Motherboards/chipsets to avoid?

Message

StringCheesian · Post by **StringCheesian** » Sat Jun 19, 2004 12:35 pm

I'm thinking of getting a new motherboard+cpu(Athlon XP)+memory bundle, but I don't know what kind of motherboard to get.

Does it matter what kind I get? Are there any motherboards or chipsets I should avoid? Are there any you can recommend?

I've got sound (SB Live), video (GeForce 4 MX), and ethernet (Netgear) cards, so it's ok if it doesn't have any of that on board. I have a regular non-sata hard drive, so I don't need sata either.

I'd like one that works well with NVidia cards under Linux (ie. can do side band addressing and fast writes - my current board does neither

), and uses very well supported (by Linux) chipsets with fast stable Linux drivers that won't bring down my harddrive or agp video performance.

agent_jdh · Post by **agent_jdh** » Sat Jun 19, 2004 1:42 pm

Well, the best Athlon XP chipset is the nForce2 Ultra, and two brands I would consider are Abit and Epox.

Most motherboards these days come with sound, ethernet and sata anyway, I doubt it would be much cheaper to get one without these features (if you can get one at all). nForce2 ethernet is supported OK in Linux, but sound isn't (there is an alsa driver but it does not provide hardware mixing).

You can get an nForce2 board with no video e.g. Abit NF7 rev 2 or AN7, use the onboard ethernet, disable the onboard sound and sata (maybe the sata controller will be useful if you upgrade your hard drive at a later date?), and it will certainly support SBA and FW for AGP. You can donate your ethernet card to another system - the ethernet controller (in fact, all the PCI devices) on the nForce2 chipset is 64-bit PCI.

spb · Post by **spb** » Sat Jun 19, 2004 2:25 pm

I'd go with an Abit NF7-* or Asus A7N8X-*. They're both nforce2 boards, and both very nice. The integrated sound is a bit iffy (uses the Intel i810 drivers) and doesn't have hardware mixing under Linux, but if you've got a seperate sound card you should be fine.

Post by **NeddySeagoon** » Sat Jun 19, 2004 3:42 pm

Stay away from PCChips

agent_jdh · Post by **agent_jdh** » Sat Jun 19, 2004 4:26 pm

NeddySeagoon wrote:Stay away from PCChips

That goes without saying.

chINeSe mIDgEts · Post by **chINeSe mIDgEts** » Sat Jun 19, 2004 5:37 pm

stay away from or at least look out for some asus boards in general. i know your going AMD but certain boards like my p4s8x-x series and related ones have some weird, but avoidable problems. for example on mine if the ninthe (ground) pin is plugged in on the front side usb the second onboard IDE conrtoller wont be recognized be the bios.

placeholder · Post by **placeholder** » Sat Jun 19, 2004 10:03 pm

Out of all the brands that I have used in the past (Iwill, Biostar, and now MSI) MSI has been the best. My board is the MSI K7N2 Delta-ILSR. That means I get IEEE1394[firewire], LAN, SATA, and RAID (as in SATA + normal RAID). It also comes with onboard sound which annoys me, but I just disable it and move along with my SBLive which has lasted me over 4 years. I made this upgrade because my old Biostar would allow me to turn the FSB up to what the 2800+ wanted it without not reading the RAM since the RAM was PC2100. This board does it all fine.

So in other words, I recommend the NForce chipset and stay away from Biostar. Iwill seemed okay, but I highly recommend MSI. Cheers.

geniux · Post by **geniux** » Sat Jun 19, 2004 10:20 pm

My board is a MSI K7N2 Delta-L, and it's the best of all boards I've owned. Runs great with Linux.

placeholder · Post by **placeholder** » Sat Jun 19, 2004 10:32 pm

geniux wrote:My board is a MSI K7N2 Delta-L, and it's the best of all boards I've owned. Runs great with Linux.

My friend also uses that board, and I would be too but it went on back order so I got this one (upgraded version) for the same price.

geniux · Post by **geniux** » Sat Jun 19, 2004 10:38 pm

Pwnz3r wrote:
geniux wrote:My board is a MSI K7N2 Delta-L, and it's the best of all boards I've owned. Runs great with Linux.
My friend also uses that board, and I would be too but it went on back order so I got this one (upgraded version) for the same price.

It's because the price I have the Delta-L, could'nt afford the Delta-ILSR when I built my pc

It would have been great to have sata.

slarti` · Post by **slarti`** » Sun Jun 20, 2004 12:04 am

I'd avoid Gigabyte and MSI because of the poor memory performance and reliability of their 754 Athlon64 boards.

placeholder · Post by **placeholder** » Sun Jun 20, 2004 12:56 am

geniux wrote:
Pwnz3r wrote:
geniux wrote:My board is a MSI K7N2 Delta-L, and it's the best of all boards I've owned. Runs great with Linux.
My friend also uses that board, and I would be too but it went on back order so I got this one (upgraded version) for the same price.
It's because the price I have the Delta-L, could'nt afford the Delta-ILSR when I built my pc
It would have been great to have sata.

