Athlon64 3000 - who's taking the $215 plunge?

[blakerwry]

i wouldn't blame that on the chip, I would blame it on the motherboard 1st and foremost.

I noticed that this SiS based board I am using now is much more responsive during I/O operations compared to my kt266 based boards(or any other board I've layed hands on). However it seems slightly less responsive in CPU/memory intensive operations (I've even noticed that F@h affects benchmarks). Sandra confirms that memory bandwidth is not one of this chipsets strong points.

Personally, I didn't see why you and Merc went the VIA route. The SiS athlon64 chipsets rock.

 

[CougTek]

The SiS athlon64 chipsets rock.

Yep, but so far only ECS has made a design on it (maybe others, but they aren't yet selling).

I also think the SiS755 is a superior chipset, but when the choice is limited to ECS, it can be a hit or miss. The only review I've read on the ECS board shows that it matches the performances of the reference design board from SiS, a good thing, especially since ECS had the bad habit in the past to slow down the timings and their mainboards often ended up being slower than those of the other manufacturers on similar chipsets.

 

[Adcadet]

Dido to what Coug said. SiS stuff scares me, as does ECS. If I were trying to build a budget killer gaming box I might bite, but I don't have time to mess around. And from what I've seen the performance difference is small.

 

[Adcadet]

i wouldn't blame that on the chip, I would blame it on the motherboard 1st and foremost.

I noticed that this SiS based board I am using now is much more responsive during I/O operations compared to my kt266 based boards(or any other board I've layed hands on). However it seems slightly less responsive in CPU/memory intensive operations (I've even noticed that F@h affects benchmarks). Sandra confirms that memory bandwidth is not one of this chipsets strong points.

Good point. Although now that I try to duplicate what I said before I cannot. I noticed the problem mostly when Windows had just booted but stuff was still loading. Now when I test it well after a boot it's better. And this is even loading programs for the first time to try to mimize the impact of cache. So either my earlier complaint was unfair, incorrect, or I'm loosing my mind. Note that I doubt these choices are mutually exclusive.

 

[Mercutio]

Newegg told me the gigabyte board I'd selected is in stock again, but after some review, now I think I'd rather have an Albatron K8X800 Pro II (gigabit, SPIDF in and outputs for a Via Envoy sound chip, SATA etc).

...which is now out of stock not available anyplace else I'd trust to buy it.
Argh.

At least the Athlon64 retail box is, um, pretty.

 

[mubs]

Now the question is: is it as responsive as my dual Athlon MP 1.2 GHz? Well, it is definitely faster in single apps than my old system. But when trying to do 4 things at once, I still think my old dualie could handle the load and still respond better. It seems like when a few apps are launching and are delayed by HD reads, my old system's GUI (in WinXP) still stayed responsive where this system will hesitate. Oh well.

It's been a while, Adcadet. So, do you still prefer duallies or is a fast single CPU equal or better?

 

[Mercutio]

Since this is up at the top of the thread list right now I'm going to mention that I'm taking back every positive thing I've ever said about Albatron.

I have three of them in my house, nominally. I had to RMA one last week and two this week. One is on its second RMA.

I don't know what goes wrong with them. The damn things TALK instead of giving useful BIOS beep codes. All three of them ultimately devolve into "There is a problem with your CPU"... but there isn't, 'cause the CPUs in question work just fine on other boards. Same with RAM.

I haven't RMA'd a gigabyte board since January, and I've sold or handled four or five dozen in that time. I've set up five total Albatron 8x800 Pro IIs and I've had four RMAs in total.

 

[mubs]

Aaaw, that's too bad, Merc. Maybe they're possessed?

In my mind, Albatron had always been an ultra cheap, low reliability, dies-as-soon-as-the-warranty-is-over type product. I tend to lump Matsonic in this category as well. I was impressed when you rated Albatron highly, and had made a mental note to check them out before my next purchase. I'm sorry it turned out this way.

 

[ddrueding]

Well, my 30+ AMD 64 3000+ and 30+ MSI K8T Neo FSR motherboards are working beautifully. I love these boards, their driver update app and ability to flash the BIOS from Windows are happy things for me. Not to mention flawless support for the low-power "mobile" (or "desktop replacement") chips.


Blah blah, considering I bought 3 cases of these things without a single failure; I think I can recomend them pretty highly.

