mobo's, raid, more questions!

[Ender]

I'm looking at this mobo: http://usa.asus.com/products/mb/socket754/k8v-d/overview.HTM

Couple questions:
1. Getting this mobo will I able to put a 3000 64 bit chip in it? Thereby allowing me to get a less expensive chip now but have availability to upgrade to nicer 64 bit chips in the future? The socket is the same so I'm thinking it should work...

2. It has sata raid option. What's the dif between sata and uata? I just bought the UATA drives - though not opened so I could take them back - so I'm wondering if the the onboard raid isn't going to work. Also if I'm reading right I should be able to raid a total of 4 drives?

[Ender]

Also the AIW 9800 is a 'Pro'. Is that what you use DD?

[Ender]

oh yeah, and the AIW only comes in the 128mb variety.

Keep in mind, advice givers, I'm considering this card cause it has the video capture amenity, but I am looking into improving my video card as a whole. Since nvidia doesn't have anything out right now besides the 5950, I figure I might as well go ATI (can't believe I just said that) since I can a card with a capture on it as well.

[Ender]

oh yeah, and should this all come together, I think I will officially have the have fastest computer at BLE. :D HOW'D YOU LIKE DEM APPLES??!??!! ;) j/k. Though this leet upgrade may deserve a more leet case - that and the fact that I'm short about three cases right now. :(

[Itsmeee]

1.)first off go with the MSI K8T Neo. In all the reviews its proved to be faster, more reliable, and more feature rich.

The bad bit about 64bit right now is that mobo will be out of date in a few months. All AMD 64's are going to a higher pin count so speculation has it FX and 64's will work in one board instead of two different ones.

2.)Difference is SATA 1st gen has a 150 mbps transfer speed as apposed to UATA's 133. Plus its hot swappable meaning you can switch drives while pc is on. Negiligible preformance increase right now but the cables are smaller and they are a teency bit faster. So just next time you upgrade your drives get SATA.

oh yeah, and should this all come together, I think I will officially have the have fastest computer at BLE. HOW'D YOU LIKE DEM APPLES??!??!! j/k. Though this leet upgrade may deserve a more leet case - that and the fact that I'm short about three cases right now.

that brings in your PSU. You'll need either sata drive converters or a new PSU if you go the SATA route.

If you want a temp upgrade (and anyone else who wants to upgrade now) here are a few ideas and observations I've come up with.

Now is the time to upgrade. Within a year your case, psu, mobo, and a few other odds and ends will HAVE to be replaced to do even a minor upgrade. This is because of a few upcoming standereds. One is the BTX case which will be replacing the ATX case. They say we may see these cases and PSU's which go with them as soon as christmas which is a bit doubtfull but we should start seeing an influxe of these new cases 2005. These cases flip your mobo to the other side of the case, rearange cooling, PSU placement and other things. They are supposed to be very nice. Other things are AMD not having a finished standered. Inside of AMD there is a lot of bickering about there lines. It is getting sorted out, but its going slow. People are giving and soon like I mentioned above all A64's and FX's should be running on the same mobos as well as I've heard the FX's will use standered ram now?? Not sure on that one but it would be nice. PCI express is another thing to wait for as long as your upgrading in a year. Right now ATI has the only real solution which is a redisigned card (as apposed to nVidas badly working converter). These card will increase bandwidth a bit which will be nice in a year with some of the other increases in bandwidth that will be taking place in about a year. Basicly there is a lot of stuff that will be happening in about a year. I'm betting summer 2005 will be the next real time you'll be able to really upgrade safely.

As for current upgrades I'd suggest AMDs AthlonXP 2400 Mobile cpu for $77 @ newegg.com. These little buggers are designed for laptops but run on the socket a design. Infact they are Barton Core AXP's! The reason I suggest such a low speed and a mobile to top that off is two fold. BTW a lot of you probably know this, I'm just telling people that have missed it. First they are the best of the best of the Barton cores that come out of AMD's fab plants. Then they are set to 1.866ghz with a 266mhz fsb and run at 1.45v, plus they come factory unlocked because of powernow. Thats about 13% lower vcore then a desktop barton which means they run VERY cool. Now if you add a very cool running cpu that is the best of the litter and its factory unlocked!!! you get what I'm saying? Basicly these babies avarage out @ 2.4-2.5Ghz air cooled. Thats comparible to an AthlonXP 3400! They also have a really high clock rate for Athlons @ that speed so they make very stiff P4 competitors!

