did you guys see the review for SS51 XPC? Pretty good, hopefully gonnabe even better without bugs in new rev.
crabbyman
Senior member
- Jul 24, 2002
- 529
- 1
- 76
Is money that big of an issue? I have recently purchased a MSI k7n420.......I have been hearing good things about it for a while...except overclocking which you arent worried about. I thought about getting one of those two other nForce boards but decided to go with the MSI for better features. Its listed at about $120 right now.
well yeah, I wanted to spend around 70-90 bucks. I like the Epox KM266 board a lot now also. Decisions Decisions...
I think it'll either be the Epox KM266 or the Asus nForce 220 (the abit seems to have disappeared from pricewatch at the $85 range)
I think it'll either be the Epox KM266 or the Asus nForce 220 (the abit seems to have disappeared from pricewatch at the $85 range)
Just to throw in my $.02
I bought a GigaByte GA-7VKML based on VIA KM266 chipset ($69), paired up with XP1600+, Enlight 7602 mini-blue case.
1. The 90mm fan in the rear (not the one in PS) provide adequate cooling for the case. The fan came installed to take-in air (blow into case), but I switched it around to blow hot air out of case. Fan is kinda loud in either configuration.
2. HDD cage, 3.5" cage are all well designed and easy to work with.
3. So far no problem with the 300W PS, I have DVD, CDRW, floppy, 60GB Maxtor HDD, Adaptec 2940 SCSI PCI, Creative Labs modemblaster 56PCI installed.
4. Graphics (GPU) shares from main memory, capable to use 32MB of the main memory. So far I'm happy with the performance, Warcraft 3 runs fine in default video setting; which is set to medinum for all details.
i bought this board because I can't find any nv7m or a7n266-VM mobo locally. If I had the choice, I would get Abit nv7m because it has the best performance plus the price difference isn't all that great. nv7m is the only one with dual channel DDR memory, but this requires you to install two identical DDR sticks.
I bought a GigaByte GA-7VKML based on VIA KM266 chipset ($69), paired up with XP1600+, Enlight 7602 mini-blue case.
1. The 90mm fan in the rear (not the one in PS) provide adequate cooling for the case. The fan came installed to take-in air (blow into case), but I switched it around to blow hot air out of case. Fan is kinda loud in either configuration.
2. HDD cage, 3.5" cage are all well designed and easy to work with.
3. So far no problem with the 300W PS, I have DVD, CDRW, floppy, 60GB Maxtor HDD, Adaptec 2940 SCSI PCI, Creative Labs modemblaster 56PCI installed.
4. Graphics (GPU) shares from main memory, capable to use 32MB of the main memory. So far I'm happy with the performance, Warcraft 3 runs fine in default video setting; which is set to medinum for all details.
i bought this board because I can't find any nv7m or a7n266-VM mobo locally. If I had the choice, I would get Abit nv7m because it has the best performance plus the price difference isn't all that great. nv7m is the only one with dual channel DDR memory, but this requires you to install two identical DDR sticks.
mechBgon
Super Moderator<br>Elite Member
- Oct 31, 1999
- 30,699
- 1
- 0
For the record, we added four A7N266-VM's to our work fleet. The head of the Fiscal department got one with an AthlonXP 1800+ and 256Mb of PC2100, to replace her Pentium3 933 with 256Mb of PC133. She sent an email saying "this new computer's great... it's so fast, if I blink I miss what it's doing." Considering the gargantuan spreadsheets she works with, that's music to my ears 
So for standard 2D office-style work, the single-channel DDR setup seems to be adequate. The absence of the dual-channel memory controller sounds like more of a negative if you're going to use the onboard video for 3D stuff like games, at which point you would be wanting a separate AGP card anyway, if you cared about performance. Still, the Abit board has the dual-channel controller going for it. I've been leery of Abit due to some aspects of their customer support in the past, however.
So for standard 2D office-style work, the single-channel DDR setup seems to be adequate. The absence of the dual-channel memory controller sounds like more of a negative if you're going to use the onboard video for 3D stuff like games, at which point you would be wanting a separate AGP card anyway, if you cared about performance. Still, the Abit board has the dual-channel controller going for it. I've been leery of Abit due to some aspects of their customer support in the past, however.
