My wheels are turning:
Take this board plus two of these CPUs armed with this information and you have dual for $285. Very tempting. Now, I started on this because someone on Anadtech forums says Fry's has that mobo for $125. That would bring the cost down to $231. If I had a Fry's near me, I would jump on this right away.

$285 isn't too much, but I would like opinions before buying that board. Anyone have anything to say about this combo? Thanks.

Well, the Thunder K7 kicked some ass, and still does. This looks pretty much like the same board, without all the perks of the K7. For a Cheap Dual Athlon computer, I'd say this board is allright.

If you're going all out, stick to the K7 or K7X.

That board says it has "four USB" ports, but it doesn't say if they are 1.1 or 2.0. Do you care if you have USB 2.0 support? I suppose you could always add a USB 2.0 card in a PCI slot if you do.

I also see that you are linking it to GoogleGear. They are like Walmart, they put the little guys out of business...

Googlegear has the board cheapest (of vendors I trust) outside of the Fry's deal. I don't care about USB 2.0 (right now).

In reply to:

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I also see that you are linking it to GoogleGear. They are like Walmart, they put the little guys out of business...

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While I can understand this argument for book and music stores, I have to wonder about it for computer stores... Googlegear sells commodity goods online and competes solely on price. Online, there isn't much more than that, and you don't get anything from ordering from a "mom&pop" operation compared to ordering from amazon.com. Does anyone have a good neighborhood computer store that they support because they provide added value?

Matthew

I also see that you are linking it to GoogleGear. They are like Walmart, they put the little guys out of business...

In the vein of full disclosure, aren't you one of said little guys? (I assume not one that they put out of business, but still a "competing vendor")

I'm not going to argue your point; I haven't really considered this in good enough detail to comment.

Well, I would have to disagree...

Some websites offer support forums that they maintain themselves, along with selling merchandise. I think there are different internet markets.

Some people would like to build systems going to 5-10 different websites and getting the best deal on each part. Some people like to stick with one retailer. Some people have more experiance than others putting components into a system. There are people who don't know how to add a stick of ram to their pc. I don't know if Googlegear has a FAQ section, help section, or has an email support team for people that may have a problem. A lot of people don't know the difference between a barebones component and a retail boxed component. If someone that needs a complete hard drive set up buys a barebones drive from Googlegear, they might get stuck because they don't have a cable, mouting screws, and hardware...

Some websites go out of their way to help customers and actually enjoy the fact that people are upgrading their computers. I have a feeling that these wholesale hardware shops (like googlegear) are pretty much concerned about the bottom line.

I guess there is a market for everthing on the internet, but the lowest price webstore isn't always the best for everyone...

"In the vein of full disclosure, aren't you one of said little guys?"

Are you asking if I have my own webstore? Yes, I do, why else would I be so hostile towards Googlegear and the like!

Googlegear isn't only going to put shops like mine out of business, my distributers can't even touch their prices.... Thats a bad sign...

If they wound up being the only online retailer (which isn't likely but you get the point), and have no one else to compete with... do you think the prices will always be so low? I don't...

Walmart is putting K-Mart out of business. Ames is going out of business and closing their doors. If there are no other stores for Walmart to "pricematch" against, I don't think they will maintain their cheap prices...

Yes, I do, why else would I be so hostile towards Googlegear and the like!

There are other reasons. I dislike Wal-Mart. That said, I think it's important for people to understand what your (anyone's, actually, but you get the idea) biases are when looking at your opinion.

Ames is going out of business and closing their doors.

We have a lot of Ames stores around here. There are actually 3 generations of them. First Zayre stores became Ames. They Murphy Mart stores did. Murphy Mart was a division of a local company which also had 5&10 stores, and those were sold to another company (McCrory of York, PA, now also bankrupt). Later, Hills stores became Ames.

My wife claims that Ames did themselves in with poor customer service. I will confess that I noticed it, but there was a different attitude in the former Hills stores as compared to the previous generations. This does perhaps say something was institutionalized, and hadn't yet become entrenched in all the new employees. I think this particular case isn't one you can point at. Ames kept buying, despite only recently having come out of their last bankruptcy. They already lost, never had a chance to recover, and dragged other things in and then down with them.

There are larger factors at work. We have a pile of Wal-Marts around. They're getting to the point where they compete with each other. Part of this is probably due to poor urban planning, and I don't expect to see improvement soon, sadly, either.

I'm sorry, but this has all been stuff that has faced the smaller local stores for as long as I can think. Some places just don't support small, non-chain stores. Back home in Northern Virginia, my town's business center is nice because I'd estimate that 50-60% of the stores are not part of a chain. My girlfriend lives about 25 minutes away from me in a town that is very new, and they have nothing but chains.

I don't like Walmart either, but so do a lot of people. Those are the people who support the other stores. There may not be as many as there should be, but that's the way of it. I should also mention that the only Walmart near me is about 30 minutes away, and I've been to a Walmart twice in my life.

Now I just wish we could get some decent restaurants in my college's area. Nothing but crappy chains.

I don't like Walmart either, but so do a lot of people. Those are the people who support the other stores. There may not be as many as there should be, but that's the way of it.

Wal-Mart has one thing going for them: they're open late. Last night (today) I went to bed at 8:30am. That's not really conducive to doing business with "normal" places, but the Wal-Mart is always a zoo even at 3am, and usually doesn't have what I want anyhow.

