In need of advice...

[Guest]

Hello,
I am considering a new motherboard and chip for my computer but am confused as to which I should purchase. I'm primarily looking for combatibility, but speed is a factor as well. Any mobo that requires the VIA 4in1 driver set will just frustrate me; I've heard that they have a lot of problems and incombatibilities, and have experienced some of them myself. I currently use an Athlon Socket A Abit KT7 mobo w/ 700mhz Thunderbird and it has given me nothing but trouble with my Diamond Viper 770 TNT2 and SoundBlaster Live. I do a lot of gaming, but a difference of 5% in speed won't bother me if it is significantly cheaper. I already have the rest of the periphials, specifically:

Creative Soundblaster Live Value
7200rpm 40gb western digital
Linksys ethernet card
Asus 52x Cdrom

I am also planning to use either a GeForce3, or the Radeon 8500 in the new system. Should I go with one of the new-fangled P4 Socket 478, or a fast Pentium 3, or the Athlon XP?
Also, one more question: what is the difference between the Athlon XP and MP?

Thanks for any replies,
A Crash-Weary Computer User,
Shaun Pedicini.
Email: spedicini@hotmail.com

 

[FatBurger]

That's FOUR people now! That does it, I'm running a test...

<font color=green>I post so you don't have to!
9/11 - RIP</font color=green>

 

[DaveGOD]

lol@fatburger

MP is multi-processor, XP is not. that appears the be the only difference, some site even found that some of the first XP chips worked as MP's.

so you can have a comp with two MP's, if you have the right mobo. basically you want an XP, though MP is maybe interesting in that whilst W95, W98 etc have only supported one processor while NT and W2000 (being more professional-orientated) have supported multiple-processor, Win XP is for both home and business use. hence youll almost certainly be able to use multiple processors on it
Doom3 with dual AMD XP 2000+ anyone?

actually we'll have to see if the gaming developers will make games supporting dual-cpu, i imagine they will.

if your not going for a mobo with VIA KT266A chipset, then go for a AMD760/761 chipset. or the SIS. have a look in the articles on KT266A and SIS at tomshardware.com

Yossarian lives

 

[Crashman]

Best value is on the ECS K7S5A, which is a few percent slower than the fastest board out right now, more stable, uses the SiS 735 chipset (no VIA 4-in-1), and cost only $65

Back to you Tom...