DDR memory questions

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Good people,

Last weekend I bought a new Gigabyte MB with 1.4GHz Athlon 266 for a very reasonable price. I have 256MB (2×128) PC100 which suits me fine for the moment, and I realised it would hold back the CPU from running at full speed. As it turns out I get 1050 MHz in standard mode and this can be o/clocked to ~1150MHz using the EasyTune utility that came with the board. Everything works fine and I am very impressed.

Also available at the shop was an Asus (I think) board that was DDR-capable providing two slots (I think) as well as being able to cope with my PC100.

Now the questions:
– Would it have been wiser to get the similar-spec slightly more expensive Asus board with a view to buying maybe 256MB+ DDR as a next RAM upgrade in the future? (ditching the PC100 in the process).

– Would having DDR and the 1.4GHz Athlon 266 give it the capability to exceed 1.4GHz without drastic overclocking, i.e. in the same way that installing PC133 in place of PC100 would take it from 1.05 to 1.4GHz?

– I have until Sunday 7th to take advantage of the supplier’s 7-day money back guarantee. Would it be a wise option to return the Gigabyte board and exchange it for the Asus rather than face the possibility of another serious upgrade (mb/RAM/CPU) next time I want to move my technology along?

Hope some of this makes sense. Please reply if more clarification of the above is needed.

Tks.

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Thanks for the reply, Ian. I wish I had paid more attention to the Asus mb model number – I’ve had a look on their site for one that has both SDRAM and DDR capability but no luck so far. The slots have different numbers of pins, don’t they? So it wouldn’t be a case of using the same slots for different types of sticks, then the board detects the difference, would it?? Am I getting distant now? I could call the supplier but this is a crowded office, if you know what I mean. I’m presuming I saw right and didn’t imagine it…

Tks again.

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Ian,

Got it! My my, what a peach it is. A7A266 with either 2xDDR SDRAM to a max 2GB or 3xSDRAM to a max of 3GB, 200/266MHz FSB, full support for Athlon 1.4GHz, woof woof woof. (Sorry, but I’ve been a K6-2 user for the past year).

No quibbles from the supplier about the return. I just explained that with hindsight it makes more sense for me to go for the Asus board over the Gigabyte (which in itself seemed a perfectly reasonable board for the four days I had it).

Another BIG plus with Asus though is that the user manual is in real english. It reads smoothly, unlike the Gigabyte which is in ‘translated english’. OK fair enough they’re both Taiwanese companies, but I also like the explanations behind some of the BIOS settings giving details of exactly what the function behind the setting is rather than just whether it is enabled by default or not.

Now all I’ve got to do is find something in my day-to-day PC usage that can test this thing to it’s limit. This may take some time.

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