New! AMD Athlon II X4 Quad-Core Processor 620 AM3, Retail

[imported_Lothar]

Doesn't ECS make crappy boards?

 

[Engineer]

Originally posted by: Lothar
Doesn't ECS make crappy boards?

That's the general consensus, but YMMV. I've had two ECS boards and both worked. One was difficult, but a BIOS upgrade and a new heatsink took care of the issues. The BIOS I can understand, but the heatsink = fail on ECS part. The other ECS board was fine.

Not sure if this BLACK board is any better or not....not the greatest ratings in the world, but I'm not so sure that so many cheap skates who don't have a clue buy them....and don't have a clue how to set them up (much less troubleshoot them). Some of the reviews are pretty funny. I guess it's a YMMV thing. If I weren't waiting for the 605e low power chip, I would consider this combo.

 

[Darkrage]

Originally posted by: Lothar
Doesn't ECS make crappy boards?

I have heard, but I have that board and its not bad for the price really. Matter of fact I was thinking of getting this CPU to use in said board lol.

 

[Engineer]

Originally posted by: Darkrage

Originally posted by: Lothar
Doesn't ECS make crappy boards?

I have heard, but I have that board and its not bad for the price really. Matter of fact I was thinking of getting this CPU to use in said board lol.

You have no issues? Hell, I actually thought about getting the 620 chip and undervolting and underclocking it to the 605e levels instead of waiting (and also paying a premium for the lower power 605e).

 

[hans007]

Originally posted by: Darkrage

Originally posted by: Lothar
Doesn't ECS make crappy boards?

I have heard, but I have that board and its not bad for the price really. Matter of fact I was thinking of getting this CPU to use in said board lol.

the ECS is bad theme, has been going on since they did a really horrible job on the ECS k7s5a during the socket A days.

Outside of that I can't really say they are any worse than any other company.

It is just that they sell A LOT of boards especially through frys and ECS has over the years used more VIA / SIS chipsets, which made a lot of people complain a lot.


I have used a lot of their boards from frys deals, and i think mostly people complained that they had chipset problems and some terrible problems with failures maybe 6-7 years ago. of course that just persists forever on message boards even though I would say the last 5-6 years you cant really say they have been any worse than say foxconn, or biostar, zotac, abit and any of the 2nd tier guys.

 

[esquared]

Originally posted by: hans007

Originally posted by: Darkrage

Originally posted by: Lothar
Doesn't ECS make crappy boards?

I have heard, but I have that board and its not bad for the price really. Matter of fact I was thinking of getting this CPU to use in said board lol.

the ECS is bad theme, has been going on since they did a really horrible job on the ECS k7s5a during the socket A days.

Outside of that I can't really say they are any worse than any other company.

It is just that they sell A LOT of boards especially through frys and ECS has over the years used more VIA / SIS chipsets, which made a lot of people complain a lot.


I have used a lot of their boards from frys deals, and i think mostly people complained that they had chipset problems and some terrible problems with failures maybe 6-7 years ago. of course that just persists forever on message boards even though I would say the last 5-6 years you cant really say they have been any worse than say foxconn, or biostar, zotac, abit and any of the 2nd tier guys.

I happen to think that the K7S5A board was a good board. It was able to use both PC-133 or DDR memory. I still think one I built is still running fine. If you look on eBay for those boards you will see that they are still fetching between 30.00 to 40.00 for one of these boards.

I have stated this before that I have built around 75 systems with the Fry's/ECS combos and I have had only two that failed out of the box. I returned them and got new ones that worked. Many of these boards are still running as I type as I use them for running folding @ home

ECS is one of the largest motherboard manufacturers in the world. They make motherboards for Abit and others. They also make OEM boards for other companies, of which I think Dell and HP are on that list.

I am a little disappointed that these cheap combos aren't going to be at Fry's anymore.

 

[jjmIII]

another good cheap mobo..

ASRock N68-S AM2+/AM2 NVIDIA GeForce 7025 Micro ATX AMD Motherboard - $45 + ship

 

[bryanW1995]

Originally posted by: waffleironhead
can anyone recommend inexpensive mobo/ram to add to this cpu? im looking to stay under $250 for all three.

I just got this cpu, an ecs 790gx am3 mobo, and 3x1 gb ram for $221 AR shipped. I added the cpu to my cart and they had $20 off the mobo

@ ecs comments: yes, they do make some crappy budgets boards that, well, act like budget boards. their black ops series is a foray into the high end, they use much better components. They just can't command the premium of a gigabyte or asus because they don't have the name recognition. I'm more worried about bios updates being well executed and timely than anything else, asus is great in that regard and my abit ip35 pro was actually very good as well.

