Athlon64 and winxp

[Bart Simpson]

Hello Everyone,
I want to upgrade my Athlon 600 Mhz to a Athlon64 3Ghz. I run WinXP
Home edition. Are there any issues with Athlon64 running XP? I know
right now no apps take advantage of the 64 bit processor, but will
everything at least run for now?

Thanks
Ed

 

[Bruce Chambers]

Hello Everyone,
I want to upgrade my Athlon 600 Mhz to a Athlon64 3Ghz. I run WinXP
Home edition. Are there any issues with Athlon64 running XP? I know
right now no apps take advantage of the 64 bit processor, but will
everything at least run for now?

Thanks
Ed

Certainly. I'm using a machine with an AMD Athlon64 3200+
processor, right now.

--

Bruce Chambers

Help us help you:



You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don't ever count on
having both at once. - RAH

 

[Nathan McNulty]

Just a note, you will need a new motherboard as your current one won't
support a 64bit AMD processor. Also, do you mean a 1600 or 2600 MHz Athlon?

 

[Bart Simpson]

Hello Nathan,
Thanks for the answer. I am deciding on a motherboard now.
Embarrassingly, I do mean a 600 Mhz AMD chip, not 1600 or 2600. My
system is over 4 or 5 years old. The last 4 years have been spent
upgrading my son's computer in college. He is finally out, and I am
now ready to get my system into the 21st century.

Thanks again
Ed

 

[Nathan McNulty]

Ah, then you mean you have an AMD K6-2+ 600 MHz CPU (the Athlon threw me
off)

The 64bit processors are nice, but for home use, you probably won't see
any real advantages unless you do video/graphical editing, high end
gaming, or the like. Otherwise, I would stick with an inexpensive
simple 32bit AMD or Intel setup.

My real suggestion (though I much enjoy making my own computers) would
be to look at Dell for deals such as this (was only $299 last week):
http://fatwallet.com/forums/messageview.php?start=0&catid=18&threadid=361045

You just can't build computers for this nice for that small amount of
money. The reason Dell can do that is because not only do they get
discounts for larger quantities, but they also make money for
preinstalling demo software. This allows them to take extra money off too.

 

[Bruce Chambers]

Hello Nathan,
Thanks for the answer. I am deciding on a motherboard now.

FYI, I've been very happy with my MSI K8T Neo-FISR motherboard.
Besides supporting the AMD Athlon64, its other features include:

SATA RAID 0 or RAID1
800 MHz FSB
DDR 400/333/266 DRAM, up to 2 Gb
AGP 8X
Integrated 10/100/1000 Mbps Ethernet
Integrated 5.1 Channel Audio
USB 2.0
IEEE 1394

Currently, I'm dual-booting the 32-Bit WinXP Pro SP2 and the
360-day Evaluation copy of WinXPx64 SP1, and haven't had a problem
with either OS on this motherboard.


--

Bruce Chambers

Help us help you:



You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don't ever count on
having both at once. - RAH

 

[Nathan McNulty]

The three motherboard makers you will want to look at (best in my
opinion) are ASUS, MSI, and ABIT (in order of preference). Just stay
away from anything with ECS on it

 

[Bart Simpson]

Everyone,
Thanks for the help. I am narrowing my choice of motherboard to these
three brands. Reviews I have read like all three of them.
While we are on this subject, are there any restrictions on the type
of memory to use? Are any names like Kingston good to use. Locally
Best Buy has PNY memory on sale, though past experience leads me to
not like PNY. Any mrmory to stay away from?

thanks again
Ed

 

[Nathan McNulty]

Here is my favorite memory: Corsair (expensive, but the best), then
Mushkin, then OCZ. Since you are going all out on the computer, you
should look at getting their Dual Channel (for Corsair it is called
TwinX) memory setups. I would look at the 1 GB PC3200 with tight
timings such as 2-2-2-6. These chips will be quite expensive though

I base my experience off of the 32bit Intel platforms though, so you may
want to see what others suggest for speed and timings such as PC4000 at
2.5 CAS or something like that.

Also unsure if the board you are looking at has DDR or DDR2 memory. If
DDR2, I'm not sure what to recommend, but those three brand names are
exceptional. I would highly recommend getting a system with PCI Express
based board though if they make one (which will most likely use DDR2
memory)

 

[Rick]

Check Toms Hardware they reviewed several MOBO and ram. It appears that

 

[Bruce Chambers]

Everyone,
Thanks for the help. I am narrowing my choice of motherboard to
these
three brands. Reviews I have read like all three of them.
While we are on this subject, are there any restrictions on the type
of memory to use? Are any names like Kingston good to use. Locally
Best Buy has PNY memory on sale, though past experience leads me to
not like PNY. Any mrmory to stay away from?

thanks again
Ed

The only specific brand memory I ever recommend is Crucial,
although I've heard good things about Kingston, as well. Isn't PNY
the brand that's sold in discount department stores like Wal-Mart? If
so, I'd avoid it. (Of course, I'd also avoid Best Buy, when it comes
to computer equipment, unless you already know exactly what you want.)

--

Bruce Chambers

Help us help you:



You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don't ever count on
having
both at once. - RAH

 

[Jon Erlandson]

http://www.extremetech.com/category2/0,1556,644478,00.asp

A site that offers pretty good advise for the doityourselfer.
case, mobo, heatsink, fans and controls, video and audio, drives and what
nots.

 

[Nathan McNulty]

PNY makes good memory. I'm not sure where any of you are getting this
information that they are poor. Also, some of their dual channel kits
are far superior in tests even compared to Corsair and OCZ.