New Athlon system - Greebe, others?

[Wombat]

Hi folks,
I've just sold my computer to a family member, and I'm looking to assemble a nice K7 system, somewhat in a hurry.
I'd love it if I could get some recommendations and links for:
ATX case, with a decent power supply
128MB stick of PC133 RAM, that will work with..
An MSI motherboard..
And a good cooling fan for....
A nice, overclockable Athlon.

I'm a college kid on a college budget, but I don't mind paying extra for better quality, or a better warranty.

Thanks a lot,
Wombat


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K6-2/350@400, 503+ rev 1.2a, 128MB PC100 RAM, Millenium G200, RH6.1 w/ 2.2.12-20, Win98, and too many classes

[Wombat]

One other thing...
Are the retail Athlons better than their OEM counterparts? I know it's generally true for Intel, but what about AMD?

Thanks again.

[Greebe]

I'll address it in an email.

[paulcs]

I defer to Greebe's judgement on all things Athlon (and pretty much all things hardware), but, just in case Greebe doesn't, let me recommend a case:
http://www.a-pro.com/ATX802.htm

It's not the prettiest case in the world, but it isn't ugly. More importantly, its extremely feature-rich and very easy to work with. Spaces for two case fans, a slide out motherboard tray, a removable side panel. It's sometimes tough to get all three of these features in a single case, and they really make your life easier.

You get the option of ordering it with a 300 or 350 Watt Fortran Source Power supply. They're extremely quiet, and both are on AMD's recommended power supply list.

I'm currently in bed with Satan: Intel all over the place. But there is a lot to like about this case.

Paul
paulcs@flashcom.net

[merchant2112]

let me recomend a retailer. www.atacom.com

good prices (they don't list on pricce watch) good service. i called talked to some one under 5 min and when i told them i had a broken cd in the box they shiped me a replacement (overnight.) they don't charge more thant they have to for shipping. everything unless notied other wise has a 1 year warninty.

ive ordered two difrent systems from them never had a problem with them.

[RAB]

Wombat,
Glad to see you are finally moving up. Make sure you get an .18 micron K7. According to Ace's this is how:

"Yes, that is correct: almost all newer Athlons (500-800 MHz) are produced on the new .18 µ process (more info here). AMD representatives told us that there are still (small?) stocks of .25 µ CPU's, but that all .25 µ lines have been converted to .18 µ lines.

I don't have to tell you that almost every 550-650 MHz .18 µ CPU is an overclocking wonder. We have yet to test it ourselves, but one good friend of Ace's told me that it is possible to get .18 550-600 MHz Athlons to 800 MHz and more!!

How do you recognize such an overclocking wonder? Look at the top of the black casing of your Athlon: You should see gray numbers printed on top of it, something like 'AMDK7650MTRS1B'. Then look a bit further on the right side (with the heatsink pointing away from you): if you see a 'C', it is an older .25 micron CPU. If you see an 'A', you may hope for some serious overclocking potential: that means that it is a .18 micron CPU. Of course, it is still not easy to change the multiplier: it requires some serious soldering or attaching a electronic device to the golden fingers."

RAB

[Wombat]

Thanks for the tip. However, I'm ordering online. Do you know of any places that will tell you which version they have?

[Greebe]

So far only the 750 is 180nm. Week 42's OC to 800-850 and if they have 3.1 ns L2's then most likely they'll OC to 800 1:2 or 850 1:3.

[This message has been edited by Greebe (edited 23 December 1999).]

[Alfie]

I always reccomend this site for AMD cpu's.
The insight they have is uncanny(announcing chips that AMD denies they have any plans for,and then reversing themselves,etc.)
Their prices are a little higher,but they are an AMD authorized reseller and sell only AMD 1 yr.warrenty cpu's or 3 yr boxed units.
Their shipping is affordable and also use priority mail as an optional shipping method back up what they sell and are very reliable.
Check them out! http://www.lynncomp.com/

For motherboards check out this place,once again,very reliable reasonable shipping,low prices,large selection http://www.axiontech.com/

[Gasoline]

I've put together two Athlon system's. In my honest opinion, stay away from the Asus K7m and go with a Gigabyte Ga-71 Mainboard. Plus the gigabyte board is recommended by AMD, uses an AMD north and south bridge, and has an Award bios.
K7m uses a AMD north bridge, a Via south bridge, and an American Megatrends cmos.
The K7M just seemed a little buggy. No way to assign IRQ's, System hangs, Driver problems with sound cards. The Gigabyte installed in a snap.

Thats my opinion, everyone has one though

[Gasoline]

But you can't assign IRQ's with the Gigabyte either, sorry to mislead. But I think its a better board.

[chip]

i have built several Athlon systems using msi 6167 mb.very stable and reliable.
oh-i sell new mb's and cpu's cheaper.

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IT'S NEVER FAST ENOUGH!

[KvHagedorn]

Wombat,

I'm a price shopper too, but if I were putting together an Athlon system today, I'd hook up with Mike (Greebe) and get one of his pretested modified processors. He's put a lot of time and effort into overclocking Athlons, so you will get the most bang for your buck from him. Count on it.

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Kind Regards,

KvH

[Bixler]

I'm a college kid on a college budget, but I don't mind paying extra for better quality, or a better warranty.

Hope this isn't too late...I've been busy ranting about audio on RAB's thread.

Same advice.

Until you know exactly where you are headed, do business with a human being who will be there for you when you have a problem.

Listen to KvH


[This message has been edited by Bixler (edited 30 December 1999).]

[mikechen]

I prefer boards from gigabyte. I just installed 3 K7 systems in 2 days.
The first one is K7M, with savage4 pro, no problem.
The second and third one are build for my friend, which suffers by K7M for a month.
His first K7 with K7M, damaged just at the day he bought it. He send it to the retailer, and got a new one. This time no mouse. All PS/2 mouse just didn't work.
So he call me for help.
I took a look at his K7M, and surprisingly found that there's a jumper MISSING that control the PS/2 port IRQ. That's why the mouse didn't work. And the CPU fan connector has no output. However, I sold a line on the place where the jumper should be, and change a fan connector, make the system work finally.
He found his confidence on K7 again, but lost on K7M, so we build another system with GA-71X, install without a glitch. Oh, this system has TNT-M64.

Maybe there's somebody from ASUS will see this... When you have quantity, don't forget the quality. I really don't think let the users to be the QA/QC is a good idea. At least I hate it.