Mobo Replacement

[Volk359]

Greetings all,

I purchased a bunch of components from Newegg, put it all together and found out they had sent a bad motherboard. They were gracious (and speedy) about refunding it but wouldn't replace it as it was either out of stock or discontinued.

I liked the board, other then the IDE cable was too short, but not sure what to replace it with. Any recommendations? I'm using a raid card and would like to have firewire on the board (for video capture) or am I better off getting a firewire card, too? Also, will I need to re-install XP when I have the system back up and running?

Specs:

GIGABYTE GA-P35-DS3L LGA 775 Intel P35 ATX Intel Motherboard
Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 Conroe 2.66GHz LGA 775 Processor Model BX80557E6750
Patriot Extreme Performance 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800
GeForce 8800GTS 640MB 320-bit GDDR3

Thanks in advance

 

[ArizonaGeek]

I'd suggest the Abit AB9-Pro with SATA RAID (RAID 0-1-5) on board and Firewire as well. I got the AB9-Pro about a year ago and it has been great. Again, the IDE is a bit short but I got a round IDE cable for my DVD burner and that was plenty long enough. Just my 2 cents from experience. I am sure there will be others with just as good of a board.

I can tell you for SURE to stay away from PC Chips and ECS (same company)they are garbage!

Cheers
Rob

The answer is always "PEBKAC!

 

[wahnula]

Check out paparazi's recommendations here:

thread602-1417925

Can't go wrong if Martin likes it!

Tony

"If it can't take it, I don't want it

 

[paparazi]

That particular thread was constrained by the user asking for an SLI compliant board which meant Nvidia 650/680i chipset.
The 680i is indeed a good chipset but given the choice I would have probably recommended Intels P35 chipset although the differences are very marginal and the performance and feature set for both chipsets are near identical. Both have been released several months now, the 680i slightly older, both have been out long enough to have ironed out bios problems(one is crossfire the other SLi)there is very little in it.

Abit IP35 or IP35 PRO

http://www.uabit.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=32&Itemid=48&page=1&model=382

Asus one of the P5K series see:

http://usa.asus.com/products.aspx?l1=3&l2=11&l3=534

MSI P35 platinum

http://www.msicomputer.com/product/p_spec.asp?model=P35_Platinum&class=mb

Martin






We like members to GIVE and not just TAKE.
Participate and help others.

 

[Volk359]

Good info guys, thanks.

 

[paparazi]

FYI
Intel X38 equipt boards are now appearing, this chipset has an even more impressive feature set and DDR3 memory but to be honest...too new to recommend at this time.

Martin

We like members to GIVE and not just TAKE.
Participate and help others.

 

[Kofy]

Dont forget that if you purchase a new motherboard to ensure the Power supply is compatible... for example does the PS have SLI cabling? 20/24 pin compatibility? I found out my less than a year old ps was not compatible with newest mobo's due to no sli.

 

[SpiderElls82]

Have to agree with ArizonaGeek on this one. Even tho he is from AZ (Steeler's fan here). That company is about as worthless as a poopy flavored lollypop. Good luck with your choices. There are plenty of good ones in this thread.

Ben