Iwill KA266-R ---> ALi MAGiK 1

[CrazyKillerMan 0]

Iwill KA266-R

 

I was thinking about this mobo for my next upgrade, partly because of the DDR FSB, DDR RAM and partly because of the RAID. I was just wondering if this new chipset is gonna give me any problems, its the ALi MAGiK 1, and I havent really heard good things about ALi's. But the board got a perfect 10 in maximum pc reveiw. Another thing is that it has 4.1 onboard audio, if I disable this, will it still hit the performance?

 

Just wondering what everybody thinks about it.

 

thanx

[Brian Frank 0]

I would hold off on a DDR board right now, mainly because there the very first ones, so there's bound to be more problems. Also, the Magik chipset can be beaten by the KT133A chipset in most benchmarks, so essentially, you're paying more for the same performance WITHOUT DDR. The only DDR chipset worth fooling with is the AMD 760, but I couldnt recommend this either, since it is a first gen product. But if you must have a ddr board, go with one featuring the AMD 760.

And as for sound--c'mon, you know the good sound comes from hardware based ones. The performance, if anything should increase if you disable the onboard sound. However if its a good hardware onboard sound (oxymoron) you should be able to have it on without any, or just a little, decrease in performance.

[CrazyKillerMan 0]

can you recommend a good board. I have an ASUS now and am pleased with it, but, the Iwill board has the raid, which isnt really all that important as i can get a controller later on down the road.

 

Tyan only has KT133A's at their web site, Iwill doesnt have any 760 boards, asus has a 761 chipset the A7M266, Epox has a nice one called the EP-8K7A+ but i havent read much about EPOX.

 

So, should i just chill a bit before upgrading my computer?

[Brian Frank 0]

You cant go wrong with Asus. Tyan boards are good, unless you want to overclock--you will be lucky to pull that off, but other than that those are good boards. Tyan is working on the dual Athlon with the 760MP chipset(drool). I dont know if Abit has a DDR board out yet, but that would be another choice too if they do. I dont know much about Iwill other than what Ive read, but they seem to be pretty good.

 

A local tech at the only MS certified pc store said only get Asus or Abit, and if you cant afford those MSI or DFI. I'll agree with him on all but the last one with DFI.

 

But of course, the best, although pricey, is Asus or Abit. Ive also heard that a lot of people like MSI too, but I would definitely look at Asus.

 

Depending on what you have in hardware, I would really suggest waiting, because not only are cpu's changing now, but the fight for the memory standard is being fought, so with first gen products, wait and see till the Athlon 4/ Pentium 4 war gets on the main stream in few months.

 

Basically, unless your hardware sucks right now, yeah, chill a bit for like 4 months and then look around. You'll at least know what bugs are there.

[CrazyKillerMan 0]

Yes, thats what I was thinking, Ive only heard and received good things from asus boards.

 

But...I definatly want raid, so what controller if you dont mind me asking would be best. I think promise, after some research, but adaptec is also a decent name.

 

Thanx for the speedy replies.

[Brian Frank 0]

Im clueless on that one, since Ive never had a board that used raid, but I do have two boards that have an extra pair of controllers on them (Asus A7V and Abit BE6). I guess promise is good, but never having used raid, I cant say. I know Adaptec is pretty big when it comes to scsi, but I dont know about RAID.

[CrazyKillerMan 0]

thanx anyways Brian, as always youve been of help.