What u guys think of this?

[RobUK]

I'm currently pricing up an athlon system and i have come up with this spec.

ASUS A7V with UDMA100
T-bird 1 GHz (266 fsb)
256MB PC133 SDRAM
Creative GeForce2 MX AGP (not sure yet)
Midi tower 300Watts with case fans

I have the following and will be using them with the above :

Seagate Barraccuda 30.6g ATAiii Hard Disk
UDMA33 CD-rom 44x
Writer (mitsumi)
Diamond SuprExpress 56e pro external modem (9pin serial)
Standard 16bit PCI sound card
Voodoo 3 3000 AGP

Is this setup gonna be ok? Any advice or recommendation?

Thanx RobUK

[RobRich]

Opt for a different GF-2 MX video card. The Creative MX card uses 64-bit DDR memory, while the standard MX uses 128-bit SDR memory. The increased overhead associated with DDR signal latencies actually leads to the SDR card offering superior performance. My recommended offerings are from Guillemot, LeadTek, Abit, or Asus.

Also, you might wish to look for a better sound solution. A SoundBlaster Live Value or Phillips Rythmic Edge can be found for well under $50 these days.

Other than that, the system appears quite powerful. You should be good to go for quite some time. http://www.sysopt.com/forum/smile.gif

Robert Richmond

[RandomGoon]

I'd use the A7V133 personally, it runs like a champ in my system (1.2GHz T-bird). Heh, if you left off the 133 by mistake ignore me http://www.sysopt.com/forum/smile.gif Oh and I used the Philips Acoustic Edge instead of any of the SB cards to circumvent the issues between the VIA chipset and the SB chipset. I'd have to agree with Robert on the Video card, look elsewhere, I'm using a Gladiac and am loving it.

'Goon

[DanU]

There are some data corruption issues that affect the 686B southbridge. The SB Live seems to exacerbate the problem. The latest VIA 4-in-1 drivers (ver 4.31) are *supposed * to correct this. I guess we'll know soon when people start to test it out with their SB Live's.

[scotter]

the SB to VIA problem does not happen on the Asus Boards I dont know why but I have yet to have or see a post from any one else that has had that problem on a Asus board + the latest bios and via drivers are supposed to fix it http://www.sysopt.com/forum/smile.gif so I would not worry to much about that http://www.sysopt.com/forum/smile.gif
the only other thing is to make sure you get good name brand memory for that board it does have a problem running some memory even name brand I'm using micron with the -7E chips with out a problem

[RobUK]

Yes its the A7V133 board that i was talking about. Btw what are the issues with the SB and VIA ???

RandomGoon did u have any heat probs with ur t-bird on that board?

RobUK