Can you put SD ram into a DDR ram motherboard? Upgrading m/b and graphics card.

[jester3012]

Have just got GTA3 and find my PC slows down a lot, so I thought I would upgrade my graphics card. Sounded easy, currently got GA-71EX4 m/b, athlon 1.1Ghz, geforce 2 mx. Was about to buy a geforce 3 ti500, but thanks to this board (I think it was Arris) I have found my m/b will only support up to a geforce mx. So it looks like a new m/b as well.

Question is can I take my 640 Mb of SD ram and slip it into a motherboard that supports DDR ram?

Also a lot of the m/boards I have looked at seem to have onboard graphics and sound. If I am going to be putting in a new graphics card and my old soundblaster live value do I need the onboard stuff, is it not adding to the cost of my m/b?

Can anyone recommend a good card for gaming, which is not expensive as a geforce 3 is already going to cost me about £175.

Thanks in advance.

Jester

 

[Rick]

SDRAM will NOT fit in a DDR board. There are certain boards out there that have dedicated DIMMs to both DDR and SDR, but you cannot mix the two under any circumstances. I would also advise against getting on of these "hybrids" because SDR is out of date... But this might be a cheap alternative. I'd hate to see you stuck with a board you'll have to upgrade soon again though.

Keep in mind, if you have 640mb of memory, it is probably in a 256mb/256/mb/128mb configuration and hybrids have (at most) two SDR DIMMs and 2 DDR DIMMs. If you are using 512/128, that works out well. If you are using 128/128/256/128, then that's even worse.

If you buy a hybrid, you will only be able to use two of your memory modules. A notceable performance hit will occur as well from using dated SDR, but all in all, it should work fine and if you do not have the money for DDR ($43 = 256mb), then it might the right choice for you.


You will not NEED onboard graphics and sound unless you really want them. The onboard graphics and sound usually raise the cost of the board. Since most people who are interested in integrated motherboards use the onboard stuff, they save money by not buying the "real thing" so to speak. This is probably not you and you should avoid integrated motherboards... But if you find a good deal on something that has integrated LAN or audio, it's no biggie. You do not have to use it. You can always use your own hardware instead.


The main requirement for a good graphics card is DDR memory. So don't buy antyhing using SDR memory.

Some good buys might be an ATI Radeon DDR or Geforce 2 MX DDR for the extreme gamer's budget - $40-60 USD range...

A Geforce 4MX and Geforce 2ti 450 or so would comprise the next price group... You should be able to get one of these for about $70-100 or so.

Anything above would probably include Geforce 3's and whatnot. To give you an idea, my ATI Radeon 64mb DDR is decent for gaming, but not great. It plays just about every game out right now very smoothly at 1024x768. In very rare circumstances, I have to turn it down to 800x600 (nothing new drivers usually won't fix. hehe)

You won't be breaking any speed barriers, but any of the budget cards listed should be more than sufficient if you are a casual gamer.

 

[jester3012]

Thanks Rick

I am going to go for the Asus A7A266-E, it supports 3 sd slots and 2 ddr slots. Your right I have 2*256 chips and a 128Mb chip. Add to that an Inno3d geforce 3 Ti500 64Mb DDR graphic card for a grand total of £190.

My next lame question is, how easy will it be to remove my CPU from old motherboard and install in my new one?

Thanks

Chris

 

[Rick]

Originally posted by jester3012
My next lame question is, how easy will it be to remove my CPU from old motherboard and install in my new one?

Thanks

Chris

It should be a piece of cake. It slides right out and slides right back in. in order to take it out, you'll have to pull a lever on the side.. It's a "realease" mechnism.

Once you have it out of the old board, you can pop it into your new board just by sliding it in. Make sure the lever on the new board is up before putting it on there though, otherwise it won't go all the way in. Once you drop it, push the lever down until it is tight.. Simple stuff.

What might NOT be so simple is putting a heatsink snuggly on. Most clipping mechanisms require a lot of force to set in place (at least 20lbs of force), so be prepared to struggle a bit.

The standard socket A clips can be pretty poorly setup, making it very possible to jab your motherboard with a screw driver or whatnot. If you are not experienced with clamping your heatink/processor down, I suggest you place a slice of sturdy plastic or rubber and place it inbetween the clipping mechnanism and the motherboard. That way, if your screw driver (or whatever you'll be using) slips, you'll have some extra protection.

 

[Arris]

You might have a bit of a fight with the CPU clip as Rick says but the switching over of the CPU should be easy enough. Try to leave the heatsink attached. Often if the Heatsink has been attached well with a nice layer of Artic silver or other thermal compound then it should stay stuck to the CPU. You can then just drop it into the new board and on boot up it the board will detect the CPU and set up the clock multiplier automatically. As the helpful bloke Rick said "Piece of cake"...

GA-7IXE4.... *shivers*

 

[Paolo]

can you put DDR ram into an SD RAM mother board???

 

[Didou]

No, you cannot.