Need new motherboard, can someone recommend a replacement? 1

[nate12345]

I currently have an amd athlon 1800 with about 1.2 gigs of ram (3 chips - sdram, two 512s and a 256) and have an agp video card and 3 pci cards & 3 hard drives (300gigs is largest) and a dvd burner (nothing is serial).

The gigabyte motherboard that I have has failed, again... This is the 2nd one over the past few years. Anyways so last time it failed I just went and got another one, but this time I want to get another brand. I currently have the Gigabyte GA-7ZXR, I'm not sure what version.

Can someone recommend a replacement that's a higher quality and will be fit all of the components I mentioned above. I'm thinking the sdram will limit what boards it's compatible with. If you can tell me what model # to buy so I can just go on eBay and get it that would be great. Thanks,

Nate

 

[paparazi]

nate12345
Lets concentrate on chipsets first!
For socket "A" the best and fastest were the Nvidia Nforce2 and Via's KT KT880 (this via chipset came a little late to make any real challenge to the NF2 but is every bit as good)

So my suggestions:

Asus A7V880 or A7N8X-X

MSI K7N2 Delta2 series

Abit KW7 or NF7-S v2.0

DFI LANPARTY NFII ULTRA series

Any of these FULL sized ATX motherboards would be a good choice.
Martin



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[nate12345]

Thanks so much Martin, that's exactly what I needed to know =)

 

[paparazi]

I was just going to add that all these boards were amongst the more expensive for socket "A" but obviously with the introduction of newer 754/936 64bit these products have been reduced in price considerably.
If they are still too much for your budget look at Via KT600 chipset equiped boards, this chipset turned out to be used on many "budget" boards but is only marginally slower than the other two mentioned but was absolutely "ROCK SOLID"
This chipset, like the NF2 and KT880, supports the fastest socket "A" processors, all the way upto and including the "Barton core" XP3200+ with 400front side bus.

Cheap examples with this chipset eg:

http://www.asrock.com/product/product_k7vt6-C.htm

MSI V series (value)

http://www.msi.com.tw/program/products/mainboard/mbd/pro_mbd_detail.php?UID=511

Abit again Value

http://www.abit-usa.com/products/mb/products.php?categories=1&model=230

And although you may feel a bit anti Gigabyte I know this particular board from them is rock solid (again Gigabytes value line called RZ)

http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/MotherBoard/Products/Products_7VT600-RZ.htm

What you have to appreciate with all these motherboards is they are "LATE AND VERY MATURE" socket A products.
Because socket "A" was around for so long each chipset and mainboard manufacturer had several years in which to evolve both chipset and motherboard design making "late" socket "A" boards amongst the most reliable out there.
The drivers for Nforce2/KT880 and KT600 have had so many updates which again means they are rock solid.
Compare this to your early socket "A" board and things have come along way.
Martin

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