AMD Opteron -vs- Athlon 64

[Parkeshub]

We got 2 x 512Mb sticks so I think the dual channel should work. Funny, the supplier was trying to convince me to go with PC2100....said it was more reliable. I said we wanted 400Mhz.

I wanted to go with the 64 bit Adaptec SCSI (29160?) but they wouldn't go the extra $$$. At least the mobo has 64 bit PCI slots and...if I can make the case....we could go that way in the future. Maybe also including a second CPU. Plus, there's Windows XP 64bit version at some point.

 

[LordOfAll]

If you got 2 cpus then you need 4 memory chips. each cpu uses its own memory. also 940 mothrboards are 6 or more layers and 939 are 4.

 

[iwantanewcomputer]

opterons are for socket 940, not 754/939
they have 1 meg cache, like the athlon 64 fx
they support multiple processors (150 is single, 250 is dual, 850 is up to 8)
i think all 940 boards require registered EEC RAM

 

[Boonesmi]

Originally posted by: Parkeshub
We got 2 x 512Mb sticks so I think the dual channel should work. Funny, the supplier was trying to convince me to go with PC2100....said it was more reliable. I said we wanted 400Mhz.

I wanted to go with the 64 bit Adaptec SCSI (29160?) but they wouldn't go the extra $$$. At least the mobo has 64 bit PCI slots and...if I can make the case....we could go that way in the future. Maybe also including a second CPU. Plus, there's Windows XP 64bit version at some point.

i think you were right to get pc3200. how many cpu's did you get? just a single 244? or a pair? if you just got 1 cpu then you will be fine with 2x512mb. if you have 2xcpu then you will need 4xdimms

 

[Markfw]

Originally posted by: Boonesmi

Originally posted by: Parkeshub
We got 2 x 512Mb sticks so I think the dual channel should work. Funny, the supplier was trying to convince me to go with PC2100....said it was more reliable. I said we wanted 400Mhz.

I wanted to go with the 64 bit Adaptec SCSI (29160?) but they wouldn't go the extra $$$. At least the mobo has 64 bit PCI slots and...if I can make the case....we could go that way in the future. Maybe also including a second CPU. Plus, there's Windows XP 64bit version at some point.

i think you were right to get pc3200. how many cpu's did you get? just a single 244? or a pair? if you just got 1 cpu then you will be fine with 2x512mb. if you have 2xcpu then you will need 4xdimms

The only problem is that I read that unless you have an Opteron 246 or higher, it will only run at PC2700 speed. But thats fine ! Maybe you will get a pair of 250's when they get cheap !

 

[Parkeshub]

Originally posted by: Markfw900

Originally posted by: Boonesmi

Originally posted by: Parkeshub
We got 2 x 512Mb sticks so I think the dual channel should work. Funny, the supplier was trying to convince me to go with PC2100....said it was more reliable. I said we wanted 400Mhz.

I wanted to go with the 64 bit Adaptec SCSI (29160?) but they wouldn't go the extra $$$. At least the mobo has 64 bit PCI slots and...if I can make the case....we could go that way in the future. Maybe also including a second CPU. Plus, there's Windows XP 64bit version at some point.

i think you were right to get pc3200. how many cpu's did you get? just a single 244? or a pair? if you just got 1 cpu then you will be fine with 2x512mb. if you have 2xcpu then you will need 4xdimms

The only problem is that I read that unless you have an Opteron 246 or higher, it will only run at PC2700 speed. But thats fine ! Maybe you will get a pair of 250's when they get cheap !

Just a single CPU at present. I'd have loved to go dual but my boss just wouldn't go that way. I figure that we can look at dual later on when 64bit Windows gets going. Interesting about the memory speeds, I guess my lack of experience with Opteron is showing....lucky you guys are here!!! Anyway, as you say, we can retain the memory if we go 250s one day.

I figure an upgrade path would also include 64bit SCSI and use the SATA drives elsewhere. I've got an Athlon XP 3200 with one SATA so I could use one more in there and stripe them. It's the machine that I run Office XP Developer on and it runs great! I'd expect the Opteron to be a fair bit quicker again but I've not seen any benchmarks comparing Athlon XP -vs- Opteron.

Actually, now that I think about it, we are an almost complete AMD user...we've got about 200 workstations with Duron 900s and 1300s and the servers are (almost) all Athlons. There are a few IBM workstations and servers including a RISC6000 but that's another story!

 

[Boonesmi]

Originally posted by: Markfw900

Originally posted by: Boonesmi

Originally posted by: Parkeshub
We got 2 x 512Mb sticks so I think the dual channel should work. Funny, the supplier was trying to convince me to go with PC2100....said it was more reliable. I said we wanted 400Mhz.

I wanted to go with the 64 bit Adaptec SCSI (29160?) but they wouldn't go the extra $$$. At least the mobo has 64 bit PCI slots and...if I can make the case....we could go that way in the future. Maybe also including a second CPU. Plus, there's Windows XP 64bit version at some point.

i think you were right to get pc3200. how many cpu's did you get? just a single 244? or a pair? if you just got 1 cpu then you will be fine with 2x512mb. if you have 2xcpu then you will need 4xdimms

The only problem is that I read that unless you have an Opteron 246 or higher, it will only run at PC2700 speed. But thats fine ! Maybe you will get a pair of 250's when they get cheap !

i have a dual opteron setup 244's and it runs the ram at pc3200 speed.... i think what confused you is that the fsb (or what passes as a fsb) is only 200mhz on the newer opterons, and 166mhz on the older ones

but any opteron (from the slowest to the fastest) is able to run the memory at pc2100, or pc2700, or pc3200, just depending on your mobo, and how it reads the spd on the memory itself

 

[Parkeshub]

I also "got got"! I ordered a standard ATX 450watt PSU not realising the Tyan requires a 24 pin + 8 pin connector PSU!!

I put it all together...then found out about the PSU problem. I guess that's one good thing working for a company. We just put the ATX one into repair stock to be kept for another time. The correct PSU should turn up tomorrow.

 

[Alptraum]

Originally posted by: effee
there isnt much diff for SCSI and SATA

Seems you have no idea what the two technologies do

 

[PumpActionWalrus]

Athlon 64 socket 754, 64 bit extensions, single hyper transport lane, short pipeline, integrated memory controller 64 bit width, uses DDR. Athlon 64 socket 939 64 bit extensions, single hyper transport lane, short pipeline, integrated memory controller 128 bit width, uses DDR. Opteron Socket 940 only, 64 bit extensions,up to three hyper transport lanes, short pipeline, integrated memory controller 128bit width, uses registered DDR, support of 4 physical socketed cpus.