Advice required on new Motherboard Purchase

[BladeRunner 0]

Hi,

I'm not sure if this is the right kind of forum to post this question, but you are all such nice guys and always answer the questions :-)

And I will be running Win2000 on my purchase.

OK, here goes.

I'm looking at upgrading my current mobo.

I currently have a BX based motherboard that wont accept any of the Coppermine CPU's.

Now I'm tearing my hair put here deciding which will be the best option.

Major choices here:

Another BX based mobo that will accept Coppermine CPU's, allbeit not the 133mhz versions.

An 820 based mobo which has RIMM sockets on & temporarily use a SIMM - RIMM converter, but have the option of RIMM's if/when prices drop.

An 820 based mobo with just DIMM sockets.

Obviously no option to upgrade to RIMM's.

 

I know there is a performance issue when using DIMM's on an 820 based mobo, but are we talking major hit here?

 

I'm really look for any advice you can give me here.

Also, as for the make of board I have been looking at both Abit & Asus, anyone care to comment on these manufacturers and/or add other good names to look for?

 

Thanks a lot for any advice you can give.

 

Paul

[ledzeppel 0]

Well, if you want to go a little cheaper route (depending on your video card of course), go get yourself an Asus P3B-f if you have a Geforce, and run that baby at 133 MHz (assuming you want a coppermine).

It's the only one that I know of that can handle that 89 MHz AGP bus and higher!

 

If you don't have a Geforce I recommend a VIA chipset, Asus P3V4X. That one supports the 1/2 diviser for the AGP bus if you run it at 133 MHz FSB. That'll put that AGP bus at the 66 spec.

 

Which is the best option? If I wasn't picking for myself I would say the VIA chipset because it would be the 100% safest option (if there is such a thing). If I was picking for myself? BX board, it's faster, and a little more tried and true. But if you don't have a Geforce the option is simple. Also, I'd stay away from i820 motherboard, it's not worth it (performance vs. cost). if you REALLYY want an Intel chipset with the Newer HUB architecture, just wait for i815 which wil support SDRAM. And I would expect it to be as fast or faster than BX.

 

If you still feel confused go check out www.tomshardware.com that might help you on your decision also.

[BladeRunner 0]

Hi,

Thanks for your reply.

I'm using a Matrox G400 Max.

I'm currently running a PIII 550, so this is really a purchase MB now and purchase new CPU a little later when prices drop.

I've read the reviews on the VIA Appollo Pro chipsets, but I've always been very wary of non-Intel chipsets.

*Remembers the old VIA & SIS boards he used to fit many moons ago*

Does anyone have any ideas of the release date for the 815 chipset?

[ledzeppel 0]

Yeah, you are like me then. I like Intel chipsets the best. But I'll have to admit, the 133/133a chipset by VIA is becoming viable solution to coppermine users. But I use the BX w/a Geforce and coppermine 733EB. Rock stable.

 

Those i815s should be out in June/July (if you can wait that long). Also, I would trade in the PC100 memory and buy some PC133 ram. It'll give you some more bandwidth for the 133 FSB. Good luck.

[euankirkhope 0]

Hello!

 

[This message has been edited by euankirkhope (edited 05 April 2000).]

[Igor 0]

Why even bother upgrading NOW if you are planning to get cpu LATER? When ever u are ready, then see what is available on the market. Maybe by that time you will have a new Bios for ya board that will be able to support Copermines.

2 friends of mine got Via 133 and Via 133/A boards and they seem to be more or less stable (the Asus one is better) but even with AGp4 and Pc133 ram they still run slower then My BX

I'd recomend to NOT get anything now till i815.

Isn't 550 'naugh 4 u ? ;-)

[SHS 0]

BladeRunner what motherboard do you have ?.

I thur in P3 600E in my Abit BH6 Rev1.0.

If your motherboard has rigth Volt it can support coppermine CPU.

 

 

 

 

[This message has been edited by SHS (edited 06 April 2000).]

[BladeRunner 0]

Hi,

Yes I know that a lot of the BX boards can take at least a few of the Coppermine's.

