Help me pick a low budget, reliable motherboard

A

Anarchonixx

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Nov 6, 2002
Messages
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Well, first of all, I'm sorry if there's been any recent threads about this, but this computer is insanely slow, and using the net on it is almost painful.

Here's my situation, plain and simple: I'm building a cheap-ish PC for my grandparents, and I'm not sure on what motherboard to choose for the job.

Requirements:
--I know for a fact I don't need a $90+ motherboard
--I know for a fact I won't be OCing
--It will need to support an AXP2500+ (desktop version)
--Needs to have onboard sound
--Form factor: ATX or mATX
--Onboard video: not a must, so with or without is cool
--I'm going for reliability here, so I'd prefer suggestions from first-hand experience, but I'll take whatever I can get.

Everything else doesn't really matter much, since at least a couple of USB ports and the regular stuff is always included. The NF2 chipset would be ideal for these things, but I'm open to other possible suggestions.

Thanks beforehand, guys. Right now I'm typing from their current PC, a 200mhz Pentium, running Win98, haven't checked out how much RAM, on dial-up with AOL.



Summary: looking for reliable, cheap motherboard that supports AXP2500 and has onboard audio; no need for OCablility. Please suggest me something.
 
Shuttle AN35N Ultra (plus a cheap Radeon for video). And you're done :D

The integrated audio and LAN are quite acceptable, and the board is absolutely rock solid. It supports both a 400MHz FSB (not that you care) and the Barton core. No cheap little northbridge fan to start squealing and burning out after six months either.

I cannot recommend this board enough, it is one of the best deals in motherboards I have ever encountered, and has none of the quality-of component compromises typically found on motherboards this cheap.
 
Shuttle AN35N Ultra (plus a cheap Radeon for video). And you're done The integrated audio and LAN are quite acceptable, and the board is absolutely rock solid. It supports both a 400MHz FSB (not that you care) and the Barton core. No cheap little northbridge fan to start squealing and burning out after six months either.

I cannot recommend this board enough, it is one of the best deals in motherboards I have ever encountered, and has none of the quality-of component compromises typically found on motherboards this cheap.
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I agree 100%. :D

I've had one up and running for over a month now, running 24 hrs a day w/the Distributed Computer (DC) program ClimatePrediction.

I also run the massively multiplayer online roleplaying game (MMORPG) Anarchy Online w/it, and again it runs great. In fact even better than when run w/my faster P4 system. The graphics appears to be much better and sharper on it using the exact same video card, an ATI 9800Pro, as had been used on my P4 system, using the exact same video driver. The only thing I can think of w/it is, that Nvidia's chipset drivers are much better than Intel's, possibly in regards to communicating w/the video card through the AGP port. After all, Nvidia's specialty is graphics. This is only a guess on my part. I just know what I see. :D
 
If you do go the NF2 route, make sure you check Nvidia's site for memory req's as the onboard is flaky as hell. I built two boxen for my roomate and grandmother, and both had funky issues with Corsair memory, but using generic PNY memory they worked fine. I've had no complaints with Biostar for the most part, but if you're thrifty you can pick up a pretty solid, higher-end board for the cheap if you look around, which would probably be best for your application.
 
Thanks for the replies, guys. Was going to pick the AN35N, but when I went to order today, they weren't in stock. Since I needed to get these things today, I went ahead and picked up an Epox 8RDA3I for $61. Hopefully wasn't a bad choice.

I generally don't even look at the boards from ASRock, ECS, Biostar, etc. Guess I've heard too many bad things about them. Thanks anyway, guys.

EDIT: Well, the order I was talking about above was declined (CC issues with third-world countries...jk), and I was reordering and noticed the AN35N was back on stock, so picked that up.
 
You just need to know how to massage the ECS boards...mine boots at 143 MHz stable all the time...some people actually get there to run at 166 with no problems too...

Later

MD
 
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