Newbie's Question

[jimbc]

Try to build an Athlon XP Based system. Need a recommandation for a MB. Want to use my left over PC133 SDRAM. It would be nice to have USB 2.0 support, but not necessay. Any idea?
Thanks in advance.
Jim.

 

[HelzBelz]

Reading your post, I get the impression that you are on a tight budget.

For this situation, the ECS K7S5A is probably the most popular (and inexpensive) board with support for PC133 SDRAM; AND it supports DDR SDRAM as well... It's not an overclocker's board, but it does provide room for future upgrades !

There are no PC133 capable boards with native USB 2.0 support (unless I missed one). However, separate USB 2.0 PCI cards are easy to find.

Good luck !

😉

Note : For official Athlon XP support, make sure you look for K7S5A ver. 3.x (not 1.x); click right here for the ECS K7S5A official page.

 

[Buz2b]

I agree with the recommendation of the K7S5A but would just add that make sure you have at least a 300 watt Power Supply and it is of decent quality. Doesn't have to be "Top of the Line", nor a 500 watter, just good quality 300 watt or so. You could also look to a KT133A MB such as the MSI K7T Turbo2 at NewEgg. It is about $14 more including shipping but would not be as picky about the PS if that were a concern. But the K7S5A does allow for future upgrade of your RAM to DDR, so there are trade-offs all around.

 

[Boonesmi]

the k7s5a is over a year old... in my opinion its not a good choice for upgrade (hehe although i know many would disagree with me 🙂 )

if you absolutly have to keep your pc133 ram then the k7s5a is probably your best choice

but running the new athlonXP cpu's with pc133 really cuts down performance... the athlonXP requires much more memory bandwidth then the older athlons did, so expect a big performance hit

if at all possible sell your pc133 in the fs/ft forum and buy some ddr and use it with a new motherboard (something like the kt333 based epox 8k3a)


**edit**
actually if you want usb 2.0 then the 8k3a probably isnt the best choice (since its doesnt have the new usb standard)
the gigabyte kt333 board has the new usb, so does the MSI, chaintech, soyo, abit, and asus

 

[Buz2b]

hehe although i know many would disagree with me

Gee, ya think?!?! 😉 The K7S5A is a year old but BIOS upgrades have enabled it to "keep up" with CPU increases for the most part. Yes, there will be a trade off in a bit of speed to the KT333 boards you mentioned, but the difference has to be weighed against the cost of changing the RAM (sorry, but you won't get near enough money for the PC133 to buy the same amount of PC2100 or better to take advantage of the chipset) and don't forget the increased cost of the MB. A bargin is a bargin; the K7S5A has stood the test of time (and it's critics) and proved to be one of the better price/performance boards in recent times. Not the best, but one of the better ones.

 

[o1die]

Leadtek also makes a 735 board. It has a few overclocking options which the ecs board doesn't, but may cost a little more. Check out newegg or pricewatch.

 

[jimbc]

Thanks to all.
Really helpful. I will count my money then make a decision.
Jim

 

[Buz2b]

Do yourself a favor and check out NewEgg for Motherboards. Select the KT133A chipset in the search. You will get (currently) a list of three boards. One is the MSI K7T Turbo2. Great board at around $65 and runs PC133 with support up to XP2200+ I believe. No support for DDR, but that is not a concern for you at this point. I put a refurb (from NewEgg) of this board in my wife's system about 6 months ago with a Duron 950. Runs like a screaming eagle and is faster than she ever hoped. Granted, she does not do a lot of memory intensive gaming or otherwise. However, she does do a lot of digital photography and with 256 MB of RAM, she handles it exceptionally well.