But......

Up until now I have always been an Intel board person.

To be honest I've always found the boards very reliable, currently on my 5th.

I'm using the SE440BX-2, but due to the voltage regulator installed on my reviosion of the board it wont accept any of the coppermine's

550mhz enough......never!!! Must have more power!!!

Well, OK, yes it is fine for me at the moment, the only reason I would like a board that will accept the CuMine's is that a faster CPU might become an option for me at any minute (not going into too much detail here and I'd hate to miss out on the chance of a faster CPU just because my board wont accept it.

[SHS 0]

This my brother system we just build

Soyo SY-6BA+III

Intel Pentium III 600E@800E Mhz Slot1

1, Micron 128meg 8ns SDRAM 168pin DIMM 100@133 Mhz

ATI RageIIC SGRAM 4meg AGP

3dfx V1000 "Voodoo2" 3D Accelerator 12meg PCI

Promise Ultra66 PCI

Creative Lab's SBLive! X-Gamer PCI

Realtek RTL8029 Ethernet Adapter PCI

Imation SuperDisk Drive 120mb IDE

Maxtor DiamondMax Plus 6800 7200rpm 13.6gb "91366U4" UDMA66 Drive

Memorex 48x CDROM IDE

ProView 765 17"

Microsoft IntelliMouse Explorer USB

Microsoft Natural Keyboard Pro USB

Lexmark 3200 Printer

UMAX Astra 2100U Scanner USB

InterAct PiranhaPad PC

Win98SE with all DX7 drivers

3DMark Result 3127 3D marks his old system was around 1100

 

My system is a bit system slower

Intel P3 600E slot

Abit BH6 Motherboard

2, 128meg SDRAM 168pin DIMM

Creative Lab's SB Live! Value

Realtek RTL8029(AS) PCI Ethernet NIC

Promise Ultra66 PCI

I/O Magic MagicWriter 4x4x32

Toshiba DVD-ROM SD-M1202

Western Digital 8.4gig IDE Primary

Hewlett Packard 420c Printer

Intel PC Camera Pack USB

Microsoft SideWinder 3D Pro

Microsoft IntelliMouse Explorer USB

Microsoft Natural Keyboard Pro USB

ViewSonic G773

ATI Xpert 128 AGP 16meg

PCWorks FourPointSurround FPS1000 speakers

Win2000 with all DX7 drivers

3DMark Result 2287 3D marks old system was around 1297.

I don't have Win98 install so I have idea what it like.

 

Both us had 450 before as you can we got a big jump speed by going to coppermine CPU.

If intel dosen't get it sh$t to@#@$%^,

I'am going start looking at AMD CPU

& there chipset in fact I ready have hehe &

there are Very nice CPU.

Don't get wrong those new KX133 are very nice chipset to.

Those so called new i815 have ever thing integrated just all must like i810 chipset does & I don't recommend them at all.

As a system builder I'am not very happy with Intel all new controllers chipset & way over Price RIMM other then there CPU.

[ledzeppel 0]

i815 will have an AGP port unlike i810 which has video built in to the motherboard. i815 will have audio built in, HOWEVER, the user will be able to disable it through the bios. i815 will be alot like i840, but FULLY support sdram..no converter cards! As with ANY hardware, before buying wait until Tom or Anand (or somebody reliable) reviews it. But this may be what Bladrunner is looking for!!

 

I also agree with one of the other posts about waiting and buying everything at once (chipset and cpu) so you can see what is on the market at the time and what is overclocking the best (if you like to do that) or what is the best deal.

[BladeRunner 0]

Ok chaps,

Thanks for all your input.

I do have a reason for upgrading the motherboard now and not the CPU.

It's basically due to the fact that a CPU upgrade costing me nothing may come along in the future at any stage.

It would basically involve me swapping out my current 550 at no cost to myself.

I'm not going to go into too much detail here, but I do work as an internal IT support chap

After reading all your coments, I'm now certain that the 820 chipset is a no no.