 

[ddrueding]

Damn, sorry for the typos....severly PUI :mrgrn:

 

[timwhit]

Well, my 30+ AMD 64 3000+ and 30+ MSI K8T Neo FSR motherboards are working beautifully. I love these boards, their driver update app and ability to flash the BIOS from Windows are happy things for me. Not to mention flawless support for the low-power "mobile" (or "desktop replacement") chips.


Blah blah, considering I bought 3 cases of these things without a single failure; I think I can recomend them pretty highly.

I have the same combo and it has been working flawlessly for me as well.

Actually, I think I bought that board because DD talked about the board highly.

 

[Clocker]

Well, my 30+ AMD 64 3000+ and 30+ MSI K8T Neo FSR motherboards are working beautifully. I love these boards, their driver update app and ability to flash the BIOS from Windows are happy things for me. Not to mention flawless support for the low-power "mobile" (or "desktop replacement") chips.


Blah blah, considering I bought 3 cases of these things without a single failure; I think I can recomend them pretty highly.

So when is that army of machines going to start doing something useful like processing F@H work units?

C

 

[ddrueding]

So when is that army of machines going to start doing something useful like processing F@H work units?

As soon as we switch administrative client software. The current app kills all processes that attempt to run in the background.

 

[Handruin]

I'm getting close to building my next box and I'm having a hard time deciding on a board. You've given the MSI board some high praise, but after my last experience, I'm hesitant to try them again. Do you have any quarky issue with these at all? I'd be planning to put a gig of ram in it along with an athlon 64 3200+. What ram did you end up going with for your systems?

 

[ddrueding]

We went with Mushkin Blue PC-3200 and Athlon64 3000+ retails. I have tested these boards with 3 of these DIMMs (1.5GB total) and had to put the CAS @ the stock 2.5 to be stable. With only a single DIMM 2.0 was very possible. I ran a 3200+ for a while on mine without issue.

 

[Buck]

Since this is up at the top of the thread list right now I'm going to mention that I'm taking back every positive thing I've ever said about Albatron.

I have really learned to like the Gigabyte GA-7VT600-RZ board. Pretty simple, not too many extra frills, and certainly no extra fans. The only quibble has been the poor clearance between the memory slots and AGP slot. But this has become a moot point for me.

 

[Mercutio]

Aaaw, that's too bad, Merc. Maybe they're possessed?

In my mind, Albatron had always been an ultra cheap, low reliability, dies-as-soon-as-the-warranty-is-over type product. I tend to lump Matsonic in this category as well.

Er, you're wrong on that count, mubs.

Albatron is a collection of former Gigabyte engineers. Their products are so damn similar they even use the same front I/O layout and the same font for their logo. Their boards are studded with large capacitors - not the hallmark of low-quality manufacturers like ECS and Matsonic (they also cost significantly more, which would be another indication they aren't in the budget market), and they have very good documentation and "extras" in the box.

Now, that doesn't particularly matter in this case: the 8X800 Pro II apparently has some issues, at least mine have, but prior to last week I would've put Albatron above MSI, FIC, Soyo and Chaintech in terms of manufacturing quality.

FWIW, I've never been impressed by any of the MSI products I've seen. I know some people like them, but when I open a motherboard box I'd rather see a poster with install instructions or a sticker for the inside of my case, detailing jumper and connectors than a cardboard cutout with spaceships on it.

 

[Mercutio]

I have really learned to like the Gigabyte GA-7VT600-RZ board. Pretty simple, not too many extra frills, and certainly no extra fans. The only quibble has been the poor clearance between the memory slots and AGP slot. But this has become a moot point for me.

That's a great board. They work with damned near everything, as do the GA-7VM400s and GA-7S748s. The lesson here is simply to never stray from the true path of gigabyte. They even make crappy SiS-chipsets worthwhile.

 

[CityK]

when I open a motherboard box I'd rather see a poster with install instructions or a sticker for the inside of my case, detailing jumper and connectors than a cardboard cutout with spaceships on it.

Awe come on, that spaceship has provided me with countless hours of amusement!

 

[CityK]

I have really learned to like the Gigabyte GA-7VT600-RZ board. Pretty simple, not too many extra frills, and certainly no extra fans. The only quibble has been the poor clearance between the memory slots and AGP slot. But this has become a moot point for me.

