So my Socket 939 outfit is looking old and grey.

So I figure, unroll the local brick-and-mortar's circular and pick out a cheap mainboard and CPU package.

This week, I could get, for about USD 260, a Q6600 and board, or for 200(!), a 6400+ and board.

The problem is: the boards are truly catastrophes. In the past, you'd get boring boards-- the usual cutdowns you'd see on the budget boards were in support, fan headers, and RAID, but there'd be "enough" to build a reasonable system around. Now, we're seeing this sort of thing: /ECSWebSite

Now, I have nothing against ECS boards on principle, or SiS chipsets. I had several K7S5As in the day, and a K7VTA3 8.0 (yes, VIA chipset, but still an ECS product) is still running downstairs.

These boards, though-- of the boards I've seen on special lately, they've all had spectacular problems like (subsets of this list)

-Only one PATA channel
-uATX
-Only two DIMM sockets (fine in the days of single channel RAM-- NOT NOW)
-Only two SATA sockets (IMO, the minimal safe configuration is 4SATA+1PATA -- allowing you to use either SATA or PATA opticals)
-No Parallel port

So fine, I'll take a look at Newegg or similar. Their selection of cheap boards has many similar horror stories. PT880 boards with PCI-Ex4 slots. Enough Geforce 6100 boards to make you scream. Plenty of 775 boards which apparently can't use memory over DDR2-667 (that can't do great things for performance) And again, much of the cheap options are uATX.

What happened to the low-end, non-integrated video, ATX board? Why can't you even get a board as well-outfitted storage wise as my $80 ASRock 939SLI32 is (two PATA, four SATA)? I'm already annoyed that I'll have to blow $70 or so to replace the RAM (as there's no C2D or AM2 boards with FOUR DDR400 sockets)-- I don't want to have to either spend $20 on a clumsy adaptor or $75 on a new hard disc if I can avoid it.

And who else does decent mainboard package deals, perhaps with better selections than the local brick-and-mortar?

I'm about ready to just snag a (Asus) ASRock AM2CPU Board Cpu Upgrade card for AsRock K8 / 939 MotherBoards(S939 To AM2) (Retail), create a comical cooling nightmare in my case, and resort to beta BIOSes to get to wedge a 6400+ on a 939 board.

Give Thrasher enough time, he'll find ya something good for relatively cheap...

YO! THRASHER!!! Bring out the deals, brother!!!

Just to keep your sanity stay away from PC Chips Boards... I mean they work... but configuring them the first time and finding drivers is about as fun as trying to kill yourself with a powerdrill...

PCChips ~ ECS from what I understand. I'm not sure how much overlap there is now, but there used to be a lot.

I had a M807 (badged Amptron on the box), which was sold basically the same as the ECS K7VZA, and the ECS K7S5A was sold as the M830.

There are only two big problems with PCChips and ECS:

1. Low-feature boards. They typically don't give you the bag of 92 cables and four pounds of pack-in software, 200 extra USB ports, diagnostic LEDs, etc. For a brief while, ECS seemed to be aiming for the enthusiast market, but have given up lately. But reasonably fine, as long as you have moderate needs. (I always thought "one PATA hard disc, two PATA opticals" was moderate needs. Guess not anymore. :/)

2. Lack of support. You're lucky to get two or three BIOS revisions out of them, especially if you have an unpopular model. Of course, the same is true with ASRock (why did you forsake the 939SLI32?) and probably many other makes.

Well no complains with Hardware for PC Chips or Asus... But both of their software support sucks so hard... with PC Chips being worse.

How about this green monster? Has 4 ram slots, but one pata, no parallel port :-/

XFX nForce 680i LT SLI Motherboard CPU Bundle - Intel Pentium D 925 Processor 3.0GHz OEM at TigerDirect.com

$160 after rebate

This Vista Ready motherboard features the NVIDIA nForce 680i LT SLI MCP Chipset. It supports RAID 0, 1, 0+1, 5 setups and SATA components. Other features include Dual Onboard LAN, 8 possible USB ports, and NVIDIA technologies like FirstPacket, MediaShield Storage, nTune Utility, and more.
- Chipset: NVIDIA GeForce 680i LT SLI MCP
- Front Side Bus: 1333MHz
- Processor Interface: Socket 775