I more or less don't waste my time unless it's approaching urgent. I should try to get back on a sane sleep schedule.

Walmart is pretty new here. Our first Walmart less than an hour away only opened just over a year ago. Since then, I have have been getting my grocery store stuff (food and house cleaning stuff) there almost exclusively. My nearest traditional grocery store (Stop&Shop) is 2 minutes away. The Walmart is about 15-20 minutes away. I find the selection of frozen food (bachelor chow) at Walmart to be superior to any traditional grocery store I've ever been to. I cannot find these dumplings anywhere else. They are simply awesome.

Grocery shopping at Walmart also allows me to laugh at the trash they try to sell as electronics. I find that many models of TVs and such can only be bought at Walmart. I would assume they are made specifically for Walmart with crappy components to keep the price low.

As for googlegear, I have only bought 1 thing from there once in the last 2 years. I almost exclusively shop at newegg. I would buy more from the local computer store, but the guy doesn't have good prices and doesn't treat me like a valued customer for the premium I pay. I only drive over there when I am in a bind. Even then, I usually wish I hadn't bought from him when I walk out with my overpriced sub-par crap. CompUSA is usually a better option, but I hate trying to find parking in the mall.

CompUSA is usually a better option, but I hate trying to find parking in the mall.

Even they are hit and miss. The one near me for the longest time wasn't very useful. Anything on special? They were out of it.

There's one on the other side of the city that's been around longer. I went in there for the first time in a few years after the one near me was out of more than one type of CD-R that was on sale.

When I went in, someone asked what I was there for, pointed me in the right direction, and told me if they were out, they'd substitute. They weren't even out.

When they were clearing out Magellan 315 GPS I should have gone over to the other one. The one near me of course had one, full price, and it may have been the floor model. For full price, eh, I might as well spend not hugely much more and get something better. And I did.

If I remember correctly (famous last words) The Dual 760 chipset had a bug that made the on-board USB ports pretty much useless. To remedy this most AMD Dual board manufacturers included a USB add-on card.

The Wal-Marts near me used to be open 24 hours a day. Then only one of them was, and the rest closed at midnight or something. Then that one started closing at 2AM or so and the rest moved back to 11PM. Now they all close at 11PM. Despite the fact that, when they were open late, there were many people there all the time.

And the fact that they stayed open late was the only thing going for them. (I personally like the way they stock by carting entire pallets of things out to the floor and leaving them there, in the middle of the aisles, for, apparently, days, while the stockboys circle-jerk or something, I guess.) I haven't been to one in several years.

I've also only bought one thing from Googlegear ever, and I returned it.

If there are no other stores for Walmart to "pricematch" against, I don't think they will maintain their cheap prices...

One interesting point of the Walmart-type phenomenon is the entry of outlets like Walmart, Costco, LeClerc (in France) to the gas pumping business. Yes, if and when the number of other gas stations is reduced, will Costcos prices stay as low? I also think I remember that there's a beef over LeClerc (or was it Costo?) selling gas below their cost as a loss leader.

Aside from the prospect of "wipe out the indies and then raise prices" aspect, there are bigger reasons I have never shopped at a Walmart. Before they appeared in my neighborhood, I remember reading about Walmart's ability to dictate changes in record cover content/appearance to record companies. That was scary enough for me to stay away. In my mind, there is art and music out there that I find personally repugnant, and if Walmart doesn't want to sell some items, so be it. But to start tinkering with it? Slippery slope time. Ditto Blockbuster. Never been there.

I feel like I am constantly agonizing over the balance between my own pocketbook and convenience on one hand and the negatives of Walmartization on the other:

I don't patronize Starbucks at home, but when I travel I confess I seek them out as a way to get coffee that doesn't suck as bad as other locally available brew. Even though I know their presence pretty much precludes a lot of local competetion with potentially better products and service ('course, some of these folks weren't thinking about selling coffee until Starbucks appeared on the horizon). I mean, have you watched the workflow lately in a Starbucks with a drive-through? So much for the vaunted barista! Might as well be Burger King -- "Would you like a scone or a muffin with that?"

There are others on my love-hate list:

Home Depot: They have everything as long as it is what they have.
Macaroni Grill: Better food than Chilis/Applebees/Fridays, but some of the most annoying, formula-driven service in the world.

The progressive homogenization of the world. Ugh.

I *am* lucky that I have a local PC shop 1 block away who survives mostly on service/repair, but who sells a bit of everything and sells items on consignment. I still buy much of what I get on line, but mix it up with the occasional local buy like the USB-serial adapter I bought from him for $35 instead of getting it on line for $18.

Just an FYI. You can check Fry's prices by going to www.outpost.com.

Calvin

They sell those dumplings at Costco. . . .

Calvin

They sell those dumplings at Costco. . . .

You have to pay to shop at Costco.

Unless you can get a Costco member to buy you a gift $ card.

:-)

Calvin

Back to the topic, I have this exact combo sitting at home, the tiger is a solid board... a little dodgy being one of the first dual athlon boards, mines been running 2 athlon 1600 xp processors for over 8 months now. Every once in a while I'll get a blue screen memory error but I think it's because I'm not using registered memory. But that only happens every once in a while. Also... be prepared to lay down some duckets for good coolers... these things run HOT!!! and no... no usb 2.0 but I got a usb 2.0 card for 15 bucks on ebay....