Discussions about anything Computer Hardware Related. Overclocking, underclocking and talk about the latest or even the oldest technology. PCA Reviews feedback
I can get just about any board I want, so what one??
I game and will be getting a 2100 cpu. RAID must, nothing on board but willing to trade off sound for a better board. will be using win2k and 1gig of DDR
I have really enjoyed my Soyo Dragon Plus. It has the 266a chipset , C-Media onbaord sound , VIA onboard nic, and an onboard Promise Raid controler that can do Raid of be used as extra IDE ports. Tho onboard sound is as good if not better than my SBLive was and the system looks very clean as I use all the onboard stuff so only have the AGP card installed no PCI at all.
No, no, not an abit. I ahve the iwill xp333 and have no problems with it all. Everything about this board and building this system has been painless. So painless in fact it was boring.
Go with anything that doesn't have a via chipset.
I'm not lazy by nature, I work very hard at being lazy.
I'm with dadx2mj on this, check out the Dragon+. I too have only an AGP card installed and use all the on-board stuff. The sound quality is great, and the 10/100 works excellent.
The Iwill is a great board but the chipset has a few problems. The memory preformance is about 4-5% slower than VIA chipsets, given it isn't noticeable that much still. Also ATA133 RAID has some preformance issues. Otherwise the Iwill is a great board. I'm going to be changing to either an Abit KR7A-RAID or a Shuttle AK35GTR. I've had Abit boards in the past and loved them but sometimes you gotta try a new thing, although I'll probably go with the Abit.
I third the motion for the Dragon+. I have been using it for only a week now but its already the best board I've ever had. I use the onboard sound and NIC as well and am extemely pleased. I thought it was very easy to setup and has been running stable for a week (24/7).
AMD XP1800
Soyo SY-K7V Dragon+
VisionTek GeForce 4 TI4600
Onboard Audio
Onboard NIC
TDK 52X Burner
Aopen 16X DVD
512mb Crucial 2100
NEC MultiSync FE950+
Generic Aluminum Colored case with modded side fan
Originally posted by JonasWorld I third the motion for the Dragon+. I have been using it for only a week now but its already the best board I've ever had. I use the onboard sound and NIC as well and am extemely pleased. I thought it was very easy to setup and has been running stable for a week (24/7).
The reason I didn't mention the Dragon+ or the ak35gtr is that he says in his post that he doesn't want all that o/b stuff. Just RAID. If that's the case, the Abit is a good play, especially if cash on hand is not an issue. Nuthin' but a good RAID controller and a bunch of PCI slots. That's not to say these others mentioned aren't quality stuff.
That is the one thing i'll give Abit props for is not putting all that onboard garbage on their boards... These days you pretty much are stuck with onboard sound. And the cmedia ain't bad. But ti would be nice if it wasn't present at all...
I have been running this board with ZERO problems for about three weeks now without a glitch whatsoever. MSI's are not very good OC'ers, but if you want stability its hard to beat.