OT: DDR Memory motherboard accept SDRAM?

You will in all likelihood be SOL with your RAM. Athlon boards tend to have a LOT of thermal issues. Get an oversized heat sink and fan, and install supplemental case fans. Or just buy an Intel setup and forget it. The Athlon is a bit faster for the same clock speed, but generally you pay for it in reliability. Been a bugaboo with AMD since the early years.

There are still boards available that take sdram and work with socket A cpu.

The ECS K7S5A comes to mind :

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Also, you might wanna look at the Biostar M7VIW :

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Well, I'd say that's quite a generalization. You're right about the past, but Intel is having issues with its newest processors.

I've got a Athlon XP 2500+ (1800MHz) and never had any issues with stability at all in the ~year I've had it (of the 1GHZ Athlon that I had before it).

JR, you may be able to find a board that accepts both SD and DDR RAM, although you'll likely only get two slots of either. And of course, you cannot use both types simultaneously.

Regards,

Robin

And you might upgrade to a DDR motherboard and DDR memory and sell your SDRAM memory.

Hugh

Have you checked to be certain that the CPU cooling fan is operating properly? If in doubt replace with a high performance unit.

A less frequent problem is when the case cooling fans aren't operating properly. Cool air must be flowing through the case for the CPU cooler to operate properly.

DDR and SDR (both are SDRAM) modules are mechanically incompatible because the latter have 2 notches in their edge connectors while the former have only 1, and it's in a slightly different position. Also DDR and SDR signals are different, as are their voltages -- 2.5V and

3.3V, respectively.

The SiS 645 and many VIA VT266/333/400 sets support both DDR and SDR, but they can use only one type of memory at a time because of signal and voltage incompatibilities, and many motherboards have sockets for only DDR modules. The most famous boards using the SiS 645 are the K7S5A and K7S5A Pro, and you definitely want the Pro version to avoid the design flaws of the K7S5A (see

and ), which include memory compatibility problems and CMOS memory amnesia.

Your motherboard may simply have bad electrolytic capacitors in its voltage regulator circuit because it may be of the age when many faulty electrolytics were manufactured. These aren't normal caps but low ESR types made for high frequency switching operation (do not substitute ordinary electrolytics, not even those rated for 105 Celcius) and may look different than the other caps on the board. There are usually 4-10 of them, located around the large transistors and diodes and the toroid chokes, and it's possible that some are bulging or leaking on top (see pictures at

although faulty caps often look perfectly normal. and sell good Japanese brand replacements. Watch not only the voltage and capacitance ratings but also the mechanical fit because motherboards rarely have room for even slightly larger diameter caps. When desoldering, realize that 4-6 layer circuit boards absorb much more heat than 2-layer boards, and these caps are soldered to the internal copper layers that absorb the most heat.

Look at the motherboard. The DIMMs are Keyed and the Sockets are much different with keys and shape.

Some motherboards on early versions - had two SDRAM slots and two DDRDRAM slots. Those are often only the server grade computer - not home models.

Good luck - but it looks dim to me :-)

Martin

My roomies and I have been running the K7S5A MB for about 2+ years now. No problems with the board at all.

Asus A7A266 boards will accept both types of memory.

RJ