The Intel Pentium D Processor 900 Sequence features a dual-core design with two complete processor cores that each run at the same speed in, in one physical package, featuring Intel Virtualization Technology. Enabled platforms can run multiple operating systems and/or applications in independent partitions or environments for improved security and remote mangeability.- Processor Speed: 925 /3.0GHz
- Cache Size: 4MB
- Processor Socket: Socket 775

Review
Bjorn3d.com -XFX 680i LT SLI, Satisfying Your Daily Tech Cravings Since 1996

When I built my AM2 system a while back I got a Biostar board for $70 that was great. Was basically a 550 chipset with integrated video. Wasn't lacking in any area and was a great overclocker.

Newegg's got a Biostar nForce 570 for $88 which is a pretty good deal. It's only got one PATA slot and no parrallel but frankly almost nothing comes with parrallel ports anymore. And I seem to remeber an Anandtech review that found it was a beast of an overclocker.

Quote: Originally Posted by Seyeklopz How about this green monster? Has 4 ram slots, but one pata, no parallel port :-/ XFX nForce 680i LT SLI Motherboard CPU Bundle - Intel Pentium D 925 Processor 3.0GHz OEM at TigerDirect.com

Sorry... I should indicate, I suppose, that I'm coming from a 4600+. What's the 925 equal to? a 3600+? (can't quite suppress the AMD fanboy in me)

Quote: Originally Posted by Hak Foo Sorry... I should indicate, I suppose, that I'm coming from a 4600+. What's the 925 equal to? a 3600+? (can't quite suppress the AMD fanboy in me)

I think it's a bit slower at stock...but the 925 will overclock like crazy. I think Digi had one that he was very happy with.

My overclocking experience tends to be disappointing (that's the other thing bargain mainboards lack: voltage tweaks-- my current one will let me undervolt the CPU to 0.800, but not one tick over 1.40) so I like robust stock performance.

Howabout this ABIT. Once you update the BIOS is's a great motherboard and again it's got everything you want bar a parrallel port.

Looks okay, but I think I've talked myself out of the Q6600... I'm figuring:

-70 for 2Gb of DDR2-800 (75 if I want CAS4, 65 or possibly less for CAS5-- DDR1 never had these terrible latencies o.O)

-80 or so for a hard disc

adds a big chunk to the price.

There's a $70 difference between a 6400+ and a Q6600. However, the E6750 is $20 less than the 6400+ even. This sounds enticing, but I'm even less familiar with the LGA775 offerings than the AM2 ones (I was going to build a C2D box for work, but then decided to be nice to the company's budget and went for an AM2 4200+). I understand P35 is good, but beyond that, I'm out of the loop (the last Intel build I did was a Celeron 533MHz)

:ponders:

E6750 retail box (Newegg.com - Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 Conroe 2.66GHz 4M shared L2 Cache LGA 775 Processor - Retail)
Gigabyte DS3L (Newegg.com - GIGABYTE GA-P35-DS3L LGA 775 Intel P35 ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail) -- like the legacy ports, decrying the lack of Firewire)
2Gb of Geil DDR2-800 (Newegg.com - GeIL 2GB (2 x 1GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 800 (PC2 6400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory - Retail) -- the cheapest with a heatspreader
250Gb Seagate 7200.10 (Newegg.com - Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3250310AS 250GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM) -- just for the warranty factor

It all comes home for 418.30 and change.

Thoughts (I haven't spent this much on an upgrade in a long time... probably since I went Athlon 64 in the first place):


I could save about $4 by going for the Abit IP35 you mentioned, but then I lose my legacy ports. I can't see anything the IP-35 offers, though, that the Gigabyte doesn't... it's just less.

I hate to say it, but I could also trim a full $20 by going with the Elitegroup P35T-A... which, although also devoid of legacy ports, gives you a nice "physical X16, electrical X4" second big PCI-E slot, six internal SATA and one eSATA port. The other big appeal there is it pulls it below the 400.- threshold.

The big issues I could see:

-Will I be dissatisfied with the E6750 in comparison with the 6400+? I'm full aware quad-core is a waste for today's apps, but I'd assume any P35 board will handle it gracefully later. That's a good thing with Phenom compatibility a question-mark.

