Are VIA chipsets really that bad?

[CaptainNemo]

I'm still not sure if my MSI 745 Ultra mobo is dead (so much for SiS stability), but I orderered another mobo anyway; time is short, mobos are cheap, and it is the only way I can find out what is and isn't fried (i.e. CPU, memory, etc.)

However, I went and ordered an (MSI) KT600 board instead of a NF2 based one; I guess things like the PCB layout and the more up-to-date feature set must have won me over.

Are VIA chipsets really that awful? This system will only be running an XP2100+ with PC2100 memory, and will become my second system next Spring. Therefore, I won't be tweaking it that much.

Bad move, or am I fretting about nothing?

(no fanbois please; I just want facts)

"Some mice have two buttons. Macintosh has one. So it's extremely difficult to push the wrong button." - Apple ad. circa 1984.

 

[allanon1965]

i thinkn your fretting for nothing, i have personally used via chipsets quite often over the years and never had the bad experiences others holler about, right now my wifes puter is running an msi km2m combo board that uses the via km266 chipset, no problems at all, and let me say, if her puter dont work, i have to sleep in the doghouse!(and im not) myself i am trying an asrock k7s8xe i bought from a feller on here, and it has the sis748 chipset that supports a fsb of 400mhz (200X2), it is great as well, i have the fsb up to 160 from 133 (X2=320) and its rock solid, my 1800+ runs at 2100+ at 39c, so im happy. so i would not be worried about the via chipsets, but thats my experience, with about 2 dozen boards with via chipsets, others may vary.

Fat, Drunk, and Stupid is no way to go through life Son.

 

[Crashman]

VIA killed my father. If you buy one knowing this, I'll have to kill you.

VIA has cost me thousands of dollars in labor as a PC builder. They've probably gotten better, but they're not getting any more of MY money.

You see, when past VIA chipsets had problems, the company denied that these problems existed. First they'd blame the system builder, then they'd blame the manufacturer of the problematic part (eg, the part that didn't work right with the VIA chipset board in spite of it working with every non-VIA board in existance). They'd release patches for BIOS and software that would slowely fix problems, or compensate for them, and still deny that the problems existed.

And it's often the case that when I load the newest VIA drivers on older motherboards, the system crashes so badly to require a format of the hard drive. Using older drivers usually doesn't cause that problem, but the older drivers often have problems of their own.

So while VIA might be in the clear for the last year or so, their constant abuse of ME forces me to push you away in any way possible.

If a known terrorist owned Mobile, would you buy gasoline from them? Same storry.

How do you know your 745 Ultra is dead? And why would you blame SiS for that?

<font color=blue>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to a hero as big as Crashman!</font color=blue>
<font color=red>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to an ego as large as Crashman's!</font color=red>

 

[Codinerx]

I would recommend the kt600 chipset, but only if you are not overclocking. Many kt600 boards come packed with an array of features for very reasonable prices, and there is no reason to spend the extra money on an nforce2 unless you decide to overclock. However, the price difference between the two is not that great... so I guess its up to you to see what you can find! If you are looking for a great cheap board, the Epox 8kra2+ comes with almost everything for about $80 bucks.. it would almost be a perfect board if it were Nforce2.. goodluck!

 

[CaptainNemo]

Heh - fair enough.

The reason why I bought the second board (which should arrive any minute) is to try and find out what happened to the 745 Ultra (which has been rock solid up until now). I'm not blaming the chipset (I would have bought a 746 if I could have found one); I'm just pointing out that the presence of chipset X doesn't make a mobo immune from defects.

It could be static; I could have shorted something; I may have a blown component because of incorrect default bios settings; it may be MSI's notorious DIMM slots etc.

I just don't want to think that I have bought a dud; things like PCB layout may sound trivial, but having the ATX connector top left and vertical IDE slots means I can mount the mobo horizontally with the ports facing front and mount any drives underneath it with twisting the ribbon cables in the silent case that I am planning.

"Some mice have two buttons. Macintosh has one. So it's extremely difficult to push the wrong button." - Apple ad. circa 1984.

 

[HardWareBoss]

Nice of Via to blame everyone but themselves. Did they blame the computers too? While they where at it?

