Upgrade from K6-2 400 NOW or LATER?

[Scoober]

I currently have a K6-2 400 and have the urge to upgrade to a Duron or T'Bird. The issue is, should I do it now or wait until AMD releases 266 processors? I will undoubtedly see a tremendous improvement in performance from my current K6-2 regardless of if I do it now or wait. But if I wait, will I see much of an improvement with 266 processors over the current Duron/T'bird?

Will the new processors require DDR RAM, or are my current PC100 DIMMs ok?

I've got about $300 to spend on an upgrade (mobo and cpu), what do ya'll recommend?

 

[Shack70]

Myself, I would upgrade now. Ofcourse I always feel the urge to get faster hardware. When the new stuff comes out, $300 might not cover it. As for the memory, I have no idea!

Get the thunderbird and a nice board now. Sell the k6 parts you have left over and wait till the price for the new AMD chip and board are right for you. You can always sell the thunderbird later on and upgrade again.

 

[Moving Target]

You could spend $50 on a K6-3+ 450 now at tigerdirect and run it at 600 (even at 450 it would smoke your K6-2 400). Then you would have a cheap upgrade and you could wait for the 266 cpu's. Just an idea!

If your mobo will support it of course. Check AMDZonefor info.

 

[chriscraft]

Great question, it really depends on how you use your computer now and what you intend to do with it....

The odds are that since you've lived with a K6-2 400 this long, you don't have a critical need for really high-end hardware... and if your price watching, I would guess the current socket A stuff will do just fine...

With $ 300 try this

IWILL KV200 ---- $ 135 w/shipping
T-Bird 900 --------- $ 147 w/ shipping
GlobalWin FOP32 $ 30 w/ shipping
Arctic Silver -------- $ 20 w/ shipping
Total------------------$ 332

or

Epox 8KTA+ - $ 106 w/shipping
Duron 800 -------$ 81 w/shipping
HSF - same-----$ 30 "
Thermal paste-$ 20 "
Total--------------$ 237

Both systems should overclock to near 1gig, and you could use your current PC100 memory for now... you should have 128MB at least.. I'm assuming you already have an ATX case with a good power supply.. if you don't, go with the Epox/Duron option,that will leave ya $60 to get a case and good power supply...

Either of these systems will give you performance that you will be pleased with for a long time to come... With only $300, I don't think you'll get far with the new 266 processor and DDR memory options

good luck

 

[Scoober]

All good options guys! Thanks!

Moving Target, maybe I'll get the K6-3+ anyway to replace my K6-2 400 regardless. I have an Epox MVP3G-M mobo -- should be OK. I have an old 166 I could use for scrap with the 400.

ChrisCraft, I have a SuperPower case (250W PS) that I love and 256mb PC100 RAM. I should probably research the PS to make sure it's "AMD approved".

And good point on the 266 option being more expensive, ChrisCraft and BlackFlagg.

Decisions, decisions!

But it's FUN!!!

 

[chriscraft]

Your case and memory sound fine.. if you do go with a Duron combo, you'll see a world of difference, even between the K6-3+ 450...

But you do have one of the best M/B's for the K6-3+, just upgrade the BIOS and you should be OK....., with luck you should be able to overclock to 600Mhz, 550 for sure.. I have a K6-3+ 450@600 on a Tyan S1598 board, it's very fast and was a fun project

 

[Scoober]

While researching socket A mobo's, the RAID functionality of the Abit KT7 looks quite appealing; acutally it's the ability to use additional IDE devices rather than RAID itself. Are there add-on PCI cards that allow the addition of IDE devices (hdd's, cd, dvd, etc)? Because I've heard bad things about the KT7-RAID and you mentioned the Epox or IWill and other people recommend the MSI. I don't need the extra drives now, but I'd like to know that adding them in the future is possible (I currently have 2 hdd's, cd-rom and burner).

 

[Scoober]

<<bump>>

Any other thoughts?