SDRAM Athlon XP boards?

[Jugernot]

I need to replace a mobo in a small webserver at work that had a PIII 500E with Abit BE6-II Raid board in it. I'd like to stick with the SDRAM in it though as I'd rather no have to buy all new ram for the server.

Anyway, all I can find is the ECS K7S5A (SiS 735) which has two 168 pins SDR and two 184 pin DDR slots. But I've heard this mobo is unstable in some circumstances. This server need to be stable, will NOT be overclocked and will never be under a lot of stress. I planned on putting a Athlon XP 1600+ in it.

Keep in mind, this server gets rebooted once every few months (Last reboot was 4 months ago, running RH 7.1) and it never really gets touched otherwise, it just sits down in the server room hosting a few websites.

You guys think this board would work ok in this application (stable)?

Thanks

EDIT: Just found a SHUTTLE AK32L (VIA KT266) board on newegg that looks pretty good with SDRAM slots. It's around the same price too..

 

[mechBgon]

You meant to say that the server will not be overclocked, right? The K7S5A is not desirable for most methods of overclocking. I had one, and found that its performance with SDRAM is good, however, and unless your board is a dud, it should be stable (barring other circumstances like damaged RAM, etc). I would also budget for a new power supply if the existing one is as old as the motherboard is, and especially considering you want to run an AthlonXP off of it. Sparkle Power 300W would be a good pick, and only $30 or so.

edit: another option would be a KM266-based board. KM266 is KT266A with the addition of onboard video. Some KM266 boards have SDRAM slots (Biostar makes one that does, one that doesn't).

 

[Jugernot]

Yes, will NOT be overclocked!

And yes, I'll be buying a new PS with it. These newer XP CPUs suck the juice from those old 300watt units too fast. As far as the KM266, it's definitely something think about. Adding onboard video is one less thing I'll have to worry about when it comes to compatiblity and switching out from the old system. But the mobo in question is $10 more than the K7S5A and has two less PCI slots... Not that I'd need more than 3 PCI slots because I'll be using one for the servers 3com server NIC.

Anyway, it's something to think about....

 

[Vette73]

Look for a KM266 board that uses Sdram. The KT266 chipset has some problems(but Shuttle made the best KT266 chipset)
But the KM266 is a KT266a chipset with a savage video card.

I think Shuttle and Ecs both have a KM266 board that takes Sdram

How many PCI slots do you need?? Most if not all KM266 boards have sound and Video on-board

 

[SuperSix]

Originally posted by: Marlin1975
Look for a KM266 board that uses Sdram. The KT266 chipset has some problems(but Shuttle made the best KT266 chipset)
But the KM266 is a KT266a chipset with a savage video card.

I think Shuttle and Ecs both have a KM266 board that takes Sdram

How many PCI slots do you need?? Most if not all KM266 boards have sound and Video on-board

Gigabyte offers one of these too, GA-7VKMLS...

Why not a Celeron 1.7 ~ 2.0?

If I found out my server guy used an ECS board for a server, I would fire him/stab him, not necc. in that order.

 

[Jugernot]

Heheh, well this just a little server where we host our own company websites. Our clients get put on the Dell Poweredge 2500's and Quad CPU Compaq Prolient servers.

As for why not a P4? Price... I don't have a whole lot left in my budget for the year and I'm looking at $160 total for 1600+ XP, Shuttle AK32L, and a 300 watt Antec Power supply. I can barely get a cheapo P4 board and a Celeron 1.7GHz for that...

 

[Tequila]

If you can live with SDR sdram only then the MSI K7T Turbo2 is a nice board and can be bought for $70-80 at various dealers. It has 5pci slots, 3 DIMMS for a total of 1.5GB of memory. I'm very happy with mine. The layout is excellent except for the AGP slot which is annoying because an AGP card willl extend right next to the DIMM slots which means you have to remove the AGP card before you can add/remove DIMMS.

 

[kmmatney]

I've recently built 2 systems using the BIOSTAR M7VKQ bought from NewEgg. I specifically needed these boards for the ISA slot, but I'm pleasantly surprised by how reliable they've been. These systems are running Athlon 1800 XPs.

 

[Kazuo]

My KT133A board works fine (ECS K7VZA 3.0) with AthlonXP processors.
Most KT133A boards do and they can be had for next to nothing these days, I'd bet.
I know I'd sell mine
The K7S5A should probably be OK for most uses. It's AMD approved!
I dunno. I'd definitely trade my board for a K7S5A any day. It's got the onboard ethernet, DDR and SDRAM... and with the newer BIOS updates it's gotten reasonably stable.
Definitely not an overclocking motherboard though, even with the CheepoBIOS.
Personally, I'd look for a KT133A board because it's probably still the most mature SDRAM-only chipset. And if you find them they're probably inexpensive enough. Otherwise go the whole hog into DDR.

 

[The Grim Reaper]

You could also go for Soltek 75-KAV....I've got one with 384 MB PC133 ram and an Athlon XP 1800 and it works like a charm...the most stable system I've ever had...

I've also had another soltek motherboard before in the good old amd k4 days, and it was just as stable

So my recommendation goes to Soltek 75-KAV

 

[alm4rr]

check out the MSI turbo w/ kt133a....