9 Apr
2006
9 Apr
'06
11:43 a.m.
BJaY escribe:
I've just managed to lay my hands on enough cash
to upgrade to a decent
computer for audio, and I haven't got a clue as to which motherboard to go
for. I'm thinking of AMD64 3700+1Gig RAM (I use big sound fonts). I'm a
little confused by the motherboard blurb, there seem to be loads of boards
with similar specs but very different prices. If anyone could help with the
following questions I'd be grateful (sorry if some of them are a bit OT):
I'd stick to Asus, whichever model you take you can't get a better
mobo IMHO.
Is integrated graphics still bad ? Will I run into
driver availability
problems if I'm stuck with O/B graphics ? Will memory bandwidth be a problem
?
Well, I'm a kind of a late adopter guy who always looks for more or
less old Matrox MGA adapters when building a computer. Their display
quality and stability can't be beaten. I'm not a fellowed 3D user.
Do I want to pay extra for SATA 2 ?
Well, the faster the disk I/O the better, I guess...
Is AMD still better for Audio ? I'll be using
loads of LADSPA effects. Is
there a value for AMD's advantage with the De-Norm problems ?
AMD mobos are right now good enough for audio, which didn't use to
be. I'd stick to AMD for a homebuilt system. Better prices, very high
performance.
Is processor cache size an issue for digital audio ?
Do I need to go for the
processors with larger cache's ?
Yes it's as far as I know but I never have a look at that spec!
Is NFORCE4 chipset OK now ? It seems to be on alot of
the cheap
motherboards.
I don't know and also would like to know.
Can I still use my old ATI Rage Pro AGP on the new
motherboards with AGP x4
and x8, is there a bandwidth penalty anywhere for using an older card ?
Yes you can. As far as AGP is a separate PCI bus you shouldn't
notice. You can even in most cases disable IRQ for your AGP bus and
save it for a PCI card.
Of course I'd like to be corrected if I'm misunderstanding something.
Cordially, Ismael
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