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Are VIA Chipsets on mobos really good to get anymore or is it better to go to AMD chipset?

W

WyteWatt

Banned
Wondering if via chipsets really are that good anymore because it seems like with people changing from via chipsets to others fix all kind of problems and stuff. I feel like i need to be a lot more careful of what chipsets i buy. I mean is it better just to go intel and get intel chipsets and processors ? Or just go amd chipsets ?

What does everyone think ?
Thanks



 
While it is true that VIA boards have had there fair share of problems one big reason they seem to always be in the tech support threads is that simply more VIA boards are sold for the Athlon platform than any other board. Additionally, some hardware manufacturers like Creative have bungled the compatibility of their products with the VIA platform due to poorly written drivers and badly designed hardware.

Anyhow...I think it is very possible to have a stable VIA platform...especially if you chose the proven KT133A chipset. It has been out about a year now so all the bugs have been worked out. It's not as fast as the new DDR boards, but that market is pretty immature and it makes sense to wait unless you are going all out and building a new system. I would recommend a solid KT133A board like the Iwill KK266 Plus or the Epox 8K7AT which are some of the best Athlon boards out there in terms of stability and overclockability.
 
You will find that most of your high end motherboards are using a hybrid chipset (AMD nb / Via sb). They are all stable when you install things properly. The biggest problem seems to stem from user error IMHO.
 
VIA has indeed had a number of compatibility problems. However, they are much less frequent than many make them out to be. The newer 4in1 drivers have also begun to solve many of those problems, and they are beginning to update their drivers quite often now. I think if you hang around and wait for the KT266A you will be pleasantly surprised. It looks extremely promising, however the SiS735 chipset seems to be running pretty flawlessly at this point as well. I've been running a system with a VIA motherboard for some time now, I don't know that I have ever crashed (Except when trying to overclock my memory and such as far as I could). Get a VIA board and Windows 2000 and you shouldn't have any problems. I even have an SB Live! soundcard with which I have had no problems whatsoever.
 
I own a KT133A and I am happy, but I see all of these issues with their chipsets and I am not to interested in any future VIA chipset.
 

just as JOHN said, set your system up properly (it doesn't matter whether it's AMD-VIA-hybrid or pure VIA) and you'll have a very stable computer. but if you plan to spend money right now, i'd definitly chose the AMD-VIA-solution with DDR-RAM, just for the increase in speed and with memory being that cheap.
 
Am I wrong, or doesnt VIA base it's design off the AMD reference chipset design? (Just "try" to improve it?)
 
My KT133A board (IWill KK266) is the most stable board I have ever owned. Stabler than my old BX boards even. There is a lot of truth in setting it up properly though. If you take the time to read up on installing drivers properly, tweaking the BIOS etc it can reward you with a more stable system.
 
I think that it is very possible to have a Stable VIA platform too. I will take the highest performing solution avialable.
 
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