I've been dormant long enough

[026TB4U]

It's that time and I'm getting the "new motherboard" itch.

Since the nForce is taking forever to develop and Abit is dragging their as* in releasing it, I'm looking at the KR7A-133R. The 133 adds native ATA133 to the southbridge and of course the raid controller also is ATA133. Seems like a pretty sweet board.

IA says wait for the DDR333, but that may a few months down the road. So I may take the plunge and get the KR7A-133R.

Whatcha guys think?

[Rando]

for 333, I know it's tough man, it is for me, but it's only a few months, I know I'll be glad I did, and I think you will too, whether it's Nvidia, VIA or SIS, that's decided upon. Willpower m'lad, willpower:D

[Techvillage]

It's difficult to know what to do - I have had the money in my pocket since early December, looking at what to get. I'm not normally this indecisive, the MSI K7D master, is just hitting the shelves, which I would like to get, but that is only ATA100, and I would need to get a seperate raid card.

And you guys talking about waiting for DDR333...... mmmm....

[026TB4U]

I've honestly been waiting for the nForce, but as they are finally starting to hit the shelves, they are talking about a revision and the whole DDR333/ATA133 thing. And not to mention the performance sux so far. As much as I hate to get another Via board, it does look the most promising at this time.

And with computer hardware, you can't keep looking ahead or you'll never purchase anything. Just like you can't look back after you purchased something :eek2:

[Techvillage]

Originally posted by 026TB4U
And with computer hardware, you can't keep looking ahead or you'll never purchase anything. Just like you can't look back after you purchased something :eek2:

It's very true isn't it :( In technologoy areas, unless something truly significant, a real milestone event like going from digital to analogue then I will buy pretty much straight away, becuase there is always something new coming out, but from what I have read so far the difference between ata100 and 133 aint' that much, it's the DDR333 threads that I have seen with you guys discussing - is this a real milestone event in technolgoy, that one should delay a couple of months for???

[026TB4U]

Again, the KR7A is on top when it comes to overclocking. Who needs the KT333 when the KR7A can run the fsb at 178mhz stable :eek2:

http://www.aceshardware.com/read.jsp?id=45000293

I still think this is the best board at the moment. If it had USB 2.0, it would be a no-brainer. I would of course get the KR7A-133 which adds native ATA-133.

[Zemuss]

I am between a rock and a hard place on the choice.
For me its between the Iwill xp333-raid and the Kr7a-133 raid.

They both have somewhat of the same performance but the Iwill cost is cheaper but that doesn't make the quality cheap.
I read a review that 026 sent to me and another for the Abit board. I really can't decide. Augh.

I think IWILL is probably the right choice right now. But do I want to make that risky choice? Its an attractive buy but it also has the Magik chip set which I was drawn back on because of the past.

So do I suck it up and buy the Abit, dish out the extra money? Or take the chance with IWILL.


LATERS.
"Z"

[floppybootstomp]

I'd say go for it. I know that itch, when you wannit, you wannit now.

I've still got my KT7-RAID, 14 months old now, and if I were in a position to upgrade I'd go for the KR7-RAID myself. I figure that would be a plenty good upgrade.

Only thing is, I'd have to buy an Athlon XP; DDR RAM and probably a new PSU as well. That adds up to a fair few pennies.

At the moment I have an Antec 300W PSU. I figure if I got me's an independent 12 volt PSU (I got loads of them lying around) to power the 4 case fans; cooler fan & vid card fan, that would save enough current in my 300W PSU to run a new system. What d'ya think?

Anyways, were you to hang on waiting for every promised development, you'd never buy anything. And there's always a revision of whatever's the latest a month or two after. AFAIK, the KR7 has already been revised.

If you get yourself a new setup based around the KR7, I figure you'll be happy with it and it'll do you at least until the end of the year, when there'll probably be quite a few new options to choose from.

