Biostar M7VIG - Great Budget System Board

[Mallow]

Biostar @ Newegg.com

I just built 3 system with this board. I couldn't be happier. They have built in LAN (altho newegg doesn't say it does - I was please with the surprise! ), built in S3 Savage 4 Video, built in Audio AC 97 Audio, DDR DIMM slots and SDRAM DIMM (for the super budget ), AGP and 3 PCI slots. Low on the PCI slots but hey, what would you really need to put into a budget system w/ all that onboard stuff.

I know the onboard stuff isn't top notch but as this thread was titled, budget system board so no crapping on that plz

I just thought I'd spread my good experiences with this mobo to other budget builders



ps. Does anyone have experience with this board for budget systems? K7T Turbo

 

[mechBgon]

Thanks for the heads-up I fixed a dead HP with one of Biostar's all-in-one VIA-based Celeron boards, and that worked out pretty well too (for office use). Rather funny how the boards with the most built-in stuff cost the least, huh?

 

[eplebnista]

 

[Buz2b]

ps. Does anyone have experience with this board for budget systems? K7T Turbo

If you mean the K7T TURBO2 (6330-250), yes. I built one for my wife's main system. It works well, is stable and has good upgrade path as far as the CPU goes. The only limiting factor is PC133 RAM but cram in bunches and you don't notice.

 

[Parrotheader]

Just wanted to dig up this thread and see if anybody else had any comments on this board. I'm thinking about upgrading one of my P3-based systems to an AMD-based system and this little board seemed like a great candiate since it's only $61 at Nutrend. This is my primary rig that I use mostly for work at home, a little gaming, and increasingly use for DIVX encoding (main reason I'm looking at upgrading.) So I need a board that fits the following:

-CHEAP (I don't NEED to upgrade, I'd just LIKE to upgrade for as cheap as possible)
-Not too picky about power supplies (mine's a generic 300-watt model)
-Support for 100/133 SDRAM as well as DDR (I'll upgrade to DDR eventually)
-Support for the current top speed XPs so I can max it out eventually. (I'm planning on a 1600-1800 for now)

It looks like the biggest drawback to this one is minimal PCI slots. But if the integrated LAN works that'll scratch one slot I need. The only other thing on that system I'll need a PCI slot for is the sound card. So 3 should be plenty. I just don't know all that much about Biostar and couldn't find any review for this particular board aside from the customer feedback on Newegg. I've heard the ECS boards can be flaky which is why I'm sort of leaning away from the ECS special at Newegg.

 

[dbwillis]

Not exactly on topic, but I use the Biostar M6VLQ board for my server, runs very nice, onboard everything is nice too.
Havent had any problems with it

 

[Buz2b]

Yeah, no reviews found either. FWIW (and that aint much), it is listed on the AMD Recommended MB list. However, that list is for Durons. I haven't checked otherwise.