How to choose a good motherboard

[Gary Hendricks]

Hi all

Here's a nice guide I came across which teaches you how to choose a
good motherboard. I thought it might be useful for some of you here.

http://www.build-your-own-computers.com/chose-a-motherboard

Gary

 

[GT]

So you don't just go by the colour then? I think the purple ones are nice.

 

[kony]

Hi all

Here's a nice guide I came across which teaches you how to choose a
good motherboard. I thought it might be useful for some of you here.

http://www.build-your-own-computers.com/chose-a-motherboard

Gary

Due to referral links and ads on the 'site your post
qualifies as SPAM. Further, Tiger Direct is a shady outfit
and you do a disservice recommending or linking them at all.

 

[Jamie]

the best way to choose a board is depending on what proc you want to buy, as
for that site, the board is far from the most expensive parts of a computer
usually one of the cheapest.

 

[kony]

the best way to choose a board is depending on what proc you want to buy, as
for that site, the board is far from the most expensive parts of a computer
usually one of the cheapest.

You must build odd systems. Most people spend more on a
modern board than CPU, case, power, or memory. Typical board
these days is about $100, and the most common CPUs are the
entry level, most common video is still intel integrated
(which is sad, but true).

 

[VWWall]

You must build odd systems. Most people spend more on a
modern board than CPU, case, power, or memory. Typical board
these days is about $100, and the most common CPUs are the
entry level, most common video is still intel integrated
(which is sad, but true).

I built a system about a year ago to test out WindowsXPx64. The MSI
K8MM-ILSR *with* an AMD Athlon64 3000+ was less than $200. The on-board
graphics, (S-3), is not too bad, and the audio is great, once I found
the drivers! MSI's site is not too bad, but the stuff that comes in the
retail package is almost worthless!

 

[kony]

I built a system about a year ago to test out WindowsXPx64. The MSI
K8MM-ILSR *with* an AMD Athlon64 3000+ was less than $200. The on-board
graphics, (S-3), is not too bad, and the audio is great, once I found
the drivers! MSI's site is not too bad, but the stuff that comes in the
retail package is almost worthless!

Onboard video using DDR memory is great for cost savings, 2D
uses and DVD/video, it's just a bit disappointing that after
nVidia launched nForce1, the others (save for ATI who still
seems to have more limited penetration) didn't counter. I
still feel that even with integrated video, it'd be nice of
they threw a 32-64MB framebuffer onto the boards instead of
continuing to be limited by system memory bandwidth.

 

[VWWall]

On Tue, 10 Jan 2006 20:54:37 GMT, VWWall



Onboard video using DDR memory is great for cost savings, 2D
uses and DVD/video, it's just a bit disappointing that after
nVidia launched nForce1, the others (save for ATI who still
seems to have more limited penetration) didn't counter. I
still feel that even with integrated video, it'd be nice of
they threw a 32-64MB framebuffer onto the boards instead of
continuing to be limited by system memory bandwidth.

It uses only 64K of my 512K DDR. I'm not into games and it shows the
DxDiag graphics and DVD/video just fine. The only problem I have so far
is that in Linux most distros by default limit me to 1280 x 1024 at 77
refresh. The board does have an 8X AGP slot. Do you know of a ,(cheap)
AGP card that has drivers for Linux and WinXP x64?

 

[kony]

The board does have an 8X AGP slot. Do you know of a ,(cheap)
AGP card that has drivers for Linux and WinXP x64?

I'm imagine anything nVidia TNT2 era or newer is your best
bet. As for where to get one cheapest, that's hard to say.
ebay and web forum for-sale boards are bound to have some
used. The following has several new Dell pulls though they
might've been cleaned out of the better values by now, and
their shipping charge used to be a bit steep (don't know if
that's changed, used to be about $10 even for a small item).
http://www.centrix-intl.com