Socket 939 vs Socket 754

[kfranc9]

Is the Socket 939 Motherboards better performers/overclockers than the 754 mobos?

 

[DAPUNISHER]

Yes, if you throw out pricing, 939 is better than 754. Dual channel and unlocked multis on the FX make it top dog.

 

[slpaulson]

The only read difference is dual channel memory.
So yeah, it is faster. Plus the 3500+ just got a whole lot cheaper in the last few days.

I'm trying to figure out if these 939 boards handle 3 sticks of memory better than the 754 boards...
I already have 3 sticks of ram, and I really don't want to have to worry about getting new ram before my next upgrade. I know a lot of the 754 boards say they don't support three sticks at pc400, so I'm hoping the 939 boards are better.

 

[kfranc9]

I was planning on getting the Abit, but the gigabit ethernet card is supposedly PCI based...meaning it will be limited to PCI speeds.

So I believe I'm gonna hold out for the MSI...any ETAs?

 

[Odeen]

Originally posted by: kfranc9
I was planning on getting the Abit, but the gigabit ethernet card is supposedly PCI based...meaning it will be limited to PCI speeds.

Not just that. All the other components on the PCI bus (such as auxilliary IDE controllers, firewire, sound, etc) all share the scant 133 megabytes/sec bandwidth, and you don't want a network card capable of 250megabytes/sec throughput (1 gigabit / 8 bits per byte * 2 for full duplex) starving other devices for bandwidth.

I'd rather have chipset-based 4-channel SATA and 10/100 networking than PCI gigabit. But that's just me 🙂

The MSI fully implements the nF3 250GB chipset (all 4 SATA ports are courtesy of the nF3 controller) If it was actually available for purchase, it'd be a smart choice.