I am planning on buying an AD11 mobo with a 1GHz Tbird. However there are two versions of it, a slot A and a socket A. What is the difference between a slot and a socket, and which is better?
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I am planning on buying an AD11 mobo with a 1GHz Tbird. However there are two versions of it, a slot A and a socket A. What is the difference between a slot and a socket, and which is better?
No real performance difference between the two; just different designs. The slot type is similar to the PCI slot on your motherboard and takes a chip that's "imbedded" on a card--connections to the mobo are configured in a single line (like on a PCI card). The socket type is your standard "wafer" (lying flat on the mobo) with pinholes that the socket-type chip lines up with. If you go with the slot-type, make sure the mobo comes with a bracket to help stabilize it in the slot. As far as preference (have used both), I prefer the socket type; easier to work with. On the slot type, the heatsink/fan is pointing right at the DIMM slots. Put an extra large cooler on that, and sometimes it bumps into the closest DIMM slot. Don't have that problem with the socket type.
AMD is discontinuing the slot A Athlon. To the best of my knowledge most of the slot A Athlons that are on the market are an older design and do not actually meet the "Thunderbird" specs.
In addition AMD will not be releasing Slot A processors in the future so you would be limited in your ability to upgrade.
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