Athlon XP 2600+ Mobo recommendations?

[cyrax80]

I was running an athlon xp 2000+ with an epox 8k3a+...and it just kicked the bucket. I want to keep my RAM (784MB crucial pc2100), so that's really the only limiting factor, but I'm pretty sure most of the boards I'd be looking at would support 2100 or 2700...

Anyway, I need to buy a new mobo and processor, and I was looking at the xp 2600+ 333 fsb - it looks like that's just before the price jump. Any suggestions? I can't seem to find too many recent articles here.

 

[pspada]

perhaps the most cost effective option would be the Fry's dealie, at least if a) since you want to reuse your PC2100 RAM and b) there's a Fry's near you.

 

[Corporate Thug]

NF7-s

 

[IQJUMPuw]

I would recommend

AXP 2500+ Barton and Epox 8RDA+

Other nForce2 boards are way too expensive and it's a waste of money if you don't plan on using the features that come with those mobos. Features like soundstorm, SATA and stuff...

If you don't plan on overclocking, just get a KT400 board. If you plan on keeping your PC2100 RAM, KT400 will be more than enough.

 

[cyrax80]

Can someone explain to me how RAM clocking works? If I have pc2100 RAM, what fsb would I need? Or does it not matter since the RAM should be able to down/over clock? It just seems to me that the RAM speed should have to be divisible by the fsb...but 2100 isn't divisible by anything so that doesn't work. Am I overanalyzing this?

 

[dunkster]

The approximate calculation is:
16 X Memory Frequency = PC rating, or;
8 X Data Rate = PC rating.

For PC2100:
2100/16 = 131.25 (The real answer is 133 MHz)
2100/8 = 262.5 (The real answer is 266 MHz)

For PC3200 the numbers work better:
3200/16 = 200 MHz memory frequency.
3200/8 = 400 DDR.

Hope this helps!

 

[cyrax80]

If I was to get a 2500 and oc it to 3200, keep my ram clocked at 133 and the fsb at 200 (ocing it)what kind of cooling would I need?

 

[pspada]

Some pretty good hsfs, not only for the CPU, but for the northbridge too. Also, you are better off if you can run your memory in sync with your fsb.

 

[cyrax80]

So here's another question: If I want to retain my pc2100 ram, it runs at 133mhz. If i get a new chip and rather than running them asynchronously, I run the fsb at 166, overclock the ram to 2700, would that half the processor speed of a barton AXP 2500+ since they're supposed to run at 333mhz?