Help! I need advice

[Guest]

I am going to upgrade my motherboard and processor. I've got a PII 350 right now and am Considering AMD Athlon Thunderbird 900 or 1Ghz, with an Abit KT7 (without RAID because I don't need it). However, I am a bit affraid of going with AMD because I hear so many horror stories about how it's not compatible with this and that, and patches here, upgrade bios there, etc. I want a stable system and if it means paying more for less performance then so be it. Can any of you reflect if the AMD I am thinking about getting is better/more stable than a say PIII 800 that I could get for about the same price? Anyone want to talk me into getting RAID (I want it, but logic is telling me I don't need it)? Any better reccomendations for motherboards?

Thanks

 

[DSutcliffe]

I just built an Athlon 800 system with a promise ATA100 RAID controlloer and 2 IBM 75GXP 30GB drives striped. It is the fastest computer I have ever had the pleasure to build and play games on.

I have been running it now for a while and have yet to use the reset button on the case because it is also one of the most stable systems I have ever built. Good luck and logic should tell you that you shouldn't pay more money for less performance if stability and compitibility are equal.

 

[Guest]

Hey,

I was an avid Intel fan until my friend talked me into trying an AMD TB 800mhz. My system contains:

Abit KT7-raid mb
256 mb pc-133 Micron 222 memory
2-IBM ATA100 15gb deskstar hd
hp 9500 cdrw
50x cdrom
zip 100
globalwin fop38 hs/fan
4- 80mm fans for intake and exhaust
ATI Radeon 32DDR
Inwin mid-tower case w/300w ps
Windows Millenium

I am thoroughly impressed with the setup as I was able to change over from my old machine ( Intel AL440LX mb, P2-300mhz cpu) without a hitch. I have found that the AMD chip is fully compatible with all my software and hardware, and that abit is great at upgrading drivers for the mb. The speed is fabulous with the KT7-raid, as I get a considerable increase in read/write speed with the striped drives running in parallel, rather than using one drive on the IDE connector. Using raid also has the benefit of letting me have my four slots for IDE drives open for something other than a hard drive (CDROM, CDRW, ZIP, etc.). The bios and SoftmenuIII on the KT7 is fabulous. I can virtually set just about anythign, including overclocking my CPU, which I have done to 1.10ghz. It is stable as heck. I have only had two lockups in 2 months, and with my old intel system, I had 2 lockups a day. The one critical thing to look for is a great heatsink/fan combo. Heat is a real issue with the athlons. The more cooling(fans), the better. I have a chipset cooler on the mb, chipset cooler on the video card, 2-80mm fans for intake, and 2-80mm fans for exhaust. That's not to mention the dual fans in my power supply, and the hs/fan. I also have a card cooler fan nest to the video card in a PCI slot.

Now, the negative about using raid with Millenium is that Millenium doesn't take full advantage of raid, but there is still a tremendous speed increase over using a single ata100 hd alone on an IDE cable. My hd benchmark in sandra2000 is more than three times that of an ATA66 drive.I hope this has given you some insight as to what you want. In other words, you get more than your moneys worth with AMD. I never could say that with Intel. Any questions, reply to hdfreedom208@yahoo.com.

Keep the rubber down bro

 

[Guest]

Where have you exactly been hearing these horror stories, they were not around here.

I think you are on of those AMD agents testing the waters to find how many loyal followers you.
I for one will follow AMD into the depths of hell, march against impossible odds, look into the enimies eyes and say...

"Are you crazy! I wouldn't buy Intel if they were giving a 50% mail in rebate."

Thunder Thunder ThunderBIRDS HOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
I'm not called Crazy_Mck for nothing!





Take Care.
If money was no object, how could you spend it!

 

[Guest]

I am one of the few people who actuall expeirenced said problems. The thing was on the original slot 'A' mobo with Irongate, the Nvidia drivers occasionally had problems. This only occured for a week or so and was fixed by a quick bios flash. No problem. If you are worried about Athlon problem, you are worried for no reason. I still run my good old Athlon 550 on Irongate and have NO problems, well that's not true, I'm still running Windows. (HeHe)

 

[Guest]

I agree that a socket A Athlon (1000 MHz) is the best bet, and the Abit Raid is wonderful. I suggest a GeForce based graphic card: if you have a lot of money to spend go for the Ultra.
And I've never experienced a single problem with Athlons

 

[Guest]

Thanks everyone for your views. I think I will end up going with the RAID board (cause it's only $25 more), and I'm still up in the air if I am going to get the 900 or the 1000 but I will definitely go with the AMD. ook42, I'd get a GeForce in a heartbeat, but I bought a Voodoo 5 a couple months ago.


Thanks

 

[Guest]

I had lillte problem with my G400max and the A7v, but it is solved now by installing the newest 4in1 driver fra via. But else I think my duron 600@950 is runing fin. I would take the Asus a7v, if you won´t use the raid on the abit. The a7v preforms better then the abit.

Cs Amigo

<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by amigo on 11/17/00 11:36 AM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[Guest]

I too was a diehard intel man for many years, I sold my PII 450 running in an asus P2BF mb and switched to an Abit KA7-100 MB with an Athlon 800mhz processor, I did have a few conflicts, especially with nvidia drivers, but i read the manual and followed its recommendations to the letter, switched to a vodoo3 video card and a soundblaster live! soundcard and it performs excellent! I have not had a single lockup in over 3 months since i got the system running stable. I highly recommend the New amd's and the Abit boards, just be sure to read manuals thoroughlyI wouldnt switch back to intel if they were giving the things away for free!!

 

[Guest]

Yes, there were conflits and all that stuff... over a year ago! As with all new hardware, when it comes out, there are a few bugs here and there, but they have all been worked out and the support is great. The reason you are still hearing those rumors is because some misinformed people heard those rumors without inquiring if they are now fixed...

Get yourself that Ghz beast!


Seoman. newbie at last.

 

[Atman]

I've never liked intel. Good product, lousy company, support, business practices, etc... I usually pull for the underdog anyway....AMD has it's downfalls but they put out a wail of a product and don't seem to leave you stranded should something happen. I've had great support/contact with AMD whenever necessary and with intel the wait is usually around the 2-week mark. I just setup a KT7-RAID last week running 900MHz, 256MB PC-133, oxygen vid card, and it ran like a charm. ABIT boards are great IF they work. I've sold tons of em and most all are stable as a rock but the very very few dud boards I've received have had little or no responses from ABIT tech. I have now switched over to other boards, Asus and also Epox for the cheapies. ABIT just lost some more business. (I bet they are just crying their eyes out.... ;-) )
Atman

oh, and so far, the AMD systems are either equal or better in terms of stability for me.

 

[Atman]

ps

why don't you dual boot. I'm running Windows 2000 for my main OS and Me (yuck) for games.

 

[Brent]

The biggest problem chips, for having to patch everthing under the sun, were the cyrix processors (different company enough said). The only other problem than the above mentioned posts haven't mentioned was the Powersupply's needed to output a cleaner voltage. I believe most all ATX PS producing companys have upgraded to a version2.1 now.

 

[Guest]

Yeah, there was this guy who built my AMD and the only problem I had with it was a faulty hd. Other than that, my Athlon is the bomb!! hehe

Drink

 

[Bubba]

I think most of the compatibility problems you may have been hearing about were problems with the K6-2 and K6-III series of chips. But even then, the problems were mainly the fault of VIA and their really crappy chipsets. I had many problems when using socket 7 boards and chips.
But since upgrading to a socket A I have had no problems at all. No patches no bios updating, all runs fine as is. Even the SB Live seems completely happy which was a total shocker to me.