SOLVED Asus A7A 266 DDR/SDR

[jb]

I was interested in new mobo and I noticed this one has memory slots for both DDR and SDRAM. I was wondering if anyone thinks its worth buying a new mobo with the SDRAM dimm slots?

Its my understanding that DDR is better than SDR any opinions on the pro's/con's in these two memory platforms?

I was thinking it would be better to buy a mobo that supported only DDR memory so it could dedicate more dimm slots for this? What do you think?

Thanx all

 

[Silver.C.]

Heya, I was looking into buying a new board as well (im building a new system) and I ran across the A7A266 as well. For the most part I have gathered that it is a good board. Though on the otherhand you can not overclock it very well and you can get faster. In addition to this it has the Ali Magik 1 chipset which leaves alot/some (depending on how you look at it) to be desired. I was about to get that board but I then ran into the Epox EP-8K7A+. That has both AMD and VIA chipsets for north and southbridge. It is a very fasy, very relyable, and a pretty darn overclockable mobo.

As far as DDR/SDR Ram, when you said that DDR is better than SDR Ram that was a huge understatement. When it comes to the A7A266 yuo cant run SDR and the DDR at the same time so it is pointless to even have the SDR DIMMs on the board at all. This is based upon the fact that you will most likely be getting DDR Ram. Hell, its dirt cheap (pricewatch.com)

Ok, thats my little bit. Have a good one.

 

[killem1x1]

I have had the A7A for about a month now. It has been an easy board to work with except for one thing:
1. The multiplier can't be changed "outta the box" unelss it has "10 dip switch settings rather than 4"

I have seen posts where people have soldered a jumper on #10, updated the BIOS to # 1005, and stated they could change the mult no prob, but there is also another post a few up from this one regarding the same issue with the multiplier

 

[Vryce]

I have the a7a too, and its a good board, however..I would recommend not getting one with both ddr and sdr....

*is waiting for nForce*

 

[supraway]

Funny thing. Had a problematic computer come to me with an Asus A7A motherboard in it (freezing problems). Worked on it for like 2 days, replaced every part, and finally decided to take out the DDR and put in SDRAM. It stopped locking up. We had tried 3 different types of DDR ram to no avail.

 

[bdf24]

Well I'm running one with Sdram. It's very stable and very fast!

 

[BC]

supraway (Jul 18, 2001 01:13 p.m.):
Funny thing. Had a problematic computer come to me with an Asus A7A motherboard in it (freezing problems). Worked on it for like 2 days, replaced every part, and finally decided to take out the DDR and put in SDRAM. It stopped locking up. We had tried 3 different types of DDR ram to no avail.

I had the same problem, all kinds of lockups (including DDHELP locks), lag spikes with net card, not being able to shut down, etc. I've heard of several of these problems recurring with others trying to use this board. The one thing I've been told and has cleared up absolutely every problem for me was to flash to the 1005 beta 5 BIOS. THis bios is easily available at the German Asus site, but I've heard you can also find it at the USA site if you rummage around in the Beta bios bin. German has it labeled though so you can be sure what you are getting.