That's a great board. They work with damned near everything

They are good boards. I mentioned it before, but in case you were unaware, pressing Cntl-F1 on the main BIOS screen gives you access to the hidden BIOS features (mem timings etc). I think its Cntl-F4 for the Nvidia board...can't remember.

 

[CityK]

]Awe come on, that spaceship has provided me with countless hours of amusement!

And its bound to out live my motherboard too!

 

[Buck]

By the way, if you're going to use Sempron CPUs on the Gigabyte GA-7VT600-RZ board, make sure you are using the F4 BIOS version. It is a downloadable option that can be flashed through their Q-Flash utility.

 

[Mercutio]

Does that mean you've taken the plunge, Buck?

I got two of my Albatron boards back today. Man, if these don't work out for me their replacements will be available free of charge in the forsale forum.

 

[ddrueding]

By the way, if you're going to use Sempron CPUs on the Gigabyte GA-7VT600-RZ board, make sure you are using the F4 BIOS version. It is a downloadable option that can be flashed through their Q-Flash utility.

And in order to flash the BIOS, that means you must also have a non-sempron CPU available to do the flashing, correct?

 

[Buck]

Mercutio,
No plunge yet, I just saw the description for the F4 BIOS version and that is what it stated.

David,
I would suspect not, but I suppose it is possible and would make the whole process useless.

_____


They have also released another BIOS revision, F5. This fixes an apparent problem booting into Windows NT 4.0 without a PS2 mouse connected.

 

[Mercutio]

It appears that in the case of at least one of my Albatron failures, the BIOS battery literally explodede I didn't notice the scarring on the inside of my chassis when I pulled the old board out, but boy is it visible now.

Weird.

 

[Mercutio]

Bought a couple DFI K8M800-MLVF boards last week (u-ATX integrated everything). We'll see how these are. DFI boards aren't terribly exciting, but this one has a comfortable number of big caps and a VERY sensible layout.

 

[ddrueding]

Bought a couple DFI K8M800-MLVF boards last week (u-ATX integrated everything). We'll see how these are. DFI boards aren't terribly exciting, but this one has a comfortable number of big caps and a VERY sensible layout.

I haven't trusted onboard graphics for anything but servers in a long time; if you could let me know how it looks for basic office apps @ 1280x1024 that would be awesome.

 

[Buck]

Somebody just asked me for some ultra-budget Celeron pricing to replace some existing computers. So, I slapped a few things and came up with a basic box for $660.00 -- I thought that was a decent price. The box consists of:

Intel BLKD845GVSRL -- integrated Video, Audio, and LAN
Celeron 2.4 GHz BX80546RE2400C
CKVR333X64C25 512MB RAM
Mitsumi D359M3BLACK Floppy Drive
NEC ND-3500A/GNBlack DVD +-RW
Hitachi 14R9245 40GB 2MB Cache Hard Drive
Apex TM-163 Black Enclosure
MS Keyboard & Mouse Black
VS2120 Speakers Black
Samsung CRT 793df Black/Silver

Of course, for this customer, the Keyboard, Mouse, Speakers, and Monitor could be removed if those peripherals are already available from their existing systems. That would bring the price down to $465.00.

 

[Mercutio]

I'd say the S3 Unichrome graphics product looks at least as good as a low-end nvidia-based card. To me they are acceptable, even at 1280x1024.

 

[Handruin]

Has anyone worked with the Giga-Byte K8NSNXP-939? I'm half-way considering the 939/3500+ route over and above the options I've seen for 754 motherboards with an Athlon64 3200+.

I believe the K8NSNXP resolves the gigabit LAN issue and uses the NForce3 250 Ultra chipset.

 

[Mercutio]

Bought a couple DFI K8M800-MLVF boards last week (u-ATX integrated everything). We'll see how these are. DFI boards aren't terribly exciting, but this one has a comfortable number of big caps and a VERY sensible layout.

Very sensible and utterly unable to boot windows, no matter what I try. Wow. What a great product.

Knoppix starts OK at least.

 

[Buck]

I went ahead and ordered the following to see how this little machine will work:

Intel BLKD845GVSRL -- integrated Video, Audio, and LAN
Celeron 2.4 GHz BX80546RE2400C
CKVR333X64C25 512MB RAM
Mitsumi D359M3BLACK Floppy Drive
NEC ND-3500A/GNBlack DVD +-RW
Apex TM-163 Black Enclosure
VS2120 Speakers Black

... I obviously have other drives that I can use so I don't need the Hitachi for demonstration purposes.

