Socket 423 or 478 or AMD??

I would personally advise that you avoid the Pentium 4 and get an AthlonXP. The current P4 is just not "god box" material, especially seeing as it gets outperformed by much cheaper CPUs (i.e. AthlonXPs).

If you decide to go with the Pentium 4, Socket478 is the way to go. I have never heard anything about Socket478 being in any way worse than Socket423.

Whichever CPU you go with, I would recommend an ASUS motherboard. The Asus P4T-E is currently top-of-the-line as far as Pentium 4 goes; the Asus A7V266-E rules the roost for uniprocessor Athlon systems.

Kelledin
[dave@discovery ~] kill -9 1
init: Just what do you think you're doing, Dave?

What you heard about Socket 478 was wrong. Socket 478 had no performance differences from Socket 423. What your probably thinking of was the 845 chipset, which used SDRAM. But Socket 478 boards were also available with the i850 Rambus chipset. So it's not the socket, it's the chipset, and there are good boards with the i850 chipset in Socket 478.
But none of that excuses the lackluster performance of the P4. The reason for getting a Socket 478 motherboard is for future upgrades to the Northwood core P4, which will be less lackluster than the current Williamett version. And even that will most likely be a bit slow and expensive.
So that leaves you with the Athlons. The current crop of XP's are even better than the already good T-birds. AMD's biggest drawback has been their reliance on VIA chipsets, but now you have several chipsets to choose from: SiS 735, 745, ALi MAGiK 1 (now in revision "C" for improved performance), and the nForce. While the nForce and 745 are new to the market, the 735 and MAGiK 1 have prooven themselves stable enough for use under Windows 98SE.

What's the frequency, Kenneth?

If you choose Pentium 4 Route you can even get a chipset fron Sis or Via (645 form Sis, and P4Xx266a from Via) Both are very nice and will allow you to save some money and use DDR ram, and I believe the DDR chipsets are cheaper than intels chipsets.
And depending on what you plan on doing with your computer, and your knowledge into software/os tweaking you'll probably want to go with 98se.
If you want to install it and have it work with everything 98se is your choice, if you want to install it and tweak it to work with everything 2kpro, or XP pro would be good. I use 98se right now, but am planning on upgrading to 2kpro AND XP pro because not everything works in XP yet. 98se tends to get the best gaming performance, but if your computer has 256 megs of ram or more 2kpro and/or XP can benefit nicely. 2kpro and XP pro are also more stable than 98se because they are based off of different kernels.

Welcome to the end of your life Mr. Intel CPU. Don't worry I promise its going to hurt.

Socket 478 with Rambus is the way to go, Avoid AMD unless your willing to deal with far too common problems associated with building AMD system. Socket 478 gives you the of using a Northwood processor or a Willmette processor. Wilmette will drop to dirt cheap around Jan 7th, I expect the 1.8Ghz to drop around $100. This will hurt AMD's already outdated PR rating.

Socket 478 is not bugged or slow, just some lemming giving you false info.

Win 98/ME is the fastest for gaming, and fairly stable (unless you own a AMD) Win2k and XP are extreamly stable but slight less performance for gaming.

I have finished playing with SiS645 and the Via P4x266A chipsets, the SiS has fallen behind in performance scoring in last place in my tests. The P4V266A supprised me boasting PC600 memory performance with PC2100 DDR. both boards were stable, not very overclockable.

The Via did not have vcore voltage settings but overclocked slightly better than the SiS645 whitch had Vcore settings. The Vcore settings on the SiS645 made no difference in overclocking ability.

I recomend the Asus P4T-E or the Abit TH7-II RAID

Both are exception overclocking boards, very stable and high compatability. I can throw anything so far at these 2 and had 100% happy face results.

*cough*troll*cough* *cough*beware*cough*

AMD technology + Intel technology = Intel/AMD Pentathlon IV; the <b>ULTIMATE</b> PC processor

I laugh very hard at the fool who disses the Athlon processor and promotes the Pentium 4.

*cough*loser*cough* *cough*beware*cough*


Is that the best reply you can come up with?? Its a sad day indeed when the Lemmings run out of ammo.

Don't start me up, you know I can reply back with counter-info but I don't see the point. I know you will answer back with more nonsense. Besides, I love the Northwood (or at least what is rumoured about it, so far).

AMD technology + Intel technology = Intel/AMD Pentathlon IV; the <b>ULTIMATE</b> PC processor

According to toms review of p4 mobos using chipsets from via and sis along with the intel rambus, the sis board is fastest followed closely by the via.

Witness the speed of a 1x Cd-rom and dispair.

thank you for your help i really apreciate it(and need it!)
thanks again.... good onya.....(australia)

Thank you for your help(i need it) its a real headache to upgrade the right way(if there is one) er GAMES is what my machine will be used for mostly..any other use and id just get a typewriter...good onya bud...(australia)