On one of the Intel forums today somebody posted a link to an 815 chipset MB.

OK, it's probably only a prototype, but everything on-board and only 2 PCI slots!!

I can see what 815 is aimed at.

Anyway, back to the plot.

After all consideration am looking at ABit BE6-II.

Seems a very good all round board, ATA-66 on-board etc etc.

So as my final question in this thread....

Anybody here own one or installed one, are they good?

Any general ABit owners here, do ABit make a good board?

 

Thanks again.

[YuppieScum 0]

Just my $0.02 to throw in...

 

I've just built a box using a Tyan Trinity 400 mobo - Via chipset, 4x AGP, ATA/66, PCI & DIMM clock divisor - and a P-III 550E on an MSI Slot1-FCPGA card.

 

Machine is up 24*7 and has been rock-solid since I built it.

 

 

------------------

SuperMicro P6DBS (dual UW-SCSI) BIOS 2.2, 2*Celery 300a @ 450Mhz, 384MB PC100 RAM

SCSI-A=4.3Gb+9Gb, SCSI-B=Tosh32x CD-ROM, Yamaha4416 CD-RW, Iomega ZIP100, IDE1=4.3Gb

IBM EtherJet 10/100 NIC PCI + Nortel ADSL "modem"

Matrox G400 DH 32Mb AGP + Quantum3D Voodoo2 SLI PCI (CL TNT1 AGP on a shelf)

SoundBlaster Live PCI (not Value)

Win2K build 2195 Retail (not 120-day eval)

[FrogMaster 0]

I have three machines running great.

They are based on Abit BP6, Abit BX6-2 and MSI 6163 Pro.

They are all three great motherboards. My favourite would be the MSI one. Very robust, very well designed, very flexible, very good overclockability, frequent bios updates.

My main machine is built around the BP6 though, because of smp in W2K.

If I were to change my mind, I would throw an ATA66 controller, a coppermine and a GEForce DDR at the MSI board. Maybe I'll do that if Nvidia do not move their **ses right now!

[MrFrosty 0]

If your motherboard lets you overclock to 133 Mhz, get a slocket and use a fcpga. That's what I'm doing on an Abit BH6, BF6, and BE-II.

[coreyfro 0]

Yuk!!! the se440bx is a terrible board!!!! the company i used to work for refused to diviate from that crappy board, but time and time again it failed to do what we needed... HELL, it can't even have 2 floppies!!!

 

 

I finally talked them into supermicro boards (as they are rock solid and not too pricy) right before i left.

 

and intel's server-boards!! what an ungodly mess!!! i didn't even have to talk my coworkers into supermicro boards for out servers, the choice was obvious...

 

intel can't make good boards, and that is final

 

 

Quote:

Originally posted by BladeRunner:

Hi,

Yes I know that a lot of the BX boards can take at least a few of the Coppermine's.

But......

Up until now I have always been an Intel board person.

To be honest I've always found the boards very reliable, currently on my 5th.

I'm using the SE440BX-2, but due to the voltage regulator installed on my reviosion of the board it wont accept any of the coppermine's

550mhz enough......never!!! Must have more power!!!

Well, OK, yes it is fine for me at the moment, the only reason I would like a board that will accept the CuMine's is that a faster CPU might become an option for me at any minute (not going into too much detail here and I'd hate to miss out on the chance of a faster CPU just because my board wont accept it.

 

 

 

[This message has been edited by coreyfro (edited 07 April 2000).]

[BladeRunner 0]

Hi,

I think your being a bit harsh there :-)

I've been using genuine Intel boards for quite a while, and have always found them very very reliable.

The last two companies I worked for only used Intel boards and to be honest I've never seen one fail.

I've had the Endevour, Marl, Tucson and currently the Seattle2.

What I don't like about the Intel boards is that Intel seem to assume what you do & don't want to do with their products.

As you said the SE440BX-2 board doesn't support two floppy drives.

OK the majority of people don't want or need two floppies, but it should be the users choice.

The reason I'm moving away from Intel this time is their bad upgrade path.