Originally posted by: mechBgon
For the record, we added four A7N266-VM's to our work fleet. The head of the Fiscal department got one with an AthlonXP 1800+ and 256Mb of PC2100, to replace her Pentium3 933 with 256Mb of PC133. She sent an email saying "this new computer's great... it's so fast, if I blink I miss what it's doing." Considering the gargantuan spreadsheets she works with, that's music to my ears
So for standard 2D office-style work, the single-channel DDR setup seems to be adequate. The absence of the dual-channel memory controller sounds like more of a negative if you're going to use the onboard video for 3D stuff like games, at which point you would be wanting a separate AGP card anyway, if you cared about performance. Still, the Abit board has the dual-channel controller going for it. I've been leery of Abit due to some aspects of their customer support in the past, however.
I agree, if you want to play older or slowwer moving games then the KM266 is what you want. If you want something faster video and better sound go with the nForce.
I play a fair amount of games so I would go with the nForce, but if you need an all round system and have to save all your pennies, then get the KM266 board.
So does everyone seem to feel that the nForce boards are better suited for LAN boxes or other gaming pcs; while the KM266 would be just fine for a file / media server??
- JH
- JH
If you want to use the built-in video, the Abit NV7-m is the way to go because of the dual (Twin-bank) memory controllers. If you have a seperate video card, there is very little or no difference between the 220 and 420 nvidia chipsets in terms of performance. The Asus board does have features that might be worth it such as CPU overheating protection (it reads the temps directly off the XP's) and locking the AGP/PCI clocks when OC'in the FSB. If you get the Inwin micro-ATX case with the 180w PSU (like this)
the CD-rom drive would be blocking the CPU heatsink/fan with the Abit NV7-m; you would need a low profile HSF in order to make it work. This is not a problem with the Asus since the CPU socket is located nearer the PSU and is therefore not blocked by the CD drive.
the CD-rom drive would be blocking the CPU heatsink/fan with the Abit NV7-m; you would need a low profile HSF in order to make it work. This is not a problem with the Asus since the CPU socket is located nearer the PSU and is therefore not blocked by the CD drive.
CubicZirconia
Diamond Member
- Nov 24, 2001
- 5,193
- 0
- 71
- Aug 22, 2001
- 31,774
- 31,782
- 146
Just as an update I now have a A7N266-VM (the Abit was out of stock when I needed it ) and it's rock solid and has excellent performance for onboard video (2136 3DMark2001 S.E.) using XP1600+ and 256 Crucial 2100DDR. I suggest pairing it with the XP as the 1ghzMorgan I had in it was dogging badly in memory bandwidth running asynchronously and I never tried it with the mem@100mhz, BTW the audio is superb. EDIT: I also would run something newer than 98S.E. on it as the install was tedious and the board didn't really like it.....
) and it's rock solid and has excellent performance for onboard video (2136 3DMark2001 S.E.) using XP1600+ and 256 Crucial 2100DDR. I suggest pairing it with the XP as the 1ghzMorgan I had in it was dogging badly in memory bandwidth running asynchronously and I never tried it with the mem@100mhz, BTW the audio is superb. EDIT: I also would run something newer than 98S.E. on it as the install was tedious and the board didn't really like it.....The performance of the 220's built-in video should be between a GF2 MX200 and a regular MX while the 420 should be between a regular MX and an MX400( provided you have two sticks of memory; one stick just makes it a 220). This more than decent for a built-in solution. SIS chipset mobos with the built-in SIS 315 performas about the same as a regular MX, maybe a bit less because of the shared bandwidth.
mechBgon
Super Moderator<br>Elite Member
- Oct 31, 1999
- 30,699
- 1
- 0
I may post this in a separate thread for those interested, but I've been doing some experimentation with an A7N266-VM as compared to a K7S5A and an A7V333-RAID.
The A7V333-R is my own computer that I use at work. It has an Adaptec 19160 Ultra160 SCSI card and a 15000rpm Seagate Cheetah X15-36LP hard drive... yummy! However, using Adaptec EZ-SCSI's SCSIBench, the same-sector transfer rate from the hard drive is being bottlenecked at 72Mb/sec. If I enable the onboard VIA USB 2.0 controller, that drops to about 50Mb/sec, which is ridiculous for a drive whose SUSTAINED transfer rate is just below 60Mb/sec.
