Building a new Asus A7N266-VM AA

[gujuguy007]

Hi,

I'm trying to build a new computer for my parents...something decently inexpensive with the Asus A7N266-VM AA MB. Probable cost is around 250-300 bucks. The motherboard looks great from what I have read and newegg has a good price. I have a 30 gb hard drive already that I plan to transfer to the new comp as well as install XP. I was wondering what would be a good AMD processor speed that will run on this MB and what type of memory should I get? Also, should there be any complications that I should be aware of before I put the pieces together? Thanks to anybody that can help.

 

[mechBgon]

I did a brain dump of my A7N266-VM info in this thread.

For those who may come across this thread later, if the link above doesn't work, the thread got archived and can be found here: archived

I built a system for my dad out of my trusty A7N266-VM and picked an AthlonXP 1700+. With WinXP, I would go with 384Mb+ of RAM so the OS has elbow room to cache apps after they've been opened the first time.

 

[gujuguy007]

thanks mechBgon...link really helped.

 

[mechBgon]

Sure thing

 

[gujuguy007]

I also had one more question...do u know of any cases w/ps that would be ok to use...i belive the board is micro ATX...I've have used enlight previously and works great...would 300 ps be enough if i dont plan to OC.

 

[mechBgon]

If it's a quality 300W PSU like Enlight, Sparkle Power, Antec or Enermax, then it should be fine, yeah. For my dad's system I picked something rather deluxe-ish, an Antec Plus660AMG which comes with the nice Antec TruePower330 unit. Quiet, high quality and a 3-year warranty, with two dual-ball-bearing fans for long life (meaning, in the PSU). It isn't easy to make yourself buy a $100 case/PSU but I decided it was worth it to me.

edit: btw, we use that case for the ones at work too... specs

 

[pcmax]

Enlights are good cases, just about any case microATX or otherwise would be fine. I run my A7N266-VM with a 185 watt PS(all it has room for in the crappy little microATX case I picked up for free, the PS is from an Inwin microATX case though), and XP1600, 512 DDR, and 1-2 hard drives at any given time in my game server. As long as your not going to stick an additional AGP card in it which it sounds like your not, any decent PS will work but the bigger the better.

 

[vicvon]

Give this one a try. I have used it on several lower priced builds I have done and the included 300w ps has worked perfect every time. A couple of those builds were with the A7N-266.


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[gujuguy007]

thanks..you guys helped alot..i'll give u an update when i put the comp together.

 

[Frangelina]

My little Angelina run a 1600xp and 256 crucial 2100 on a MSI KM266 MicroATX with 3D Savage integrated in an Enlight Desktop case for MicroATX (newegg) an the original PS of one hundred something. It works very stable since June 2002. I build one with the VM-AA in January and it works as good in an Antec minitower (revolution I think) at 60 bucks with USB connectors around the power switch. Do not buy that case if you want to use the external USB connectors. There are two. The one on top is so fragile that I think the connector will come out one day when unpluging.

 

[Frangelina]

If later on you want crank up their XP to 2600, and you feel unsecure with the original PS, you can always replace it with a PCpowerandcooling.com turbocool that upgrade it. Take the one with 110 connector under the fan. The other one with the connector beside is made to replace the e-machines one when you upgrade one of them with new MB/ram/cpu. They are both at 45 bucks.