This particular revision of the Seattle2 can only go upto the PIII 600 512k.

If I had waited two months, the later revsion supports upto 733 Coppermine.

The same was so for the Original SE440BX (Seattle) board, it can only take upto a PIII 450.

If it wasn't for the very poor upgradability I would probably have stayed with Intel boards.

But that's just my opinion

[Pagongski 0]

I read the thread a bit late but heres my opinion anyway. I have installed quite a few motherboards from chaintech to abit and i must say that my choice goes to Abit, definitely. I currently have a BP6 (dual celeron abit MB) and i am quite happy with it so far (still struggling with win2k drivers, etc, but its not the board's fault, hehe).

As for the ABit BE6-II, thats the MB i had before this one, awesome board, the overclockability on the thing is crazy and it supports coppermine. I am considering changing to that board again (have to steal it back from my girlfriend's comp, hehe) because i want a PIII copper, its easier for me to upgrade than with two celerons.

I have a friend that swears by intel MB, he has a capecod one and loves it, i think its i820, right? Well, the performance on the thing is not that much, i dont know why but the BX is always faster. As for the via chipset, i say a very big no no, i read somewhere it was strangled at the AGP port. I installed one and after some tests with it we saw the graphic aceleration (ok, quake2/3) was terrible under it, even with a good 3d card. Needless to say he sold it right after he saw the scores. :-)

Also tried QDI motherboards, nothing fancy here, just normal MB, nothing worthy of note.

Go for Abit, thats my opinion, the BE6-II is a great board, trust me, and the ATA66 on board works marvel, you have the chance of having 8 hds. hmm, abit released a new BIOS for it, i better download it. :-)

Sorry for the long post, hope i helped somehow.

[BladeRunner 0]

At last!!!

Thanks for that post, it's what I've been looking for.

I wanted someone who had used the board to tell me what they thought of it.

I know that when I got my last but one Intel Motherboard I was so impressed that I took every oportunity to 'sing it's praises'

Nobody seemed to want to do the same on this ABit board, so I was a tad worried

 

I know I said a while back this was going to be my last question on this thread, but:

Going back to the performance hit issue with the 820 chipset & DIMMS.

Up until 2 days ago I was using a PIII 500.

I now have a PIII 550.

Would it be fair to say that using an 820 Chipset & DIMM's would be similar performace to how my PC was when I was using the PIII 500.

eg.

820+DIMM'S+PIII 550 = BX+DIMM's+PIII 500

 

I'm sure the above question doesn't make sense, but hay it's 10:30am, it's busy at work and I haven't had my morning coffee yet

[Pagongski 0]

It all depends on where you want the performance, i mean, the 820 has high points, but the BX has some too. I am confusing you, hehe. :-)

I cant say how close those two specs would be to each other, but i think the 820+PIII550 would have better performance than the BX one, once again it will depend on what you run on it.

This is my opinion: I would go for the BX chipset, i still dont have that many facts to trust the 820 that much yet, maybe my opinion will change when i see more results, but NOW i would decide for the BX, good enough? (hey, but see if you can get the PIII550 AND the BX ;-))

(Hope you got your coffee)

[BladeRunner 0]

Hiya,

Yes, thanks I got my coffee

In reponse to your last sentance, the PIII 550 on a BX is an option, and my current option.

I just wanted to know if I moved to a 820 chipset I don't want a performance drop from what I was using two weeks a go, a PIII 500 on a BX.

I think the general posts say go BX, so ABit BE6-II here I come.

 

Thanks everyone for the input.

[Crash99 0]

If your still there, one of the main problems I have heard is that while gaming, the i820 w/ dimms tend to have random lock ups due in part to the board originally being designed for just rimms...also, BE-II's are good mobos...if your using a alot of pci cards, keep an eye on the ultra 66 contollers...they don't always mix well w/ s/blaster live and scsi cards(resource conflicts)...other than that, its great...up to a 200mhz bus is avlble, but it wld probably fry everything else on the system b/c pci divider is max of 1/4 and agp 2/3