For $77 an almost guaranteed 2.4Ghz on your current cooler isn't that bad :D With that money you save you can get a matched pair of 512 PC-3200 ram (1GB) to help that CPU not get held back by your ram, and donate a few $$$ to the Itsmeee goes to college foundation!

[M4LFUNCT10N]

SATA and UATA are two different technologies. One is Serial and the other is parallel. So you won't be able to use UATA's in the serial ports.

I don't believe that mobo will take an older, aka regular athlon processor. That mobo uses a 754 slot while I believe the regular Athlons use Socket A. I'm sure I'll be corrected if I'm wrong.

[Itsmeee]

Originally posted by M4LFUNCT10N
SATA and UATA are two different technologies. One is Serial and the other is parallel. So you won't be able to use UATA's in the serial ports.

I don't believe that mobo will take an older, aka regular athlon processor. That mobo uses a 754 slot while I believe the regular Athlons use Socket A. I'm sure I'll be corrected if I'm wrong.

I thought he meant can he have an A64 in it now...is ender falling asleep at the keyboard again *smacks ender*

BTW you could go for an A64 2800+. Like $25 cheaper. I'd go 3000+ if your going 64bit but there are options.

[Ender]

Originally posted by M4LFUNCT10N
SATA and UATA are two different technologies. One is Serial and the other is parallel. So you won't be able to use UATA's in the serial ports.

I don't believe that mobo will take an older, aka regular athlon processor. That mobo uses a 754 slot while I believe the regular Athlons use Socket A. I'm sure I'll be corrected if I'm wrong.

Ok thanks for the dif between sata and uata. Helps a lot. :D


btw, I already have a xp2600+ so there no way I'm getting a 2400+. ;) Mine is overclocked to those speeds...possibly higher. Plus I have 1gb of ram.

I was wanting to know if I could get the 3000 64 bit chip and use it in the fx mobo that I listed, since it's the same socket 754 that both chips use.

and thanks for the info itsmee. :)

[Ender]

Oh yes, the reason I want to upgrade now is quite immediately I need more space/speed/and processing power - ie I don't really and can't wait till 2005.

2. By upgrading now I should have a pc that will last me a good little while doing what I need therefore I can wait till all the new stuff comes out and it fool tested by the peanut gallery and working great, then drops in price as intel and amd reach for the stars again in their race.

[Ender]

oh yeah, itsmee could you link me to that msi board and those reviews you talked about?

[Itsmeee]

newegg.com with info (http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDesc.asp?description=13-130-434&depa=1). Click resources and it will also list reviews of the board from places like andatech. Most of the reviews are actually shootouts with other A64 boards and it comes out on top in every review I've read.

You got a 2600+ to 2.4Ghz? Nice!

Yeah a pc based off the A64 is going to last for a long while :)

[Tha[\]atos]

Dual SATA RAID
The Promise 20378 RAID controller incorporated two Serial ATA and one parallel connectors with RAID 0, RAID 1 and RAID 0+1 functions while the VT8237 RAID controller provides another two Serial ATA connectors for RAID 0 and RAID 1 functions. The K8V is the ideal solution to enhance hard disk performance and data backup protection without the cost of add-on cards.

translation: you can use 2 sata drives and 2 uata drives on the first controler and you can use 2 sata drives on the seccond controller, for a total of 6 drives.

they make adapters that allow you to hook up sata drives to uata controllers, but I don't know if they make them for the other way around.

[DiscoDave]

Originally posted by Ender
Also the AIW 9800 is a 'Pro'. Is that what you use DD?
Yep. I think you're taken care of on all the other questions =).

[Ender]

Originally posted by Tha[\]atos
translation: you can use 2 sata drives and 2 uata drives on the first controler and you can use 2 sata drives on the seccond controller, for a total of 6 drives.


OMG! Can you imagine!!!!!!!! 8)