I also went and priced a similar system through Dell. I was able to get the specifications close, Dell doesn't offer a DVD burner with their Dimension 2400 line as I did with my version. I don't sell WordPerfect like Dell, so I included OpenOffice, and instead of Norton, and some fee-based anti-Spyware stuff, I included NOD32 and Spybot. After shipping and taxes, I only ended up $25.00 higher then Dell. Considering that I'm not trying to beat them, I thought it was pretty good.

 

[P5-133XL]

No - Not the 2400/3000 -- Try the 400SC. An immeasurably better bargin machine.

 

[Buck]

No - Not the 2400/3000 -- Try the 400SC. An immeasurably better bargin machine.

I just went through Dell's wizard for the PE400SC, and after including all of the items that I speced, it comes to $1,005.00, and that excludes the operating system, DVD burner, and office software.

 

[P5-133XL]

Then you are including lots of stuff that are not part of your previous system. The closest matching system I came up with is $473 (not including the $100 rebate). The machine has a 2.8Ghz P4 instead of a Celeron! If you want DVD-Writer & speakers then you need to call Dell(those options exist but not through their Web configurator). The rebate will probably pay for your DVD-Writer...

The 2400/3000 is truely Vomitware, while the 400SC has good bones.

PowerEdge 400SC:
Intel® Pentium®4 processor, 2.8GHz, 512KB Cache, 800MHz FSB 428SC [221-3068] 1
No Operating System, Other NOOS-O [420-4106] 11
FREE $100 Mail-In Rebate MRQ3S01 [463-1893] 81
Free Upgrade to 512MB DDR (400Mhz, 2x256MB) for the price of 256MB! 512DBL4 [463-3217] 3
3.5 in, 1.44MB, Floppy Drive FD [340-8975] 10
48X CD-ROM CD48X [313-1928] 16
Standard Windows Keyboard,Gray S [310-1680] 4
Logitech PS/2 2-button Mouse with Scroll L2M [310-4405] 12
NO MONITOR OPTION N [320-0058] 5
Electronic Documentation, PowerEdge 400SC EDOCS [310-0438] 21
1Yr,Parts + Onsite Labor (Next Business Day) W1YOS [950-3040][900-9054][960-1305] 29
40GB 7.2K RPM IDE Hard Drive 40GB [340-8976] 8
Onboard NIC OB [460-6604] 13

 

[CityK]

Bought a couple DFI K8M800-MLVF boards last week (u-ATX integrated everything). We'll see how these are. DFI boards aren't terribly exciting, but this one has a comfortable number of big caps and a VERY sensible layout.

Very sensible and utterly unable to boot windows, no matter what I try. Wow. What a great product.

I happened to notice that htpcnews just posted a review of that very board, an gave it a 5/10. I didn't read it , but thought just in case you were interested in comparing notes.

 

[LiamC]

Handruin wrote:

Has anyone worked with the Giga-Byte K8NSNXP-939? I'm half-way considering the 939/3500+ route over and above the options I've seen for 754 motherboards with an Athlon64 3200+.

I believe the K8NSNXP resolves the gigabit LAN issue and uses the NForce3 250 Ultra chipset.

H, you may want to look at this review--the GigE issue is not solved on the GB board...

http://www.techreport.com/reviews/2004q3/gigabyte-ga-k8nsnxp-939/index.x?pg=1

 

[Jimshady]

If you (like me) never plan on upgrading components, rather anticipate replacing the entire system when the time comes, there is no reason not to get a A64.

amen brother.

 

[Buck]

Then you are including lots of stuff that are not part of your previous system.

Yes.

Intel BLKD845GVSRL
Celeron 2.4 GHz BX80546RE2400C
RAM - 512MB
Video - onboard
Audio - onboard
LAN - onboard
FDD
DVD+-RW/CDRW
HDD 40GB 2MB Cache
Mini-Mid Tower Enclosure
MS Keyboard and Mouse
Speaker set
Samsung CRT 793DF-T/T 17inch 1280x1024 0.20mm
Windows XP Home
Office Suite
Anti-Spyware
Anti-virus software - 1 year
Service Plan - 3 years