clownwolf wrote on 2024-07-23, 07:11:

Can I just choose one at random and hope my motherboard supports it?

No.

In the old days, we would go to the manufacturer's page, and check the supported CPU list. But most of those websites are down now. What you can do is to check the date when the BIOS of your motherboard was published (should appear at system boot up) and choose a CPU which was released prior to that date. Alternatively, try to find the manual for the motherboard and look there, though that info may be outdated. Generally, you want the latest Athlon 64 models, as long as your BIOS supports them.

The Wayback machine (archive.org) can help with brands that have disappeared or whose websites dropped legacy support (Asrock... 🙁 - see here for the list). Fortunately other brands like Asus and Gigabyte still have all relevant info available without having to use such means.

Note that if you want to go for a CPU not supported at release of a board, only by a later update, you need to be sure that update is installed first.

thanks!

AMD product naming convention in this era is terrible. Its almost as bad as nVidia having 8 different GPU cores but all of them using the same "GTX 1060" product name.

I would just buy an extra CPU, one with an early core that any BIOS will recognize. Then you know you will be able to update the board for a newer CPU.

If you were to go with nForce3, you need a single core CPU for it to work correctly with Vista/7, so it's nice to have an older single core around.

dionb wrote on 2024-07-23, 09:29:

(Asrock... 🙁 - see here for the list)

There's a small trick: "SupportList.asp" can access the old interface, and under "Memory QVL" the oldest socket in the list is 754 without using Internet Archive.