 

[imported_Lothar]

Originally posted by: hans007

Originally posted by: Darkrage

Originally posted by: Lothar
Doesn't ECS make crappy boards?

I have heard, but I have that board and its not bad for the price really. Matter of fact I was thinking of getting this CPU to use in said board lol.

the ECS is bad theme, has been going on since they did a really horrible job on the ECS k7s5a during the socket A days.

Outside of that I can't really say they are any worse than any other company.

It is just that they sell A LOT of boards especially through frys and ECS has over the years used more VIA / SIS chipsets, which made a lot of people complain a lot.


I have used a lot of their boards from frys deals, and i think mostly people complained that they had chipset problems and some terrible problems with failures maybe 6-7 years ago. of course that just persists forever on message boards even though I would say the last 5-6 years you cant really say they have been any worse than say foxconn, or biostar, zotac, abit and any of the 2nd tier guys.

When I was building my computer and doing my research in 2002, they were the manufacturer to avoid.
ECS, Chaintech, and Foxconn.

 

[Darkrage]

Originally posted by: Engineer

Originally posted by: Darkrage

Originally posted by: Lothar
Doesn't ECS make crappy boards?

I have heard, but I have that board and its not bad for the price really. Matter of fact I was thinking of getting this CPU to use in said board lol.

You have no issues? Hell, I actually thought about getting the 620 chip and undervolting and underclocking it to the 605e levels instead of waiting (and also paying a premium for the lower power 605e).

nope no issues, though its not in a rig atm using an asrock board in the main for xfire. used it for a good while only switch for the xfire.

 

[cubeless]

Originally posted by: Lothar

Originally posted by: hans007

Originally posted by: Darkrage

Originally posted by: Lothar
Doesn't ECS make crappy boards?

I have heard, but I have that board and its not bad for the price really. Matter of fact I was thinking of getting this CPU to use in said board lol.

the ECS is bad theme, has been going on since they did a really horrible job on the ECS k7s5a during the socket A days.

Outside of that I can't really say they are any worse than any other company.

It is just that they sell A LOT of boards especially through frys and ECS has over the years used more VIA / SIS chipsets, which made a lot of people complain a lot.


I have used a lot of their boards from frys deals, and i think mostly people complained that they had chipset problems and some terrible problems with failures maybe 6-7 years ago. of course that just persists forever on message boards even though I would say the last 5-6 years you cant really say they have been any worse than say foxconn, or biostar, zotac, abit and any of the 2nd tier guys.

When I was building my computer and doing my research in 2002, they were the manufacturer to avoid.
ECS, Chaintech, and Foxconn.

ecs got tarred, imho, but a lot of dumbasses f'ing up thinking they could build their own pc because they read about other people doing it and/or expecting that any mobo should be able to oc a chip 100%... i've built dozens of pc's with ecs boards (at least a dozen k7s5a of which half a dozen are still running, i have one i'll sell you if you want) and had one oob failure... they are oem class, very economical boards... not enthusiast boards...

the good thing is that this chip for $100 brings solid quad perf to the low end... spend a couple extra bucks on a known oc'able mobo (the ones in cheap fry's combos are not) and you have a bargain runner...

but you still could get better perf in most current games by getting a e6300 and a p45 mobo and ddr2 and oc'ing to 3.6+ghz...

if you really can use a quad this is a better deal (especially when oc'd), tho...

 

[frostedflakes]

Originally posted by: cubeless
ecs got tarred, imho, but a lot of dumbasses f'ing up thinking they could build their own pc because they read about other people doing it and/or expecting that any mobo should be able to oc a chip 100%... i've built dozens of pc's with ecs boards (at least a dozen k7s5a of which half a dozen are still running, i have one i'll sell you if you want) and had one oob failure... they are oem class, very economical boards... not enthusiast boards...

the good thing is that this chip for $100 brings solid quad perf to the low end... spend a couple extra bucks on a known oc'able mobo (the ones in cheap fry's combos are not) and you have a bargain runner...

but you still could get better perf in most current games by getting a e6300 and a p45 mobo and ddr2 and oc'ing to 3.6+ghz...

if you really can use a quad this is a better deal (especially when oc'd), tho...

Exactly. They have a poor rep among enthusiasts because they're not really overclocking/tweaking boards, but if you just want something to run your CPU at stock settings, ECS is probably about as good as anything else out there.

 

[taltamir]

ECS were always terrible for me for running at stock settings. They had horrid compatibility issues and weird bugs that were never fixed. I used many over the years, when I started paying more for quality brands like asus or gigabyte i was amazed at how much better they are. I never looked back, it has been a few years now of the bliss of not having to spend days for every new board, finding every incompatibility and bug in the ECS board and working around it.

