Entering the 64bt World soon, Help needed with a Mobo

[Salamandar]

Hello all,

I'm going to upgrade soon, buying only a new mobo and CPU.
First my old PC :

CPU intel P4 2.4 @ 3.0
Mobo Abit IS7-e
RAm 4 * 256 MB ( 1GB ) kingston valueRAM
VGA Gigabyte 6800GT "AGP"

Now my first Question is:

Since I have 4 Sticks of RAm will they affect the performance and overclocking of an AMD 64 Based system?

2nd Question is:
Which Nforce3 based or VIA based Mobo should I get, list more than one please?

THX for your help.
P.S. I think I'm gonna get an AMD 64 3200+ CPU.

 

[Peter]

Performance in 4-DIMM setups will be a hair lower than with 2-DIMM, but not relevantly so (unless you look at raw memory throughput benchmarks). It's been that way on the Intel platform as well, only that you'd never notice because the latency improvement with two DIMMs is lost to the P4 anyway.

 

[Vette73]

I vote DFI

 

[Salamandar]

I doubt I'll find DFI mobos where I'm going to buy the stuff.
Brands that are well known where I live are:

Gigabyte
MSI
Abit

 

[SilverTrine]

Wait for the new ULi motherboards. Socket 939, full speed AGP 8x with SLI/Crossfire capable PCI-E.

 

[Salamandar]

Originally posted by: SilverTrine
Wait for the new ULi motherboards. Socket 939, full speed AGP 8x with SLI/Crossfire capable PCI-E.

no need for that, I don't like the idea of SLi or crossFire since it is a total waste of money.
The only thing that would make me Buy a Multi card solution is to see at least 70% improvment in real applications.

paying 500$ for a card to only gain 5% - 20% is a crime and since a single Geforce 7800GTX is faster than 2 6800Gt/Ultra SLI solution That Proves my point.

Any way Back to the subject of the AMD64 MOBO !

 

[Vette73]

Originally posted by: Salamandar
I doubt I'll find DFI mobos where I'm going to buy the stuff.
Brands that are well known where I live are:

Gigabyte
MSI
Abit

Then look for one that has the nForce3 Ultra chipset and see if it supports dual core CPU's.

 

[The Pentium Guy]

Originally posted by: Salamandar

Originally posted by: SilverTrine
Wait for the new ULi motherboards. Socket 939, full speed AGP 8x with SLI/Crossfire capable PCI-E.

no need for that, I don't like the idea of SLi or crossFire since it is a total waste of money.
The only thing that would make me Buy a Multi card solution is to see at least 70% improvment in real applications.

paying 500$ for a card to only gain 5% - 20% is a crime and since a single Geforce 7800GTX is faster than 2 6800Gt/Ultra SLI solution That Proves my point.

Any way Back to the subject of the AMD64 MOBO !

The ULi will support PCIe AND AGP - so when AGP dies (in the future, higher end cards will be PCIe) you've got an upgradable path. And, the ASRock ULi board will be socket-upgradable to M2. Before dismissing this solution I suggest you take a look into it.
http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview...atid=29&threadid=1637097&enterthread=y

Edit: Ah. It might not be available in your area...

-The Pentium Guy

 

[Salamandar]

True, only well known chips and mobo makers are available where I live.
Not every one has enough alternatives.