Go on, treat yourself to a new toy :)

[catcorpse]

I know the feeling. I just ordered my first DDR rig. my last new rig (not from the junkyard or the salvation army) is my Iwill KK266+ with my new 1.33. I just picked up a MSI board, and no I am not crashing Abit, but sometimes you just have to buy it. Why wait aaround, I have been patient for quite some time, well not patient but complacent. THe weekend when my bro came over andwe had an argument and I "built" him a system and explained why he should get this over a dell, I though this is MY computer. I say go for it, and if the missus gives you and greif, blame me:D

FBS the XP's are not bad in price unless you are dumb like me and needthe biggest you can get your hands on. PSU, I really don't think that it will make a huge difference unless you have a no-name 250 watt. I have a no-name 300 powering my Iwill at 1500 and I have a 125 watt micro ATx PSU powering my FIC slot mobo with a 800 bird OC to 1000 (and this has been running for over 6 months, and I do have a 300 watter for it when my order comes in)

[Techvillage]

Hi Flops - Cats brings up a very valid point in my opinion - Our beliefs are getting so consumed by putting the largest powersupply we can find inot a PC, that we have began to loose touch with what is actually required.

A 300watter, especially a good one like the Antec one is plenty, plenty , plenty for running a rig with with an xp chip, couple of HDDS, Croms/DVD's (with spare capacity for a couple of extra HDD's and 4 fans. We are all rushing out or saving pennies for larger and larger PSU's like the 550's - it's like using a sledgehammer to crack a nut.

To back this up, you only need to go back a few years, and people were piling similar hardware in to PC's with a lot smaller PSU's - and no the XP's chip requirements, and OC' doesn't mean than you need another 300 watts on top of the 250 watter from a couple of years ago.

My opinion only folks :)

[Case]

You've got a good point there. Uness you're watercooling, I don't think you need anything more than a 300 watter, and if you do, there's no reason that you can't run 2 power supplies. Probably everybody has at least a few 250's laying around, and these would be more than adequate to power the fan bus and some drives . . .

[ImaginAsian]

Watttage on the PSU is not as important as the 5V line power where AMD CPU's are concerned. For Intel CPU's, its the 12V line. That's what I look at first over wattage. 300W vs 400W? U will find that today's power hungry CPU's will run more stable as long as the 5V line is delivering close to 5V.

Ever since switching from an Enermax to a Sparkle 400W PSU, my 5V line is solid and I have not had spontaneous reboots. The Enermax is known for low 5V lines which need a solder mod to bump it back up. With a sparkle, I simply trim the pot if the line is low.

However, if given the choice between a 300W vs 400W, I would spring for the 400W given my airflow design and fan assortments.

I am thoroughly happy with the Sparkle.

[floppybootstomp]

So did you make a decision? :beatsme:

[AmStoned]

What's a reboot?:hhead: For some damn reason, PSUs of all brands and wattages hate mango's ass. I mean even with his all powerful 400W Sparkle, he still manages to reboot 5 times during a Trillian session the other night... ok, it was really ClonlyXL's fault. Wait, come to think of it, it was mango's w2k.

Like Tech said, if you don't have drives in every damn drive bay, running Delta 80mm 80CFM fans, and vmod every damn thing in your system, an Antec 300W is plenty to spare for an AMD XP system.

I wonder if lowering the CL of my RAM from 2 to 2.5 will take my XP up another 50MHz....

OMG you guys, I did a benchmark of my LAN last night with Sandra 2K2, 116MB transfer rate! Damn.:rollout:

[026TB4U]

Originally posted by floppybootstomp
So did you make a decision? :beatsme:

Yep, pulled the trigger last night. Bought a KR7A-133R from Mwave for $136 :clap: . Sweet deal since Newegg is showing the same board for $156. Pretty big difference.

I also purchased a 512 mb stick of Samsung TRUE PC2700 with a copper heatspreader from ocsystem. That way when and if boards run 166 fsb, I'll be ready :D.

And as for IA, he considers 5 reboots a night a very stable system :Tong:

[AmStoned]

Hella sweet. How high have you taken her up to? FSB.

[026TB4U]

AS,

Should have the board on Wednesday and the memory by the end of the week (I hope). I'll let you know then how the new set-up works.

[AmStoned]

BTW, could you take a pic of the Cu spreaders you got from OCsys when they come in? DK got his from the same source, but for whatever reason, his Cu spreaders are very yellow instead of the usual orange color we see. Mind on the OCZ DDR are very orange, like the SK6 tune. I guess it could be DK's flash from the DigiCam.