0]

I'm not so sure about that Brian. I've seen some benchmarks on Tom's Hardware comparing the VIA DDR and the AMD 760 chipsets and the 760 smoked the VIA version pretty handily. This was over a month ago however.

[Brian Frank 0]

The KT133A I know for sure puts the ALi Magik to shame. Im not well educated on AMD chipsets, so they could be good, or not.

Plus, Id personally still stick with SDRAM just because, both DDR and RDRAM are much more expensive. And I dont have problems with Via.

[JoosMan 0]

Thanks brian for your input...i think you are right and im going to stick with what ive got for the time being...but i sure would like to know how that amd 760 stacks up against the via. i mean i really have no big problems with my via board but i have a leadtek 64MB geforce 2 and it really isnt running as well as i thought it would. I just have a feeling its the agp problem via has that is causing it and everytime i install their new 4 in 1 drivers i freeze up a ton As for the DDR ram i really dont think its too much more expensive and dont mind spending a little extra...but alas its the mobo thats stopping me in the end.

[Brian Frank 0]

Id really like to see the 760MP...dual T-Birds...ooh,ahh! Thats going to be a good step in the right direction.

[Joker 0]

Goto http://www.tomshardware.com

for reviews and benchmarks on puter products of all kind

 

------------------

"In order to be free to learn"

"We must be free to dream"

 

[This message has been edited by Joker (edited 23 March 2001).]

[JJ32 0]

Joosman,

 

Your OK, ALI and Via are both good chipsets. AMD rocks, but DO NOT buy a KT 133 chipset cause the FSB settings suck! Can't overclock much! KT133A is OK though.

I like that Asus A7A266 which uses either SDRAM or DDR RAM. It is out, but not readily availbale at alot of places YET! Like 2 weeks. Also I hear the Iwill and the Abit KT7A are good, but go with the ALI chipset. They are much better and have higher fault tolerance from what I hear. Can Overclock for days try like a 155 or higher FSB setting. LOL! Tell that to those Intel junkies. Anyway all I can say is JJ is rolling along rock solid stable at 1.45 GHZ on a 1.2 266 FSB T-Bird. Beats out...more like freaking blows away the 1.5 P4 in every bench except memory. Who cares anyway? Like there are even apps that take advantage of it yet. Believe me man I have some decent experience. There is no perfect choice just sometimes a better one. Good luck.

[Brian Frank 0]

JJ32, the only good chipset for power users is either the AMD 760/760MP or the KT133/133A. I havent really heard of anyone boasting about their ALi/T-Bird combo. Also, there is the L1 bridges to connect on T-Birds and Durons, which are highly overclockable if the L1 bridges are closed. Then you can adjust the clock mulitplier. Intel chips are the only ones that can be overclocked only by the FSB. The KT133A is just a tweak of the KT133, which itself is just a tweak of the KX133 that "offically" supports the T-Bird.

Intel thinks that having a faster clock speed means the fastest processor, which from nearly all benchmarks we know is true. Not to say Intel produces bad chips, but right now the P4 is a really bad move because 1.RDRAM, 'nuff said. 2. The next P4 will have a different socket pin layout 3. The T-Bird except for one or two tests is faster. The only reason to get a P4 is for extreme video editing.

If you already have a KT133 chipset, wait until the next bunch of chipsets comes to market, or if you dont plan to overclock by the FSB it is not a bad chipset. The flaw on Via's part was saying that it DID support syncronous CPU/FSB clock rates to 133MHz, which of course, it didnt. However, AMD chips are easily overclockable with the proper knowledge. AMD chips are the way to go for extreme overclocking.

If in doubt, you cant go wrong with a PIII, unless you want a serious overclock.

[BanditXL 0]

I got a few questions myself on the subject. I now own a AMD 1200 MHZ with a MSI k7t pro2a. Now my question is: If I buy a mobo that supports the DDR or RDRAM, do I have to buy a new processor.

 

And about the 760MP AMD is making, I didn't know AMD was planning to go dual (any sites I can read about it?), and if so the same question of buying a new processor aply's.

[Brian Frank 0]

Right now, if that mobo has a KT133A chipset, just sit tight. DDR while it is nice, doesnt seem to have much, if any, performance gain over the KT133A + SDRAM. If you want RDRAM, only the P4 uses it. RDRAM is expensive and shows no performance gain or just very little. The T-Bird can whomp the P4 and its $300 cheaper.

If you get a DDR board, you shouldnt have to get a new processor.

If you want to go to the AMD chipset, wait until the 760MP comes out. Im not quite sure, but it is supposed to be out this summer.

Personally, Id say stick with what you got. In addition to the new board, you will have to buy DDR memory, which is more expensive than SDRAM.

AMD has touted the current T-Bird and Duron chips as multiprocessor capable. Unfortunately, they had a brain fart and forgot to have a multiprocessor chipset to go along with it. So while AMD's current chips should support SMP, there isnt a board available to show for it. Oops.