HWbot is useless for comparing stock performance, and AMD A64 X2 6400+ vs. C2D E6750 / E6850 - Hardware Discussions seems to show it's either a push or a slaughter by the 6400+ depending on the benchmark.


-How's the stock cooler on the Cores? Loud? I could try and affix that Gemini II to it, I suppose. :evil look:


-I know Abit and ECS support (Abit, I really respected their well-run and frank forums, ECS is a joke), but how's Gigabyte? They seem to be really making a play for position in the enthusiast market lately. I have a Gigabyte 7600GS, and it's a nice enough piece of kit.

:looks at their product site: XD they have a RSS feed for BIOSes?

Their BIOS page has a lot of "Fix PS2 keyboard compatibility" listings. I don't have, nor will I want a USB keyboard (IBM Model M for life!)... what's this about? Should I worry? Anyone know if it was indeed fixed?

Well, closed the deal. E6750, 2Gb of DDR2-800, a Seagate 250Gb SATA 7200.10 (the 16M cache version, not the 8M one I linked), and the Abit board. Honestly, the keyboard problems on the Gigabyte made me skittish, and the fact they sold out while I was mulling it closed the deal. The cheaper Abit board allowed me to switch to the 16M cache drive and still come in at 419 and change.

Cross toes now that it doesn't all catch fire.

I'm not knocking ECS or PCChips at all, I have one of their AT (not ATX, old skool AT) CuMine boards with a 1ghz P3.

Some of their boards are rather interesting, I still prefer DFI and my LAN Party board over anything though.

Quote: Originally Posted by j-dogg I'm not knocking ECS or PCChips at all, I have one of their AT (not ATX, old skool AT) CuMine boards with a 1ghz P3.

Well I'm knocking PC Chips and Asus... their software/driver support is terrible compared to what I've seen in other companies (MSI, DFI, etc)

Sure they'll save you money, but if Time is Money then they are more expensive with all the time you'll spend getting it working correctly.

One thing I do admire about the low-end manufacturers is their taste for experimentation. ASRock made many of their K8 boards with a slot to upgrade to AM2 for $40 instead of $80 for a whole new mainboard. I suspect you could probably even do it without a reinstall. Did the first-tier makes do it? Nope.

And you have to admire the sheer engineering effort in the ECS PF88. (Google it).

They also tend to be willing to sample EVERY chipset, an attitude which probably helps keep minor players in play and the big boys honest (you have to admit, someone was probably soiling their pants at nVidia over the ULI chipsets that did SLI)

While , i do agree ECS is a cheap brand ( 90% of thier boards) I have to say they do have thier place in the market. Being a person who is constantly building rigs for budget users and very NON PC type people , spending $150 on a board with features is just not good business. ECS offers a great basic board/cpu combo almost every week at frys for $99 or lessand for a person that just wants to send e-mail and look at the www , they make rock solid systems that wont break the bank.

Yes for most of the users like those here at PCApex , we've moved well beyond the ECS realm , but not everyone out there know what BIOS are or what this or that chipset does, and for some of those people even an ECS board is over the top.

ECS has its place and I for one am glad theres still a board maker out there that will sell you a basic functional product for rock bottom price.

Quote: Originally Posted by HigHTecHReDNecK ECS offers a great basic board/cpu combo almost every week at frys for $99 or lessand for a person that just wants to send e-mail and look at the www , they make rock solid systems that wont break the bank.

But then you have to ask yourself, "Do they really need a new computer, or just need a reinstall of everything?"

I think that computers have really gone farther that almost all users need them to be with the exception of researchers, gamers and multimedia people. I truly believe that most people would be happy with a 1ghz CPU, 512MB of RAM and a 10GB HDD if the people at Best Buy didn't tell them otherwise.

For everyday users, they just want smaller and simpler... *Apple*

Quote: Originally Posted by Dreyco But then you have to ask yourself, "Do they really need a new computer, or just need a reinstall of everything?" I think that computers have really gone farther that almost all users need them to be with the exception of researchers, gamers and multimedia people. I truly believe that most people would be happy with a 1ghz CPU, 512MB of RAM and a 10GB HDD if the people at Best Buy didn't tell them otherwise. For everyday users, they just want smaller and simpler... *Apple*

I agree totally ** well maybe not the Apple part but.......... **