I've read a lot of very helpful posts in the forum here, and I'm looking for a suggestion or two
I'm building a system with QX6700 (quad core), 6 or 8 GB RAM, 4 or 5 SATA drives, probably running Vista 64 (assuming the board, etc. have driver support - otherwise XP 64 or Windows 2003).
The main use of the system will be development and I'll be running a variety of VMware virtual machines with enterprise type apps including Oracle 9i/10g, hence the need for gobs of memory. I will be doing a lot of Photoshop and some video editing, but I'm not a big gamer and I don't plan to overclock, and I'm not looking at a killer 8800GTX video card - I'd rather a mid-level card with less heat/power usage.
I've read some very positive reviews of the ABit IN9 32X-Max, and I'm leaning that way right now. Perhaps overkill (and pricey), but reviews seem to say it has very high quality components which is more important than an extra 2-3% speed from OCing. Any feedback on that, or suggestions for another board? I'll definitely have a number of drives (4 minimum) and I like the two eSATA ports as well, but I'm not tied to nForce 680i vs 965/975 - for me it's just the feature set/quality that got me thinking about the ABit IN9.
Incidentally, my current creaky machine is an FX-51 on an Asus SK8V - it's been OK, although the initial setup was awful (had to download drivers to get Windows to recognize any of the drives - that's just poor design). I really am open to ABit, Asus, EVGA, Tyan, you name it - any and all suggestions are appreciated, I'm hear to learn.
Thanks,
Barry
I'm building a system with QX6700 (quad core), 6 or 8 GB RAM, 4 or 5 SATA drives, probably running Vista 64 (assuming the board, etc. have driver support - otherwise XP 64 or Windows 2003).
The main use of the system will be development and I'll be running a variety of VMware virtual machines with enterprise type apps including Oracle 9i/10g, hence the need for gobs of memory. I will be doing a lot of Photoshop and some video editing, but I'm not a big gamer and I don't plan to overclock, and I'm not looking at a killer 8800GTX video card - I'd rather a mid-level card with less heat/power usage.
I've read some very positive reviews of the ABit IN9 32X-Max, and I'm leaning that way right now. Perhaps overkill (and pricey), but reviews seem to say it has very high quality components which is more important than an extra 2-3% speed from OCing. Any feedback on that, or suggestions for another board? I'll definitely have a number of drives (4 minimum) and I like the two eSATA ports as well, but I'm not tied to nForce 680i vs 965/975 - for me it's just the feature set/quality that got me thinking about the ABit IN9.
Incidentally, my current creaky machine is an FX-51 on an Asus SK8V - it's been OK, although the initial setup was awful (had to download drivers to get Windows to recognize any of the drives - that's just poor design). I really am open to ABit, Asus, EVGA, Tyan, you name it - any and all suggestions are appreciated, I'm hear to learn.
Thanks,
Barry
and go. I realize that may be unrealistic, and I'll download drivers as needed, but, well, simpler is better 
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