Building athlon sytem need help

[Guardian]

I am looking to build an athlon system, but need some advice

Here is what I am thinking:-

athlon 550
microstar 6167 Motherboard
256 MB PC100 (or maybe 384MB)
Matrox G400 DualHead
Soundblaster Live Value or 1024
DVD Rom
17GB ATA66 Hard drive
Some sort of server case

I want this sytem for photoshop, Adobe premier editing as well as playing the odd bit of half life.....

I want the sytem to fly therefor, and I know how much photoshop likes its RAM, but should I get loads of PC100 or less of the more expensive PC133?

Also want to link up to my current sytem via a network card, any Reccemendations?

Also what do people think of the SOundblaster Live?

Thanks

[merchant2112]

i just finished building a ms6167 and k7 500.

if you allready have pc 100 memory check it against the list of recomended chips on amds site. i was reading over at amdzone that some pc 100 sticks are not pc100 and are cuaseing problems. i personaly have 3 pc100 128meg sticks 2 nec and one hitachi. at the time i bought them one of each (nec) went in my bx board set up and mpv3. then i added the hitachi to the bx system all was well. then i built my k7 and moved everything. all appered to be ok but when ever i tryed running a benchmark all day or over night the system would lock up after a few hours. pulling the hitachi stick stoped that problem. i then swaped the other nec for the hitachi and am now runing 256 in the msiboard with two nec 128meg bars. all is well no lockups prime95 ran for 16hours before i turned it off. (all tests passed. (oh and that was after reclocking my cpu to 650.)

i would recomend buying a k7500 and pop the case my week41 k7 500 was really a underclocked k7650 (etched in the slug) with 3ns nec catch chips. amd i guess is running short on those 500's and is useing faster bin parts to meat the demands. week 41 42 and 44 all have been found to contain real 600 and 650 cpu cores and catch chips. i reclocked mine to 650 by moveing some smd resistors and presto 650 at defualt voltage.

i got my chip from atacom.com in ca. usa. they have msiboards for 150.00 and or k7m with out sound for 169.00

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my system has arived. all together and if i new about the usb bug in 98 with this board i would have been fiished a lot sooner.

msi 6167 mobo k7 500 wk41 now at 650.(not overclocked its a real 650 they underclcoked.) 256 meg ram ,addtronics case w 250watt sp power supply, matrox g400, maxtor diammax 2500+ 10gig hd,5x cldvd region free, 3com 10/100 nic and 56k ext modem, xitel p storm sound card. lots of controlers joystick throttle rudder raceing wheel, and 19in monitor, usb/ps2 logitech mouse

hey anyone know how to fix the usb mouse boot hang problem with the ms6167

[RoGuE]

The Athlon is an excellent CPU (I have one myself) but for heavy Photoshop / Premiere work I would recommend a PIII in preference due to the superior stabilty of BX motherboards.

256MB is sufficient for Photoshop.

The Soundblaster Live! card is generally excellent. I would recommend the SBLive! Player 1024 over the Value, as it is a better card (it has a digital out). In fact it is exactly the same card as the SBLive! Platinum (minus the drive bay connector).

[DentyCracker]

Microsoft has acknowledged that one of their files has a timing problem with AMD cpus faster than 350 MHz and VIA chipset using usb. The fix is on their site somewhere.

[Guardian]

Thanks for the comments, I checked out the Sb 1024, and it looks like a top card also found a decent server case from a local shop.

Still pricing up the differant ways, and my local computer shop even has the G400 Max in stock!!!

[merchant2112]

http://www.stormlabs.com/message/msg....asp?groupid=3

msi message board. the msi board dosn't have a via chipset. and i found out its not a usb problem its a not useing a ps2 mouse problem. fix is to use both and tuck the ps2 mouse out of the way or turn off the ps2 mouse port by purning off pnp os support and dedicateing irq 12 to isa use. (at least i hope so anyway have to try it at home yet.)