Palomina and current mobo's

[vickertj]

Hi there!
I am considering purchasing an Asus A7M266 mobo, along with a 1GHz Athlon (a significant upgrade for me...), but I want to make sure I have a lot of good upgrade options for the future. My question to you techie experts is will this motherboard probably support Palomino processors being released later this year? If not, I'd like to wait, but it seems like I'm always just waiting for the next big advancement before purchasing something. I'd love to get a mobo and a 1GHz athlon, and have the option of upgrading to something like 2GHz in a year or so, without having to drop $ on another mobo, and I'll likely wait if that won't be an option.
Thanks a ton,
Tim

 

[Jwyatt]

Well, I have read NO articles stating it will not support the new chips. Some say probably, but most say for sure. You could check AMDs site to see if there is anything about it there.

 

[johnsonsjohnson]

Ok i have another question for you. I am a complete computer idiot and I dont understand a lot of this, but if I am to get a Micron 1.4 or 1.5 ghz T-bird (which I htink will come out soon?) w/512+ megs (or whatever the maximum will be) of RAM can i possibly upgrade to Palomino and can I upgrade my RAM? Thanks a lot

 

[Swanny]

As far as I know your MB will work fine with the Palomino. AMD says it will use the same socket, and there will be no major archetechural changes. Every site I have seen says it will work fine with current mobos.

 

[JimMc]

At the least, the MB will require a BIOS update to supply the correct voltage, so bear that in mind when selecting your MB manufacturer. Anyone with a track record of frequent BIOS updates would be a safe bet.

 

[Wingznut]

Be careful though... Many OEM's use proprietary motherboards, which have no available BIOS updates.

 

[Wrawrat]

vickertj, it depends if AMD decides to change the pinout of the Palomino (like the P4 Northwood compared to the P4 Willamette)... If they change the Socket-A to something like Socket-A2, well, just too bad, all current motherboards will be obsolete. However, if AMD will do only a CORE upgrade, there is good chances that only a BIOS upgrade will fix that on the best boards. I doubt that AMD will change the pinout because they are doing some testing with the Palomino and I didn't heard about a new socket change...

 

[AdamK47]

If you check the manual on the A7M266 it says it's rated at CPUs up to 1666MHz. I think thats based on the 12.5X multiplier being the limit. I'm sure the A7M266 can go higher with the multiplier remapping on future chips.