New Mobo recommendation please

[Fat Tone]

Hi
I know people have asked simillar recently, but my question is a little different:

I'm gonna get a 1.4 Athlon. I mayl get M's next card (soon ) so on board graphics to tide over would be good if not too much extra. On-board network would be good. 266DDR, preferably 3 slots would be good. I don't want any VIA problems! I suppose RAID isn't necessary.

Any suggestions?

TIA

Tony.

[Greebe]

Many times onboard grahpics cause problems when another Gcard is added. I wouldn't suggest this route.

As for a new MB... geez that's a tuffy with the way the market stands currently. To me I'm glad not to be in the mood to build a system (couldn't afford it anyway What appears to be amazingly fast now I have the feeling will be considered slow shortly.

[Fat Tone]

Mike - I know what you mean about the on board gfx. I do have a really crappy agp card somewhere, so I suppose I could put the G400 in the new system for a while.

What things specifically do you think are gonna take a leap? The 1.4Gig is at a lovely price point, makes it possible for me to consider a 2nd system. It looks like the mobo will cost more than the cpu!

Tony.

[Greebe]

I had a little chat with Kyle ([H]ocp) the other day and we both believe that P4's will be ramping up much faster than 99.9% believe. If this occurs, then what appears to be a wonderful price now will be high like memory was just 6 months ago.

Supress that urge and save your pennies for now

[Novdid]

I agree with Greebe, wait. Both Intel and AMD platforms have some good products just around the corner (KT266A, i845+DDR, nForce, SIS 745 bla bla bla).

[Wombat]

the i845+DDR isn't happening until 2002.

[Novdid]

That's only three months. That's not very much time if you ask me.

[Wombat]

No, the i845 + SDR happens in January. No DDR until late 2002 or Jan 2003, I forget the contract details.

[Novdid]

Oooh, in that case forget that I said that it was just around the corner.

[EecheE]

ECS K7S5A

Hi Tony Andrews,

I was in your shoes about 1 month ago. Then I got a 1.4 athlon + ECS K7S5A which has the new SIS chipset. It's dirt cheap ($100 cdn) which left me some extra $ to get some cas 2 DDR. I was scared at first since I had never heard of SIS before. Then I read the first review, and they loved it. Read a second review and it still got high marks. Read a third review and I was sold.

It's by far the most stable athlon board out there.

Enjoy,
EecheE

[Technoid]

Originally posted by Wombat
No, the i845 + SDR happens in January. No DDR until late 2002 or Jan 2003, I forget the contract details.

How come then that I can already get me a I845 Motherboard then??

They have been available for weeks...

[agallag]

I'm personally waiting for a KT266A board. Either the MSI K7T266Pro2, or whatever Asus comes out with. Unless Asus does something amazing, I'll probably go with the MSI.

I have to buy a new monitor first anyway (I'm thinking Viewsonic P95f, how's that sound?), so the major upgrade will have to wait for a few months.

In order to upgrade, I have to replace the mobo, cpu, ram, cdrom, and burner. The last two have to go because I'm dumping scsi once and for all, which my current mobo (asus p2b-s) has on board. It's going to cost me about a grand (canadian) to get all the bits and pieces that I want, not including the monitor.

Before any of this happens though, I have to find myself a new apartment, 'cause my current place sucks major ass

[Wombat]

Technoid,
I'm not sure what the details are. The 845 has RDRAM and SDRAM support built-in. According to the intel/Rambus contract, the 845+SDRAM wasn't supposed to be allowed to ship for a while yet.
Maybe something changed, or my info was wrong. I'm confused, and would like to know exactly what has happened recently.

[Paddy]

I am also considering upgrading... Are you sure that you want to go AMD?

[Fat Tone]

Paddy - Unless something changes (which it might according to the hints, but AMD usually responds when it does), I can't see a reason for switching to Intel.

EecheE - thanks, I'll take a look. Anyone else got any comments on that board?

Tony.