Skip to main content

Was almost swayed over to the AMD side & the Asus A7V333 w/the Via KT333. Seems to have a lot of problems now.

Then I thought I'd go the P4 route - but the mobo I thought was best is now getting hammered on another thread.

Plz help this rookie! Mackie 24/4 into Layla into Sonar/Cool Edit Pro - running on XP Home (or 2000?)

What is THE killer P4/Mobo combo that will take the highest ram, (not RDRam)?...thx, kpl

Topic Tags

Comments

Opus2000 Wed, 07/24/2002 - 08:48

damn good question....as of now I thinking we are all asking the same question..
You can go AMD just don't go the Via or Ali route...the AMD chipsets seem to be doing well..now if you were using RME stuff it doesn't matter what chipset you use as those are stable cards..most other cards are pretty finicky as to what they are set with...especially the Echo stuff...Via, Sis, Ali and Nvidia are not good choices....Intel all the way for them..
The Asus P4B266 is a slammin board..only has a 400Mhz FSB(geez...did I just say that :p
Opus

anonymous Wed, 07/24/2002 - 17:17

Cooknpt,

I think at some point we all need to take a risk as no system is gonna be 100 percent foolproof. The Mobo you refered to as being hammered is the P4B533-V with the intel 845G chipset, I am assuming. It is the same one I got spooked over because of that thread( thanks opus!! hehe jk - it is a potential problem and full points to opus for picking it up). Having said this I have heard other users having no probs thus far, so I have bitten the bullet and ordered that Mobo, cause it seems like the only choice for me at the moment. My decision is out of desperation as I have a big project coming up, but it will be conforting to know our old machine will be on standby if there is any probs. My hunch tells me things will be ok, but will let everyone know in a week how it is performing. :)

Later
deedub

anonymous Mon, 07/29/2002 - 11:14

I went with the Asus P4B533 board...

After some intial driver complications, everything is running very well. The Intel and USB drivers supplied with the board DO NOT work well and you have to install 3 files in a very specific order or else you basically have to do a clean install all over again!

I didn't do this properly and for a couple weeks I'd get random USB problems on boot-up and shortly after... I thought it was a big mistake getting this board. As most times, it turns out user error and improper installation was the problem. Duh!

I'm happy to report this board is VERY good.

I think DDR333 and specifically a new chipset by by SiS, the 648 supporting DDR400 are going to be the new standards. This 648 chipset is benching some serious marks and seems to be a "killer" in most regards (even PCI bandwidth).

Only Rambus 1066 is beating the marks by DDR400 and only by a VERY small margin!

I bought DDR333 even though my board only supports 266 so if a really nice "offical" 333 solution comes out in the near future, I can switch over easily.

Setup:

-------------------------------------
Asus P4B533
Intel 2.4 (533)
1gb Corsair XMS DDR33 CAS 2.0
2x WD 120JB Drives
Nvidia 32mb Geforce2
Sony CRX1610 cdrw
Linksys NIC

Creamware Pulsar II
Steinberg Midex8

WinXP Pro

AMS gTower Case
Anatech 380W PSU

Cubase SX

-------------------------------------

Everything is running like a champ and I'm a very happy camper!

anonymous Mon, 07/29/2002 - 14:14

For the most part, the Creamware card is pretty good... I gave up a Yamaha 02r to mix completely in the digital realm.

I mostly use the Creamware card as i/o into SX where I mix there. The synths on the Pulsar platform are very nice!

I used to have about a $25k project studio, sold almost all of it off, except for an Alesis Andromeda and a Virus-B (which I love them and won't part with them) to go the mostly virtual route. In a nut shell, I'm completely happy!

I don't have a hardware mixer at all, I route everything straight into the soundcard. I'd like to add a Mackie Control surface once support is added to SX. I don't miss the mess of cables, endless sysex dumps and storage backups at all. Complete recall when I load SX and SFP (scope fusion platfrom [creamware OS]) totally recalling every setting and parameter is a dream.

Now having said this, all software has some bugs... creamware being no exception. But once you learn to live and work around these limitations, it's really quite good. It isn't perfect, but I dig it and don't find anything I really freak out over. It's constantly improving on every release...

Creamware completely replaced my need for any external mixers, samplers, and many multi-fx units. I don't mind living in the virtual world, but your preferences may vary.

I don't think this route is for everyone, but for me, it's been great.

Once I add a UAD-1 for dynamics and EQ, I doubt I'll have a reason to buy external hardware, if any, for many years to come.

- sinix