Archived from groups: alt.comp.periphs.mainboard.gigabyte (
More info?)
Re: <snip>
Could the group recommend a basic board. I don't need raid on the
m-board. I would also like a recommendation on a video card. I don't do much
gaming. Will use the system for digital photos and playing music. <snip>
You want Gigabyte. You are happy with basic features.
You could do a lot worse than a Gigabyte GA7VA (VIA KT400 chipset). If you
are in Europe, look in the "Bargain basement" section at www.aria.co.uk,
where you will find some boards at well under half the original price. These
probably don't support Barton or 400 FSB, but a non-Barton 2600XP (333FSB)
is cheaper than the Barton kind in ARIA's cpu section.
There are pin-outs on this motherboard for 6.1 sound (your "playing music"
request). Whether or not you get the bracket (with the optical connector and
the extra sound sockets) bundled with the mainboard I can't say - especially
with the "Bargain Basement" ones.
Furthermore, the board has 2 rear USB ports, and motherboard header pin-outs
for 4 USB channels on the front of the computer (or wherever you want them).
This will allow you to connect 2 USB channels to sockets that your case
might have, and as well you can connect a multiformat card reader - most of
these connect to motherboard headers (i.e. to help in your "digital photos"
request). Note that Gigabyte's nForce2 range of boards put 4 USB channels on
those sockets mounted directly on the motherboard at the back, and only 2
channels on motherboard header pins. That makes wiring up front panel USB
AND a multiformat memory card reader a bit more involved. (Aria have as good
a selection of card readers as I've ever seen). If you get a card reader
with a USB port as well you can connect all 4 channels - the 4 card reader
slots take 1 USB connection. When installing WIn XP, don't connect the card
reader first, as it will take Drives C:, D:, E: and F:, leaving your hard
disk as G: and CD as H::! Connect the card reader AFTER installing XP (How
do I know this?).
Some of the recommendations you were given were for a GA7N400Pro2 board
(nVidia nForce chipset). This is far from basic, as it has IDE Raid and SATA
Raid, firewire and onboard network. If you have a choice, get the GA7N400Pro
mainboard, as it has better sound! (Your music). You can get the equivalent
( IDE Raid and SATA Raid, firewire and onboard network) in VIA KT400 form
called the GA7VAXP-Ultra (or GA7VAXP-A Ultra, which does support 400FSB AND
Barton). The nForce chipsets allow you to run your RAM in "dual channel"
mode, but they only work with good quality, low latency RAM when in this
mode, e.g. Corsair TwinX.
I have recently been comparing the following:
GA7VA (this one an Aria bargain basement purchase!)
GA7VAXP-A Ultra
GA7N400 Pro
GA7N400 Pro2
using the MEMTEST86.exe utility. It reports a few MHz higher in the speed of
a T'bird Athlon 2600 on the KT400 chipsets, but a much, much lower memory
throughput (644 v. 908) Mb/s - whatever that means - compared to the nVidia
chipsets, which no doubt accounts for the better games performance reported
on the latter. This is run using generic RAM and not using dual channel.
Of course, the KT400 is obsolete, and replaced with KT600 - allegedly faster
than nForce, and supporting all the high-spec, high-cost, options - but
still with the useful 4 channels of USB on mainboard headers. But you did
say "basic", and I took that to mean "Low cost" as well as "feature
poor"....
Frankly, I've used computers built around all of the 4 above boards, with
cpu's from XP2000+ to XP2800+ (Barton), and with PC2100 to PC3200 (low
latency) RAM, and as far as Windows and Office are concerned, the difference
is not detectable. I prefer the bargain basement GA7VA, but that is because
it is in the nicest case!
Video cards are very much a personal choice, but you will find that even
cards criticised as rubbish by gamers are perfectly satisfactory for
non-game applications.
Apologies for the length of this.
Eddie B.
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