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Athlon Motherboards?
cale writes "Ok, so every vendor on the net will let you preorder one of these Athlon puppies, but has anyone seen any motherboards as of yet? I am looking to upgrade my aging K6 (original) to something with a bit more juice, and I have chosen the Athlon, except for the problem that I just can't find any motherboards for it. So if someone could steer me in the right direction that would be great." They aren't out quite yet, but my understanding is that they are on their way. What do you all think of this new technology?
Abit better do a freakin' motherboard or im gonna go cry.. without abit i cant build a computer i just rely on their boards so much.. SO IF ANYONE FROM ABIT SEES THIS GET YOUR ARSE IN GEAR AND GET AN AMD750 MOBO OUT BY XMAS.. hehe sorry to use the caps but im very concerned i love abit.. AJ
... I see these users every day, they aren't total idiots, but they aren't Nerds, and they just aren't prepared to accept the fact that despite the reality that Slot A will plug into the Slot 1 socket, the components won't work - period!
You CANNOT plug a Slot 1 processor (with heatsink) into a Slot A motherboard (I really hate the term "mobo").
The connectors ARE the same but are physically reversed on the motherboards.
Ummm.... The Alot A CANNOT be electrically compatible because it is using the EV6 bus.... What you're suggesting woul be to get a BX chipset to support older socket 7 chips.. Just won't happen... With that in mind, why not go slot? One thing it does offer is an abundance of Good cooling solutions due to the fact that it is physically compatible with the P2's (which have the BEST cooling solutions on the market). I dig the idea, as it means that this mega hot chip (which I hear it is) will now have some VERY effective cooling solutions available at a good price. AMD had to come up with a form factor for it.. it made sense to use the same physical implementations as the p2 because it will make part more widely available and cheaper. As for a socket 7 design.. not enough pins I'd bet, and also the cooling solutions are just not beefy enough.
Funny thing is Socket7 (321) has more pins than either SlotA or Slot1 (which both have 200 & something). The only reason Intel introduced an extra row of pins on their Sockets (370), was just so they could stop VIA or ALI etc, from introducing a switchable dublex bus/chipset, which whould be compatable with both socket7 & socket 370.
Why? Your question is irrelevant to the question of why AMD moved to Slot A over Socket 7. I don't care why Intel moved to Slot 1. I do know that the Athlon couldn't possibly be made to work on Socket 7 motherboards. Do you even know what EV6 is? If not, shut up or go post elsewhere about something you have a clue about.
AMD moved away from Socket 7 precisely for the "new and better technology" reasons you're so quick to dismiss, although technically it's not new -- the Alpha has been using it for some time. Why a slot rather than a new type of socket? Well, if you're going to change anyways, who cares? If it ain't Socket 7, it might as well be either a socket or slot. Slots are nice in that you have less of a problem with bent pins, and although ZIF sockets are supposed to solve that, chips can still be damaged while not being installed. More importantly, since it makes no real difference either way, but many consumers find slots easier, why NOT a new slot type?
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"Convictions are more dangerous enemies of truth than lies."
Possibly K7 mobos will be available in mid-late August for DIY channel. Check out JC's excellent K7 motherlode.
Queens of the Stone Age - they rule
AMD has a list of reccomended motherboards for the K7 (sorry AMD, but I hate the name "Athlon"). The list includes models by FIC, Gigabye, and Microstar.
Dysprosium
Actually they did it for price reasons too. By making the slot physically compatible w/ slot 1 mb manufacturers could purchase the same parts they used for slot 1 and save a little money.
-matt
Slot A also cannot be electrically compatible w/ Slot 1 because intel has a patent on slot 1 that would be violated if AMD made them electrically compatible.
-matt
Great, another Socket/Slot configuration to give users the shits! One of the strengths of the old Socket 7 setup was it's great flexibility - you had a handful of choices of CPU which could be applied to virtually any S7 Board - then along comes Intel with Slot 1 - effectively locking the consumer into it's product once you had the S1 board.
Now AMD has waded into the same waters and come up with this new Slot A - which looks identical, and is physically compatible with Intel's Slot 1, yet not electrically compatible! But the same problem exists - limited choice for users, not to mention confusion - not all of us are so technically up to date so as to know that these two very similar looking components are totally incompatible - believe me, I see these users every day, they aren't total idiots, but they aren't Nerds, and they just aren't prepared to accept the fact that despite the reality that Slot A will plug into the Slot 1 socket, the components won't work - period!
And before anyone starts up with the "New and Better Technology" cry - ask yourselves what the big advantage was with Slot 1, and why when it was fiscally expedient for Intel they forgot all about it for the Celeron Series and went for Socket 370? Just because they flip the CPU on it's side and mount it on a PCB with a couple of Cache RAM chips (maybe!) doesn't alter the internal architecture, which is really the bread and butter of the Processor, and in great part, the system. They proved that themselves with the performance of the Socket 370 systems, not to mention the ready availability of those SlotKet Converters - if the Slot 1 form factor was so advanced, they surely should not have been so easy to create, or implement, or been so successful.
Bottom line, it's all about getting back to Proprietary Hardware for the sake of greed, don't let them fool you, it logically can't be about anything else, can it?
AMD moved their new microprocessor to the slot A architecture for several reasons, most of them technical. Did you even read the white papers? The new procs run on a 200mhz system bus inheirited from the Alpha, support up to 8MB of L2 cache, and can [in the future] be scaled upwards of 16 processors to a single board (DAMN, that machine would cook!). Another interesting possibility, which I'm not sure is actually doable, is buying a multiple-proc slot A motherboard and slapping some Alphas in it (same slot/bus, remember?). I guess if you ignore all of this, there isn't a reason that AMD switched to the slot A architecture. IOW: Shut the hell up and know what you're talking about before you shoot your mouth off again.
Who knows if this will help you. I saw a banner advertising them over at tomshardware.com. Look at their Athlon review, and keep reloading until you see the banner.
Think of the possibilities for multiprocessor boxes! Biathlon, Pentathlon, or the mighty Decathlon!
If somebody made a three processor box, they could call it the ironman!
Vidi, Vici, Veni