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Thread ID: 28180 2002-12-12 19:20:00 New Mobo required - advice please Graham Petrie (449) Press F1
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105520 2002-12-12 19:20:00 Those of you who read my last thread will know I am up for a new mobo. It has to be socket A for an AMD Atglon CPU, upgradeable to a newer AMD CPU.

RAM requirements are less important I already have SDRAM, but will eventually upgrade to DDR, so one that takes both would be nice, but not essential - I will upgrade to DDR now if necessary to get a decent mobo. Keep price in mind, but I don't want any cheap junk. i would rather forgo features for quality at a certain price.

I don't expect specific models, but won't say no to recommendations. What would be extremely useful is advice on what features of a mobo that are must-haves, those that are a waste of time, and those that are good, but not necessary. Also, a list of manufacturers with good reputations, and any horror stories. I can then take this info, and use it to better determine my requirements and then do the hard research myself (reviews etc).

So please - any comments on features, manufacturers, and if apprpriate specific boards.

Thanks

G P 		Graham Petrie (449)
105521 2002-12-12 19:45:00 I can safely say that the Mobo that I reccommended for you in the other one is probably very close to the perfect mobo for you. SD-RAM and DDR (Not at the same time thou). Takes AMD Athlon, Duron and Athlon XP. Has 4x AGP slot, I think about 5 PCI slots, 1x AMR If you've got that type of modem, Onboard Sound, 2 com ports, 1x parallel port, 1x midi/gamepad port, 2x USB ports, and I think thats about it.

goto www.qmb.co.nz and have a look at it, its the Elitegroup K7S5A VIA KT266 Chipset Socket A ATX 200/266MHz c/w Sound
for $147 + GST, and.... thi URL is...:
www.qmb.co.nz
And here for a reveiw:
www.amdmb.com
Dunno how well the revei rates it, but throw K7S5A Via into google and it'll come up with enough.

Lemme know what you think of it, Im happy to provide more details (If there's actually is some Ive missed out).

Cheers


Chilling_Silence 		Chilling_Silence (9)
105522 2002-12-12 21:50:00 i wouldn't touch that mobo with a 20ft barge pole myself. ECS are a budget brand (not bad but not great either). also it is a kt266 chipset which is known to be somewhat buggy (not to mention old and SLOW).

stick to kt266A or better chipsets eg the 333 and 400.(don't forget sis or ali chipsets either) or take a look at a sis chipset board. its really hard to find good dual ram boards. i would sell the sdram and go full DDR. 		tweak'e (174)
105523 2002-12-12 22:57:00 The new NForce2 boards are out now and don't look too bad at alll. Most of them have good quality onboard LAN and sound as well.

I wouldn't go up to a KT400 based board yet, if going for a KT333 make sure it's the "CE" type. 		-=JM=- (16)
105524 2002-12-12 23:11:00 How about ASUS A7S266 (www.asus.com)? It accepts either SD or DDR RAM so you can use your SD RAM for now and upgrade later if u need.

Or u want something better ? Try A7N266 (www.asus.com) it comes with nForce 220 onboard graphics :D 		SKT174 (1319)
105525 2002-12-13 20:17:00 I recommend ( and use ) this one:-

www.soltek.de

I hope this helps. 		Elephant (599)
105526 2002-12-13 20:17:00 Thankyou everyone - Chilling - the mobo you recommended is a bargain, but for the reasons tweak'e mentioned I had already decided against it. I think I will go the full DDR path when funds allow, so maybe no PC for a little while.

Thankyou for your comments JM - very informative. I will start looking around and come back when I have compiled a short list. Thanks, and if anyone has something to add feel free.

G P 		Graham Petrie (449)
105527 2002-12-13 20:33:00 Yes!!!! finally someone on this forum that wouldn't touch a ECS motherboard, about time.

Now back to the problem at hand. The Asus A7V333 seems to have quite a good rap on the net, although might be a bit expensive due to it being Asus. The new board from Epox looks really good, its got a cool feature that allows you to overclock the CPU using the mutlipliers without unlocking the CPU. I don't know if its avaliable in NZ but the FIC's AN19E is almost identical and seems to preform better. FIC have a reputation of providing budget boards but are getting rave reviews on the net for a quality, feature packed, budget/cheap board. Epox and FIC worked together to design the board so that can provide some assurance that the board is quality. Both the Epox and FIC boards use the KT400 chipset. Normally I wouldn't reckonmend a KT400 board (still to new kinda buggy, no real gain over KT300) but these boards have really impressed me. It will be interesting to see if any other forum member have opinions on these boards.

As tweak'e said ditch the SD-RAM. There is no point at all #$%%^# around with old technology. Use this dilemma to treat yourself to some nice PC2700 DDR.

Just my 2cents worth 		Pete O'Neil (250)
105528 2002-12-13 21:21:00 It really boils down to how much u wanna spend :D and whether u want graphics on board...etc.

I can recommend a very good board for AMD, you name it and it's got it :)

Gigabyte GA-7VAXP

Comes with

AGP 8X
FSB 333/266/200 Socket A
DDR 400+
6 Channel Audio
6 x USB 2.0
3 x 1394 FireWire
ATA133 RAID
LAN on board

Cheers 		SKT174 (1319)
105529 2002-12-14 02:00:00 Look for one that's rated to work at temperatures above 10 C. The ones they sell for use in Dunedin might not work further north. :D Graham L (2)
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