I have an old computer with a 430vx chipset. I know the limit to memory is 64 cacable and system is 128. I suppose this means that up to 128mb is possible to put in the board but at a great slow down rather than 64mb. even though more than 64mb is slower, would it still work for programs that need 128mb? Would an amd k6-iii help speed up the at least 64mb cached memory.

Cache memory and system memory are not tied together in any way. Your motherboard is limited to 64mb of cache because their is no physical place to add more. Programs are not dependent on cache memory, they could run with zero cache. System memory is the limiting factor. What is cache memory

Here is some good info on Intel's chipsets and memory/cacheability. I have experienced the same dilemma, going with 64 Meg or 128 with first 64 uncached. However, with having the first 64 uncached, there was such a hit in performance, I found myself going back to 64 Meg. If I were you, I would only use more than 64 Meg if the application simply won't run (including data) or the system thrashes (too much swapping) without the extra memory. I'm a little confused as to what you are asking, but if you can put a K6-3 on this motherboard, then you need not worry about the cacheability, as the K6-3 has on-chip L2 cache, and therefore all 128 meg will be cached. The same can't be said for the K6-2, but CAN be said, I believe, for the K6-2+. Good luck.

Since the K6-3 has the on-chip L2 cache, the motherboard's L2 cache becomes L3, so as C_Legend wrote, you wouldn't have to worry about the 64mb cache issue. If you don't already have a K6-3 CPU though, you'll find that they're VERY expensive & hardly worth it, especially on an old board like that... I don't know if you can run a K6-3 on a VX board anyway...I doubt it will support the voltage. Can you set the CPU voltage as low as 2.2v? Also, you wouldn't be able to take advantage of the 100FSB that the K6-3 was designed for. Using the "2x as 6x" multiplier trick, the best you could probably do is either 400 (6 x 66)...possibly 450 if you have the 75FSB option. I know 450 is probably the most common of the K6-3 "flavors", but it seems to me, it's power would be wasted on that setup...

Well here's a real puzzle for you concerning more memory beyond 64 MB. I have an Amptron 7900 i430vx mobo and have recently put in 80 MB of ram in. The ram are edo simm modules. I have windows 95B OSR2 which I understand is some type of an oem version of the second release of win95. Anyway I too experienced a small slowdown of win95 with the 80 MB of memory. So I decided to take the extra 16 MB of ram and use it for a ramdisk for internet explorer to use as a place for the temporary internet folder. Well the weird part is that win95 is now back to running at normal speed again since it is only seeing 64 MB of ram available to it. And Internet Explorer is now performing slightly faster running off the 16 MB ramdisk. If you ask me, I'd say so much for the cache theory concerning going beyond 64 MB on these old pc's.

"If you ask me, I'd say so much for the cache theory concerning going beyond 64 MB on these old pc's" I'm confused by this statement - didn't you just confirm the cache theory?

Yes, Arcosanti. Your browser is going to be faster if you use a ramdisk for cache rather than the hard disk. And, in your case, 16 meg of uncached space is not going to be as big of a hit to performance as the first 64 meg would be in a 128 meg system, as most of your used memory is still cached in the 80 meg scenario, whereas AT LEAST half of the physical memory (in use) is uncached in the situation with 128 meg. What I would like to know is what portion of memory your ramdisk is. Arcosanti, if it's the uncached portion, then it makes sense that your system would not be getting a performance hit, as you'd be using the cached memory for the operating system and applications and using the uncached portion in place of hard disk access, which is going to be slower, whether the memory is cached or uncached. You may have just been lucky and found the sweet spot for getting the most of your memory and cache.