Replacing KT7A with something SDR compatible

Hello everyone,

I need to replace my Abit KT7A (it expired) with something that is compatible with my PC133 SDR Ram and my 1200 Athlon. This avoids me having to spend money having to replace the CPU and the memory at this point.

Eventually, this board witht he current memory and cpu will form my server when I upgrade to something a little more cutting edge.

The problem is my RAID setup. My KT7A had on board RAID, and I am having difficulty in choosing a motherboard that will provide the same RAID facility.

I have looked at the ECS K7S5A SiS735 Athlon/Duron Skt A SDR/DDR ATX Motherboard. I like this for a number of reasons, not least because it does both SDR and DDR and would give me some upgrade potential.

However, it does not do RAID. Therefore, I would have to spend a further 70-80 bucks or so to get a RAID card (probably Highpoint 1520) on top of the 60 bucks for the m/board.

Does anyone know of any other choices I might have? Furthermore, does anyone have any opinions on the ECS board mentioned above?

Kind regards,

Skirm

ps. stability is a must!<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by skirmash on 12/24/02 03:46 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

skirmash,

If you were happy with your KT7A (KT133a chipset issues, etc.) you can still get boards based on the KT133a. some of the newest of them are now "officially" recommended by AMD with up to a XP 2000 (model 6, not 8) CPU. That would give you one more upgrade if you wanted it. Older KT133a based boards should be fine up to the 1.4G Athlon, but don't work with the XP's.

If you do your research, you should be able to get a board that will work, either new or refurbished.

Check out: <A HREF="http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/TechnicalResources/0,,30_182_869_4348^4351,00.html" target="_new">http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/TechnicalResources/0,,30_182_869_4348^4351,00.html</A>
for the AMD, XP approved list. That's probably the best place to start.

Also, though AMD doesn't list it as recommended, Abit lists their KT7A-RAID ver. 1.3 as compatible with the XP's up to 2000+. I suspect you can trust Abit on this. Here's Abit's compatibility chart: <A HREF="http://fae.abit.com.tw/eng/faq/generic/checkcpu.htm" target="_new">http://fae.abit.com.tw/eng/faq/generic/checkcpu.htm</A>

Finding a KT133a board shouldn't be a problem. Finding one that is XP compatible with RAID will be harder, and I think the KT7A-RAID may be the only one made/available now.

If you want to stay with your Athlon but get away from Via, your options are more limited, basically the ECS SIS boards and some early Ali chipset boards that support both SDR or DDR. RAID would be unlikely.

Poke around on pricewatch.com to see what you can find.

my $.02

BW