I stuck my 19160 and Cheetah in my K7S5A to see how the performance compared. Same-sector transfer rates jumped to 101Mb/sec! :Q Then I dumped 'em into an A7V266-VM system and got almost 105Mb/sec! :Q:Q Those rates are at 64kb block size and I boosted it to 256kb and the rate exceeds 121Mb/sec. Daaaang... nVidia is laying the smax0r down on VIA in terms of PCI bus efficiency here. And who knows what's up with that wacky USB 2.0 controller issue...
If the A7N266-VM gives up anything in memory performance compared to the KT333 or KT266A chipsets, it looks like it gives it back in spades with SCSI. Burst-rate improvements of 35Mb/sec to 50Mb/sec are righteous!
The A7V333-R is my own computer that I use at work. It has an Adaptec 19160 Ultra160 SCSI card and a 15000rpm Seagate Cheetah X15-36LP hard drive... yummy!
However, using Adaptec EZ-SCSI's SCSIBench, the same-sector transfer rate from the hard drive is being bottlenecked at 72Mb/sec. If I enable the onboard VIA USB 2.0 controller, that drops to about 50Mb/sec, which is ridiculous for a drive whose SUSTAINED transfer rate is just below 60Mb/sec. I stuck my 19160 and Cheetah in my K7S5A to see how the performance compared. Same-sector transfer rates jumped to 101Mb/sec! :Q Then I dumped 'em into an A7V266-VM system and got almost 105Mb/sec! :Q
:Q Those rates are at 64kb block size and I boosted it to 256kb and the rate exceeds 121Mb/sec. Daaaang... nVidia is laying the smax0r down on VIA in terms of PCI bus efficiency here. And who knows what's up with that wacky USB 2.0 controller issue... If the A7N266-VM gives up anything in memory performance compared to the KT333 or KT266A chipsets, it looks like it gives it back in spades with SCSI. Burst-rate improvements of 35Mb/sec to 50Mb/sec are righteous!
With my A7N266-C and Highpoint IDE RAID controller (RAID 0 on two 40gig Maxtor 7200rpm drives) I get a score of 44519 on Sandra's file system benchmark and consistently over 40000kps under HDtach read tests. The same combo ( same CPU, memory, etc..) on my KR7A (VIA KT266A chipset) could never get that high, hovering around 35-36k under the Sandra and around 36000kps under HDtach.
Originally posted by: mechBgon
I may post this in a separate thread for those interested, but I've been doing some experimentation with an A7N266-VM as compared to a K7S5A and an A7V333-RAID.
The A7V333-R is my own computer that I use at work. It has an Adaptec 19160 Ultra160 SCSI card and a 15000rpm Seagate Cheetah X15-36LP hard drive... yummy!
I stuck my 19160 and Cheetah in my K7S5A to see how the performance compared. Same-sector transfer rates jumped to 101Mb/sec! :Q Then I dumped 'em into an A7V266-VM system and got almost 105Mb/sec! :Q
If the A7N266-VM gives up anything in memory performance compared to the KT333 or KT266A chipsets, it looks like it gives it back in spades with SCSI. Burst-rate improvements of 35Mb/sec to 50Mb/sec are righteous!
Thanks for this!
duuuma:
I've built several 6390L based systems for people and have one myself and it's a very well-designed board. (you may have noticed that I always recommend this mobo to people on here.) I've never had any troule with it and you'll find that it has lots of little touches that make it stand out. An extremely stable board, and a great value. If you don't care about overclocking and don't need fancy 3D or are planning to stick an agp card in, it's the board to have!
I've built several 6390L based systems for people and have one myself and it's a very well-designed board. (you may have noticed that I always recommend this mobo to people on here.) I've never had any troule with it and you'll find that it has lots of little touches that make it stand out. An extremely stable board, and a great value. If you don't care about overclocking and don't need fancy 3D or are planning to stick an agp card in, it's the board to have!
wow, thanks for all the replies, you guys have really lit this thread up....even though i did buy the Asus board about 3 weeks ago, and it has ran very well!
I've paired the nForce board with a Duron 950, 256mb PNY PC2100 and a Maxtor D740x 40gig hd while using the onboard LAN, Sound, and Geforce video.
The onboard features are perfect for my girlfriend (who i built it for) and her needs AND it saved a heck of a lot of money while being very excellent solutions. However, I think I will eventually swap out the Duron for a XP chip. The computer runs rock solid with WinXP also, usually being on for a week at a time.
