I Need Some Advice and Info

[MrEgo]

Hi all. You guys seem to be very informed in all the details about computers that most people will never hear about in their entire life. I have a couple questions regarding which hardware would be a better choice for certain circumstances..

1st. If I have a 133MHz FSB (or 266 I guess you could say) Athlon XP CPU, would PC3200 DDR be a better choice than PC2700? I swear I read somewhere that PC2700 actually is a better choice than PC3200 because of reasons that are beyond me. I might be wrong, but maybe you guys know more about that. Some people claim that the higher the number after it says "PC", the better the memory will perform. Maybe, maybe not, that's what I'd like to know. I'm planning on purchasing an Athlon 64 when it comes out, and I'd also like to know which memory would best be corresponding with it as well.

2nd. Which brands of memory are really good? Right now I have Kingston PC2100 ECC Registered DDR (I have a dual Athlon MP 1900+ rig), and my question is how does Kingston compare to the top brands? And what brand(s) of memory would be the best for overclockers and non-overclockers? I don't do any overclocking, although that time is soon approaching for me.

3rd. When the Athlon 64 comes out, is it still going to use the Socket A interface, and would an nForce 2 chipset support (or support it well) an Athlon 64? The Epox 8RDA+ mobo is looking like a pretty good buy right now, and if the Athlon 64 will work, and work well with the nForce 2 chipset, I'd like to buy the 8RDA+ ASAP. If the Athlon 64 will require another mobo, I'll definitely hold off on the 8RDA+. Oh yeah.. When people refer to the "Barton Core" are they referring to the Athlon 64?

4th. Are you guys hyped for the Athlon 64? On a scale from 1-10, what do you guys think about it (the anticipation I mean)? I have to say that I am hyped. I don't even know how it works, but a lot of websites are building quite a bit of hype from this thing. They make it out to be some processor that will revolutionize computing or something. Some of the extremeists out there even claim that AMD will have a vast (over 90% in some cases) majority of the CPU marketshare when the Athlon 64 arrives in the retail channel, but I don't know anything about that.

5th. Is a serial ATA HDD worth purchasing? Are there any SATA drives available on the market, if so, which ones are good?

So yeah that's like 80 questions, but if someone out there has the patience and the knowledge to answer all these, it would be very appreciative.
If you want to email me about it, you can send one to me at MrEgo19@jasnetworks.net, but I know most of you guys want to show off your skills and post your reply in this forum.. ha ha.. oh well, nothing wrong with showing off some well deserved intelligence.

Thanks.

 

[Sushi]

I can help some on question #1:

The PC3200 & PC2700 DDR would outperform PC2100 if... You (a) have a motherboard and processor that will utilize it or (b) have a motherboard that will utilize it and you can run the Memory FSB different from the processor FSB. If you don't, the mobo will default the DDR to run at the CPU FSB.

There are boards that do this, but you will have to look around if you intend on keeping the 266MHz processor. The KT333 chipset will utilize the PC2700, but check the specs and read reviews on mobos to see what you're getting. Personally, I would get an XP processor that runs on the 333MHz bus and pair that with the PC2700. The KT400 and Nvida chipsets that are relatively new can utilize the PC3200 DDR.

I cannot offer any insight into the 64-bit Athlon.

Take Care!

 

[bgeh]

Originally posted by: MrEgo
Hi all. You guys seem to be very informed in all the details about computers that most people will never hear about in their entire life. I have a couple questions regarding which hardware would be a better choice for certain circumstances..

1st. If I have a 133MHz FSB (or 266 I guess you could say) Athlon XP CPU, would PC3200 DDR be a better choice than PC2700? I swear I read somewhere that PC2700 actually is a better choice than PC3200 because of reasons that are beyond me. I might be wrong, but maybe you guys know more about that. Some people claim that the higher the number after it says "PC", the better the memory will perform. Maybe, maybe not, that's what I'd like to know. I'm planning on purchasing an Athlon 64 when it comes out, and I'd also like to know which memory would best be corresponding with it as well.

2nd. Which brands of memory are really good? Right now I have Kingston PC2100 ECC Registered DDR (I have a dual Athlon MP 1900+ rig), and my question is how does Kingston compare to the top brands? And what brand(s) of memory would be the best for overclockers and non-overclockers? I don't do any overclocking, although that time is soon approaching for me.

3rd. When the Athlon 64 comes out, is it still going to use the Socket A interface, and would an nForce 2 chipset support (or support it well) an Athlon 64? The Epox 8RDA+ mobo is looking like a pretty good buy right now, and if the Athlon 64 will work, and work well with the nForce 2 chipset, I'd like to buy the 8RDA+ ASAP. If the Athlon 64 will require another mobo, I'll definitely hold off on the 8RDA+. Oh yeah.. When people refer to the "Barton Core" are they referring to the Athlon 64?

4th. Are you guys hyped for the Athlon 64? On a scale from 1-10, what do you guys think about it (the anticipation I mean)? I have to say that I am hyped. I don't even know how it works, but a lot of websites are building quite a bit of hype from this thing. They make it out to be some processor that will revolutionize computing or something. Some of the extremeists out there even claim that AMD will have a vast (over 90% in some cases) majority of the CPU marketshare when the Athlon 64 arrives in the retail channel, but I don't know anything about that.

5th. Is a serial ATA HDD worth purchasing? Are there any SATA drives available on the market, if so, which ones are good?

So yeah that's like 80 questions, but if someone out there has the patience and the knowledge to answer all these, it would be very appreciative.
If you want to email me about it, you can send one to me at MrEgo19@jasnetworks.net, but I know most of you guys want to show off your skills and post your reply in this forum.. ha ha.. oh well, nothing wrong with showing off some well deserved intelligence.

Thanks.

1)actually, the athlon xp doesn't need to have such high speed ram. my athlon xp 1700 runs quite fast with pc 2100 ram and a via kt266a. but since pc 2700 is similarly priced, i'd recommend that you go for pc 2700. pc 3200 DDR standard doesn't even exist yet actually. and the athlon xp can't fill up the bandwidth that is offered by pc3200 ddr. it will show around the same performance in benchmarks(if the timings are the same).

2)kingston is fine if you don't overclock.they can overclock mildly compared to the top brands.i would recommend Corsair XMS for overclockers.there are other companies which also produce overclockable ram, such as GeIL and OCZ.but i won't recommend them judging by their past records.

3)when the athlon 64 comes out, it will use an entirely different socket.it will use socket 754.the nforce 2 won't support the athlon 64.nvidia is already in the works to produce a new chipset for the athlon 64, dubbed Crush K8.the barton core is actually a athlon xp, but it has 512kb of level 2 cache intead of 256kb present on present athlon xp cores.

4)yeap, i admit i'm hyped up(probably because i've waited so long for it).on a scale of 1-10, i would say that i'm hyped up to 11
the thing about the athlon 64 is that it will support 64 bit instructions(although it not gonna be utilized by many of us), includes hypertransport and intergrates the memory controller into it.

5)maybe yes, maybe not.depends on your needs. the advertised 150mb/s doesn't even reach 50mb/s because the hard drive is the one that limits it.i would buy one because the cables are small and this increases airflow in the case.there is only one manufacturer that produces serial ATA drives currently and that company is seagate.i don't think we'll mass manufacturer support for serial ATA until serial ATA is integrated directly into the southbridge. maxtor is already coming with plans to manufacture them.

by the way, welcome to AT forums.