 

[tombance]

That motherboard is the ultimate.... Check it over and over, you do not want to sacrifice your ultimate board just to get a new possible unstable mobo.

<A HREF="http://service.futuremark.com/compare?2k1=6752830" target="_new">Yay, I Finally broke the 12k barrier!!</A>

 

[ChipDeath]

I've owned 2 VIA boards, an Abit KT7 (not KT7A) and an Asus A7V333 (KT333).

The Abit was a decent board, and I still use it now in a PC I knocked together at work, not bad considering I've had it for at least 4 years. Never had any complaints (but certainly not an overclocker's board)

The Asus worked fine for about a year, but then started giving me problems, and I had to run my XP2000+(1666Mhz) at <1400Mhz to make it stable. After replacing the RAM, PSU, and HSF, I suddenly noticed the chipset temp. was ~45C.. (CPU was ~ 40C) and this is <i>underclocked</i>.. I came to the conclusion that the board's voltage controllers were crap, and were overvolting the chipset and making it overheat.

Now I have an Epox 8RDA+ with an overclocked Athlon XP, and it's about the most stable PC I've ever had. So I have to recommend the Nforce2 route.

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<font color=red>The preceding text is assembled from information stored in an unreliable organic storage medium. As such it may be innacurate, incomplete, or completely wrong</font color=red>

 

[pIII_Man]

hmm i gotta go with ur (chipdeath's) setup, get the 8rda+ it is one of the cheepest nforce boards, you only save 10 - 20 bux by buying the via and really it is a crap shoot when you go for via, some people have good luck while others have terrible luck.

Did i mention the 8rda+ is an overclockers dream (drool locked agp bus!).


If it isn't a P6 then it isn't a procesor
110% BX fanboy

 

[ChipDeath]

yup. Fantastic board. Mine's an earlier revision (think it's 1.1), so is only certified for 166Mhz FSB, but it's stable @ 196 ATM. (XP1700+ @ x11.5 = 2254Mhz) A rev 2.0 would do better of course, but I'm quite happy ATM.

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<font color=red>The preceding text is assembled from information stored in an unreliable organic storage medium. As such it may be innacurate, incomplete, or completely wrong</font color=red>

 

[CaptainNemo]

Oh well, the board has arrived now (it was too late to change my mind when I started this thread); the good news is that the 745 Ultra is probably ok, but the bad news is that my Pal XP2100+ might be fried. I'll have to get another CPU now, as the LED bracket on the new mobo isn't getting past the CPU initialization stage.

I really don't know what caused the CPU to fail. One minute the system was up and running, and then it wasn't. I got it working once more, but now it is officially kaput.

If the CPU is iffy (i.e. doomed, but still working from cold); would that cause the chipset and memory checks to hang? (i.e. the chipset/board and memory are fine, but the CPU can't recognise them).

I also noticed that the CPU would not always power up when sitting in the socket without the heatsink (I only switched it on for 3-4 seconds to check this); I had to push the CPU onto the socket (a movement of much less than a millimetre) to get it to power on. Perhaps the socket has become partially detached from the mobo by the weight of the heatsink of something (the spring on the heatsink is also not as strong as it used to be).

What a mess!

I hopeset the KT600 chipset on this MSI board is OK; the layout of the board is really nice, and it has lots of features (USB 2, Firewire, SATA etc.) that the 745 Ultra doesn't have.

Oh well... I don't know you chaps stay sane whilst doing this thing for a living.

"Some mice have two buttons. Macintosh has one. So it's extremely difficult to push the wrong button." - Apple ad. circa 1984.

 

[pIII_Man]

that siggy ownz!


If it isn't a P6 then it isn't a procesor
110% BX fanboy

 

[jihiggs]

i thought via killed your puppy?

wpdclan.com cs game server - 69.12.5.119:27015

 

[Crashman]

In a way they did, after VIA killed my father, my puppy sat by his grave and refused to eat or drink anything. It died in less than a week.

<font color=blue>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to a hero as big as Crashman!</font color=blue>
<font color=red>Only a place as big as the internet could be home to an ego as large as Crashman's!</font color=red>

 

[pIII_Man]

poor thing *hug*


If it isn't a P6 then it isn't a procesor
110% BX fanboy