[NTLUG:Discuss] Athlon incompatibilities?

[Greg Edwards]

eb110 at attglobal.net wrote:
> 
> I'm thinking of building a system with the AMD Athlon
> Thunderbird 1GHz CPU. This will be the first time I'll
> move out of Intel Inside land.
> 
> My main concern is software compatibility: Apparently,
> most software should work fine but there are stories of
> incompatibilities, e.g. StarOffice 5.2 was available only
> for x86 machines, some PC games are limited to Intel
> architecture, etc.
> 
> Any real life encounters with Athlon incompatible software
> (Windows and Linux) that people have run into? Also, tips
> from anyone who has recently built a similar system will
> also be appreciated.
> Sameer
> 
> _______________________________________________
> http://ntlug.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss

I've built 2 Athlon 650 boxes w/o any probs.  Some people have trouble
with ram cause cheap ram gets flaky.  I always use Crucial
(www.crucial.com) ECC ram and I've never had a problem with any sticks
I've gotten from them.  Make sure that you get an AMD approved power
supply 300w or better.  Also get 2 fans, 1 front 1 back, since these
need the air flow.  One of my systems I did with 1 fan and the 2nd with
2 fans.  The 2 fan system runs with a MB temp 12 deg cooler.  Both of my
systems are ASUS K7V motherboards and I can't say anything bad about
them.  Both are running with Ultra66 HD and 4x AGP.  I get 1297 bogomips
with safe bus clock settings.

I haven't found any Linux software that won't run.  I only run non games
for Windows cause I run VMware instead of dual boot.  My kids really
like Hero III and Civilization II - Call to Power (both for Linux) on
the box I have at the house:)

-- 
Greg Edwards
New Age Software, Inc.
http://www.nas-inet.com