In terms of games, I haven't tried anything yet ( b/c she'll probably get pissed ) but it did clock a 1500 on 3dmark2001, which really doesn't inspire me to play any games on it.
I bought it from mwave for $85 shipped and am very happy with it! My next system will probably be another nforce board, maybe the nforce2? anyone making it yet??
I've paired the nForce board with a Duron 950, 256mb PNY PC2100 and a Maxtor D740x 40gig hd while using the onboard LAN, Sound, and Geforce video.
The onboard features are perfect for my girlfriend (who i built it for) and her needs AND it saved a heck of a lot of money while being very excellent solutions. However, I think I will eventually swap out the Duron for a XP chip. The computer runs rock solid with WinXP also, usually being on for a week at a time.
In terms of games, I haven't tried anything yet ( b/c she'll probably get pissed
) but it did clock a 1500 on 3dmark2001, which really doesn't inspire me to play any games on it.I bought it from mwave for $85 shipped and am very happy with it! My next system will probably be another nforce board, maybe the nforce2? anyone making it yet??
I'm another pleased person who built an ASUS A7N266-VM for someone else. I couldn't make it crash with the stuff I tried. It feels fast.
Compared to a Geforce2 MX on an ECS K7S5A, the 3D-game video is definately smoother, maybe because the nForce 220 accesses AGP for built-in video at at 100MHz (but still 66MHz if using the AGP slot) and a Geforce2 MX uses SDR memory vs DDR for nForce.
I liked the on-board sound. It can do 6 channels if you find where to make the settings.
Nvidia has drivers billed as all-in-one at its site, one for Windows 98 and one for XP. I'd advise using this instead of the ASUS drivers CD. The one for XP worked fine if I applied to a clean install of XP. (Things got nuts when at first I applied tbe new one over the Asus supplied things.) All the drivers were done in one shot; memory controller, AGP, LAN, sound, and video. Everything worked fine inclucing the LAN.
ASUS supplies a program that will monitor the fans and temps. Somebody said ASUS uses the on-chip diode for XPs.
Compared to a Geforce2 MX on an ECS K7S5A, the 3D-game video is definately smoother, maybe because the nForce 220 accesses AGP for built-in video at at 100MHz (but still 66MHz if using the AGP slot) and a Geforce2 MX uses SDR memory vs DDR for nForce.
I liked the on-board sound. It can do 6 channels if you find where to make the settings.
Nvidia has drivers billed as all-in-one at its site, one for Windows 98 and one for XP. I'd advise using this instead of the ASUS drivers CD. The one for XP worked fine if I applied to a clean install of XP. (Things got nuts when at first I applied tbe new one over the Asus supplied things.) All the drivers were done in one shot; memory controller, AGP, LAN, sound, and video. Everything worked fine inclucing the LAN.
ASUS supplies a program that will monitor the fans and temps. Somebody said ASUS uses the on-chip diode for XPs.
I am also one of those person waiting patiently for the nForce2 mobo. I hate when nVidia release the press release a month ago, and product won't be in the channel for another two weeks from now. Com'on, that's like 8 weeks wait for people that really wanted this board!! My patience is running thin everyday.
well after my first great experience with the Asus A7N266-VM, i'm building TWO more systems with this board for friends. This time, i've got a bigger budget, so we're gonna go with at least XP1700+ or above coupled with Radeon 8500.
I can't wait for Asus to come out with nForce2...hopefully by xmas time I'll have a new system too!
I can't wait for Asus to come out with nForce2...hopefully by xmas time I'll have a new system too!
I can't recommend anything Abit at this time... I have 5 dead Abit mobos because of the crappy caps they have on the boards. This is the only manufacturer that I have had this problem with.
Geoff
Geoff
TRENDING THREADS
-
Discussion Zen 5 Speculation (EPYC Turin and Strix Point/Granite Ridge - Ryzen 9000)- Started by DisEnchantment
- Replies: 25K
-
Discussion Intel Meteor, Arrow, Lunar & Panther Lakes Discussion Threads
- Started by Tigerick
- Replies: 21K
-
Discussion Intel current and future Lakes & Rapids thread- Started by TheF34RChannel
- Replies: 23K
-
-
Facebook
Twitter