Yeah, I wouldn't have this one either if it wasn't for the Delta-L going on back order. They let me buy this Delta-ILSR for the same price as the Delta-L. Happy times.

I don't know about this poor memory thing, but my MSI board is fine memory-wise.

StringCheesian · Post by **StringCheesian** » Sun Jun 20, 2004 1:05 am

Thank you very much to everyone so far, I knew I could count on the Gentoo community for some good advice. Keep it coming, if you've had experience (good or bad) with any motherboards that others might benefit from, don't hesitate to speak up!

slarti] wrote:I'd avoid Gigabyte and MSI because of the poor memory performance and reliability of their 754 Athlon64 boards.

Is that true of their Athlon XP boards too?

geniux · Post by **geniux** » Sun Jun 20, 2004 1:06 am

Pwnz3r wrote

I don't know about this poor memory thing, but my MSI board is fine memory-wise.

Mine too, but I think he only means the AMD64 boards.

placeholder · Post by **placeholder** » Sun Jun 20, 2004 1:14 am

StringCheesian wrote:Is that true of their Athlon XP boards too?

I have no problem with memory using an AMD AthlonXP 2800+ on my board (being MSI). So I'd say no.

Lews_Therin · Post by **Lews_Therin** » Sun Jun 20, 2004 1:42 am

Pwnz3r wrote:So in other words, I recommend the NForce chipset and stay away from Biostar. Iwill seemed okay, but I highly recommend MSI. Cheers.

My Biostar works perfectly for me. Why do you reccomend to avoid them?

slarti` · Post by **slarti`** » Sun Jun 20, 2004 8:05 am

The main problem that is definately true of Gigabyte and MSI boards is that they do have trouble with double sided RAM (the most common and cheapest if you want a high capacity DIMM, I'd be surprised if you could even find a single sided DIMM bigger than 512MB or so) at higher frequencies on their 754 pin boards. I know it's not a direct problem for you, but it sort of puts me off them altogether.

Boris27 · Post by **Boris27** » Sun Jun 20, 2004 8:28 am

I have an Abit NF7-S (about 100 euro), and it's great.

It has S-ATA, Firewire, USB2, certified soundstorm audio (great in windows, sucky in linux), and a 3-phase voltage controller, which means a bit more stable.

You can get the NF7 (not -S, so it has no S-ATA and Firewire, and only the "basic" soundstorm audio) for less, and I highly recommend it.

placeholder · Post by **placeholder** » Sun Jun 20, 2004 8:52 am

Lews_Therin wrote:
Pwnz3r wrote:So in other words, I recommend the NForce chipset and stay away from Biostar. Iwill seemed okay, but I highly recommend MSI. Cheers.
My Biostar works perfectly for me. Why do you reccomend to avoid them?

Mine was okay (used it for my mom's computer) but it had problems with working with PC2100 RAM if the FSB was over 266mhz.

MaxDamage · Post by **MaxDamage** » Sun Jun 20, 2004 11:54 am

slarti] wrote:I'd avoid Gigabyte and MSI because of the poor memory performance and reliability of their 754 Athlon64 boards.

I own a KT400 Gigabyte MoBo with a 2000+ Athlon XP and haven't had any problems with Linux. Don't know about the 64bit boards.

nouse66 · Post by **nouse66** » Tue Jul 13, 2004 5:04 am

has anyone heard anything about the
SOYO SY-KT600 Dragon plus ?
it has s-ata and for $53 at newegg.com its really tempting...

Plastic · Post by **Plastic** » Tue Jul 13, 2004 5:21 am

ABIT NF7-S 2.0 here. The sound is tolerable, IMHO. I was of the impression that the KT600 chipset is more powerful than the nForce2 Ultra 400 MCP-T. Needless to say, you can't go wrong with an nForce2 from Asus, Abit, AOpen, Epox, MSI, DFI, or Chaintech.

Lord Bob · Post by **Lord Bob** » Tue Jul 13, 2004 6:15 am

Pwnz3r wrote:
Lews_Therin wrote:
Pwnz3r wrote:So in other words, I recommend the NForce chipset and stay away from Biostar. Iwill seemed okay, but I highly recommend MSI. Cheers.
My Biostar works perfectly for me. Why do you reccomend to avoid them?
Mine was okay (used it for my mom's computer) but it had problems with working with PC2100 RAM if the FSB was over 266mhz.

I have a biostar board as well (M7NCG 400 for those who care) and it has a similar problem, but with the on board video. I knew this before I purchased the board, though, from reviews on the interweb.

Really, my only beef about this board is the lack of documentation. It is the thinnest manual I have seen -- ever. Other than that, the board performs nicely, is stable and fast and has some overclocking features you could only dream of on a micro-ATX board.

I like the board a lot!

MrF · Post by **MrF** » Tue Jul 13, 2004 10:15 am

I will never buy another via based motherboard. I spend ~ a year trying to figure out why the linux nvidia drivers kept crashing in opengl games. swap to a intel p4 board and I haven't had single crash in the same amount of time.

MatzeOne · Post by **MatzeOne** » Tue Jul 13, 2004 10:18 am

no asus!

spend your money on epox, abit or msi boards