Athlon MB help

[flakbait]

A friend of mine is going to give me an AMD K7 900MHz Athlon along with a 128 meg stick of SDRAM. The problem is two fold. I don't know which motherboard to snag, and I don't know which BIOS and VIA 4in1 drivers to get either. When I asked about his current board he couldn't find much beyond a sticker with K7AMA on it.

If anyone could tell me what to snag, I'd greatly appreciate it.





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Flakbait [Delta6]
Delta Six's Flight School
Put the P-61B in Aces High
"I wanted to go back for another 50 missions, but they ruled it out
because I had a case of malaria that kept recurring. So I had to stay
in the States and teach combat flying. I was shot down by a mosquito!"
Frank Hurlbut, P-38 pilot

[bloom25]

You need to find out whether it is the old(er) slot A format, or the newer Socket A format.  Slot A is easy to tell, it's in a big plastic package about the size of two decks of cards end to end.

If it's a slot A processor, I don't know whether or not it would be worth your money to find an old slot A board.  Personally I would try to sell the slot A processor on eBay and buy an Athlon XP and new Socket A motherboard.  (That would be far more upgradable and MUCH faster.)

[flakbait]

I'm pretty sure he said it was a socket A, cause I remember him saying it was socket something. I went back over your post about Athlon motherboards and that jolted another bit of memory. He said his current board would take either DDR or stock 100/133 SDRAM. Up to a gig of the stuff too. His current board will take up to a 1.3 gig processor, and the local comp shop has a few in. He also said something about socket 462 if that means anything.

This is my first venture with Athlon processors and building a new system solo. So far the only things that I'm not sure about are...

Mobo
BIOS version
VIA 4in1 drivers
When to install what, software-wise


Thanks for your help Bloom, I do appreciate it!


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Flakbait [Delta6]
Delta Six's Flight School
Put the P-61B in Aces High
"For yay did the sky darken, and split open and spew forth fire, and
through the smoke rode the Four Wurgers of the Apocalypse.
And on their canopies was tattooed the number of the Beast, and the
number was 190." Jedi, Verse Five, Capter Two, The Book of Dweeb

[bloom25]

If it is a socket A (Thunderbird) 900 Mhz processor it's going to be a 100 Mhz FSB type.  If I were buying a board to support it, I would get a good new one.  That way you could use at least up to the newly released Athlon XP 2100+.

By the way, you don't have to get a board that uses VIA drivers.  I had a good experience with the MSI (microstar) K7N420Pro, which uses the nVidia nForce 420 chipset.  (Windows 2000 or XP highly recommended.)  If you don't have a GF2 Mx or higher video card, this board has one built on, along with very good integrated sound.

There are many good boards available using VIA's KT266a chipset as well.

(Both use DDR SDRAM by the way.  I highly recommend a DDR SDRAM board for top performance and upgrade reasons.)

Building your own system is not difficult, but I do recommend seeking help mounting the heatsink on the Athlon if you've never done one before.  (Maybe your friend ... ) You need to be pretty careful when you do it to be sure the heatsink is flush on the die and oriented correctly before applying pressure to the locking clip.  It's not hard if you've done it before.

[flakbait]

I might end up getting an nForce board if they have one in cause I don't have a very high-end graphics card. He's getting a 1.3 gig Athlon and another stick of RAM, which means I'll get his old processor and RAM. So I'm pretty sure I'll get the heat sink along with it. If not, I'll have the guys at the comp shop mount one for me. I've never mounted heat sinks before and the last thing I want to do is burn up a perfectly good chip.

Thanks again Bloom! If I encounter any more unknowns I'll holler.



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Flakbait [Delta6]
Delta Six's Flight School
Put the P-61B in Aces High
"For yay did the sky darken, and split open and spew forth fire, and
through the smoke rode the Four Wurgers of the Apocalypse.
And on their canopies was tattooed the number of the Beast, and the
number was 190." Jedi, Verse Five, Capter Two, The Book of Dweeb