 

[frostedflakes]

My experience has been that even higher end boards have incompatibilities and quirks that you have to work around. Perhaps ECS is worse about this than other brands, though. I'll admit I haven't had much personal experience with them, but I haven't read a whole lot of bad stuff about them, or at least not much more negative feedback than you see for other brands.

 

[marcplante]

welll...I split the difference by buying an Asus Mobo and taking a flyer on an open box at newegg...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...?Item=N82E16813131366R

$47 off seemed like a decent deal, and if it's DOA, I can still get the refund. I'll just need to poke around all of the ports, etc. to make sure it's Ok.

Also got the CPU at Newegg since it was only $99, and I threw in 2x 2G RAM since I was already shopping (Very late BDay present. amazing what happens when you have that open cart staring at you). I like to have things at a single vendor if possible.

This CPU replaces my Athlon x2 4400+ that I just sold for $70. reasonably cost effective upgrade.

Now I just need to settle on a new HD. Really can't figure out how much to buy. I don't store games or movies on my PC. I offload to DVD, so I don't use a ton of drivespace.

I figure I'll bottom feed for a 500G drive

 

[jjmIII]

Originally posted by: marcplante
..This CPU replaces my Athlon x2 4400+ that I just sold for $70. reasonably cost effective upgrade...I figure I'll bottom feed for a 500G drive

Spend that $70

 

[sirelk]

I am getting the upgrade bug after reading Anand's article about the Athlon II X4 620.

I'd to keep the costs close to $400 to upgrade the following:

-memory (Should I go ddr3 or stick with ddr2? Any real performance differences at this level?)
-motherboard (790 looks nice, but maybe I don't need anything more than 780g?)
-cpu (Athlon II X4 620 all the way)
-graphics card (Egads! These things get hotter than my toaster! And they are all 20 feet long!)
-and possibly my case (this can wait if need be, depending on the cost of the rest)

I do some gaming (Crysis maybe? Since everyone talks about it) and I do photoshop, video editing, some autocad. I currently have a 24" 1900x1200 monitor so I'd like to take advantage of the realestate.

I'll be upgrading from an AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+, Nvidia 7600GS, 2 gig ddr2, MSI K9NBPM2-FID AM2 NVIDIA Quadro NVS 210S Micro ATX, and possibly changing this old ATX mid tower I got back in 2001 (ugly thing!).

Please share your input and advice. I am lost in a sea of options here.

edit: I should have put this in the hardware section. I forgot I was in HotDeals.

 

[marcplante]

I found enough hints in ths thread to make my decision. You're going to have to decide whether you're price sensitive which will drive you to the cheaper components mentioned. You also don't mention your HD. If you're not running a SATA drive (I wasn't) you're going to need to budget to buy one too. The $70 option above is nice. i just bought it.

All totaled I spent $340 on

AMD 620 quad CPU
ASUS MB
2 x 2G RAM
500 GB WD HD with 32MB cache.

I also recovered $70 by selling my old CPU, and may be able to salvage a bit more for the RAM.

Consider an 8800GT or 9600 GT as a sub $100 decent graphics card, and I think you're in your budget (though I bought an open box MB for $92).

Good luck

 

[sirelk]

Yeah. I'll admit it was a "lazy" post on my part. I am just inundated with all the choices out there. All these graphic cards, GT this and GTX that and so many different manufacturers. The motherboards are really confusing to me with AM2/AM2+/AM3, GX G FXT, etc...

There weren't all these standards when I built my first computer. The last pc I built, I was just trying to base my choices off consumer feedback on newegg, but now there's so many more options.

Just this spring I snapped up a Raptor 10,000 rpm Sata drive (74 gig) for around $50 on newegg and I will just stick with that for now and a slower 160gig drive to store larger files on. I'm holding out till SSD tech gets cheaper.

I'm more concerned about the motherboard than anything else. I don't want to skimp there.

It's been fun getting on and pricing things out and looking into all the reviews.

 

[soccerballtux]

soooo hottttttttttttttt

 

[Engineer]

Price lowered by about 7 bucks (to $99.00) but coupon is dead!

Edit: Well, you get get $5.00 off using SMILE5 so it's $94 - cashback (5%).

$89.05 after cashback and coupon (YMMV)! :Q

Looking better all the time!

 

[JSLIM]

SMILES code didn't work for me....... grrrrrrr

 

[Schmide]

Originally posted by: JSLIM
SMILES code didn't work for me....... grrrrrrr

Smile5 at ya wink wink