Legit Reviews

Hi.

I'm looking to upgrade my current Asus A8N-VM CSM (3200+) motherboard and processor and am looking at the Asus M3A with a Phenom 9500 processor and 4 x 2GB PC2-6400C5 800Mhz memory.

I've been bittten in the past running server OSs and having compatible drivers. I'm looking to run Server 2008 in 64 bit mode. The machine is going to be my replacement Virtual Server box. As an IT consultant I need lots and lots of VMs.

Can anyone advise on the compoatibility of this motherboard or recommend another that would be good. I don't want to overclock, I just want a stable quick box to act as a server.

Many thanks.

Mike...

If your asking what I think your asking Phenom has issues with Virtualization as documented by the TLB bug. They have a TLB fix for it but it causes a performance hit.

As for the M3A board, it runs phenom great. Windows server drivers for it no clue.

Exactly what I was after, thanks.

I've been looking at a lot of other forum posts since posting this, and I think that actually a Q6600 CPU would be a better bet for the work this box will be doing. Just need to find a motherboard for that.

Thanks, Mike...

High end board or server cheepie board?

Get an ASUS P5K Premium board, or if you need RAID for the VM's, the P5K WS has a PCIE slot.

They are stable as a rock.

Or since virtualization is a key role you could get an Asus Server board and go to dual Quads, i ust built one with the Asus TS700-e4/RX8 and dual quad xeons.

Thanks for all your help. I used to a lot of system building, but It's getting to the stage where it's all just numbers these days ;-)

Although the box is going to be purely a virtualisation box, I don't want to spend a great deal on it. It's not going to be for production use, it's purely for my benefit and maybe a few customer demos.

I'm opting for the Q6600 and will be sticking it on an Asus P5k board. Overclockers, who are around the corner for me have a great deal on 8GB RAM too. It's not going to set the world on fire, but it'll be good enough for me.

I have a 3 port XFX Revo, which is in my current setup, which I'll transfer over. Very underrated RAID card. I've had it for 3 years now and it's never skipped a beat.

Again thanks for the advise.

I'll post a note once it's built if all goes well.

Cheers, Mike...

I've had good luck so far using drivers for x64 Vista for Server 2008, if there are no Server drivers. They seem to work fine, as long as they're signed (but then, all x64 vista drivers must be). If your mobo mfg has x64 vista drivers, you should be ok.