[CLUE-Tech] AMD64 MB recommendations?

[Mike Staver]

I'm not sure what you know about the AMD64 line, but I've done a LOT of 
research on the topic over the last year.  So, here's what I know:

1) There are 3 sockets for AMD64 based cpus:
    754 - Single channel memory, being phased out quickly.
    940 - Opteron and FX lines - very pricey, but the best
    939 - AMD's new baby - dual channel memory and the future of the 
AMD64 line.
So based on that, I suggest going with 939.  However, if you look at the 
available 939 cpus on the market, they may be very unaffordable for 
you.  It think the cheapest I saw one is for $635 for just the cpu.  
That's way out of my price range. You can get a 2800+ for socket 754 for 
$145:

http://www.mwave.com/mwave/viewspec.hmx?scriteria=BA20095

2) There are several chipsets supporting all sockets, but let's talk 
about the 939 supporting chipsets.  That leaves us with Nforce3 Ultra 
and VIA K8T800 Pro chipsets.  I'm not sure about many of you, but I've 
been badly burned by VIA chipsets on many occassions.  Even though I 
have had several motherboard made by MSI that have VIA chipsets that 
still work awesome to this day, I've have many more that just plain 
quite working or were completely unstable after short periods of use.  
My estimate is that out of 30 VIA motherboards I've purchased, 25 of 
them were a complete joke right out of the box (unstable even after 
driver upgrades, etc) or quite working in less than 1 year.  So, I've 
been using Nvidia chipsets for 2 years now, and I've had one bad board 
out of 20 - so I feel better about going with Nvidia.  I also like 
Nvidia's windows drivers and how often they get updated.  But if you 
plan on putting Linux on this system... then I would stay away from 
Nvidia I'm sorry to say.  I can't even get Suse 9.1 to run on my Nforce 
2 based Athlon system yet, and you would think the kernel drivers would 
support a 2 year old chipset by now, but I guess not.  Maybe I haven't 
tried hard enough yet, but if I can't get the installer to work out of 
the box, I give up easily :) 

Anyways, if you're looking for Nvidia based boards for windows use:

http://www.mwave.com/mwave/viewspec.hmx?scriteria=BA20351

That's the only one I saw that has socket 939 with the Nvidia chipsets, 
and I've had good luck with Gigabyte in the past.  But let's say you 
want Linux to work on the board, then by all means, I would go with:

http://www.mwave.com/mwave/viewspec.hmx?scriteria=BA20431

And one last thing - if you are looking for a good socket 754 (it's 
definitely cheaper) motherboard with all the options, I like this one:

http://www.mwave.com/mwave/viewspec.hmx?scriteria=BA20007

I just ordered it for a friend, and will be building the box for him on 
Tuesday, so check back with me if you want and I'll let you know how it 
works.  It does have an Nvidia chipset though as this guy is a windows 
only user.  If any of you have Suse 9.1, or any other distro working 
good on an nvidia based board, let me know! The Suse 9.1 installer just 
locks up on me before I can even hit F2 to see it posting info, so I 
don't even know what's hanging it. 


Joe 'Zonker' Brockmeier wrote:

>Hello all,
>
>Thinking seriously about getting an AMD64 and wanted to get some
>recommendations about AMD64-compatible motherboards? I usually go with
>ASUS or MSI, but I thought I'd ping the list so see if anyone is
>currently using an AMD64 setup (with Linux) and what kind of experiences
>they've had -- any problems, etc.
>
>Thanks!
>
>Zonker
>
>_______________________________________________
>CLUE-Tech mailing list
>Post messages to: CLUE-Tech at clue.denver.co.us
>Unsubscribe or manage your options: http://clue.denver.co.us/mailman/listinfo/clue-tech
>  
>