EPOX EP-9NDA3+ or MSI K8N Neo2 Plat?

[Fanny]

I was just wondering what people thought of each mobo and was looking for info on which one I should buy. Please no "OMFG BUUY THIS CUS TEH OTHRE SUXXX" posts

 

[Mrvile]

I haven't tried the Epox but lemme warn you that the MSI one is pretty unstable, you'd need to run a bunch of driver/bios updates before you can get it running properly. Once you do though, it's a beast. Just don't hit it with static like I did and fry it.

 

[PClark99]

Well, I ran my Neo2 right out of the box with absolutely no problems at all.

Of course Epox makes nice boards as well.

 

[tjaisv]

take the msi one, it beats the epox in most benchmarks

 

[ChineseDemocracyGNR]

Originally posted by: tjaisv
take the msi one, it beats the epox in most benchmarks

The difference is so small it's within an error margin.

 

[oldmuggle]

I've only bought ASUS boards before. Out of 4 I had one bad. I received the EP-9NDA3+ this weekend. I really like the board. Unfortunately, mine had an issue with onboard gigabit lan. I got very quick responses from EPOX tech service, but the end result is I have to RMA.

I do recommend the board, hope you have better luck than me.

 

[overclock]

I just ordered the MSI Neo2 Plat from Staples of all places. Item # im1e24895. They pricematched to ZZF with no problem. I got the board for $129. I tacked on some FAR stuff and used a $20 off $150 coupon. My total after I get the rebates and sell the FAR stuff on ebay will be $ 80 for the board. I ordered the 3000+ from Newegg.

Other S939 mobos from Staples:

Abit AV8 im1d88934
MSI Neo2 F im1e24621
MSI Neo2 FIR im1e24620

They can't order EPOX, ASUS or Gigabyte, but who would want a Gigabyte board.

They do carry tons of Intel boards, if you're into Intel.

If you want the part number go to Sparco.com and do a search. You can only special order items that start with the letter "A". To get the Staples item number simply drop the A and reverse the next 3 digits and then the next three digits. For example, the K8N NEO2-PLATINUM number is a42e598. So my number becomes im1e24895.

 

[Waylay00]

Yea, I'm also wondering about which board to get. Specifically I'm torn between these two boards. If I order the MSI Neo2 from Monarch Computer in a combo deal (they update the BIOS for you) will it be stable?

 

[Caveman]

How hard is it to update the bios on the MSI board?

 

[Caveman]

How hard is it to update the bios on the MSI board? Anyone done this?

 

[mdahc]

I have the Neo2 as well, and it worked just fine right out of the box. I've overclocked my Athlon64 3200+ (Winchester) to 2.2GHz, and my system ran Prime95's torture test with a setting of 10 for 22 hours straight. Aside from my personal experience, I also recommend it since it uses the built-in nForce4 chipset for all of its SATA ports whereas the EPoX one only has two native and two on a PCI controller. Otherwise, they're pretty much the same in terms of features.

Also, it's easy as hell to update the BIOS. MSI includes some update software that will do it for you in Windows, or you could always download the manual installer and do it the old fashioned way.

 

[Icepick]

Originally posted by: Caveman
How hard is it to update the bios on the MSI board? Anyone done this?

I've got the MSI K8N NEO2. I'm unable to get the Live Update software that came with the board to work. Instead, I downloaded the BIOS file from the MSI web site manually. Then used Winflash to update the BIOS through Windows. I've done two BIOS updates this way and have seen no problems. Updating the BIOS is a snap with this software.

 

[mdahc]

Originally posted by: icepik

Originally posted by: Caveman
How hard is it to update the bios on the MSI board? Anyone done this?

I've got the MSI K8N NEO2. I'm unable to get the Live Update software that came with the board to work. Instead, I downloaded the BIOS file from the MSI web site manually. Then used Winflash to update the BIOS through Windows. I've done two BIOS updates this way and have seen no problems. Updating the BIOS is a snap with this software.

That's weird. I just updated to v. 1.4 using their update software without any issues. Oh well, at least your manual install went okay.

 

[Caveman]

Can one of you guys tell me the procedure for installing a SATA Drive on the Neo2 MoBo? I've got a 74 Gig WD Raptor that will be my boot disk and an IDE that will be for DATA...

Please help. I'm a noob and my board comes today. Thanks.

 

[Icepick]

Originally posted by: Caveman
Can one of you guys tell me the procedure for installing a SATA Drive on the Neo2 MoBo? I've got a 74 Gig WD Raptor that will be my boot disk and an IDE that will be for DATA...

Please help. I'm a noob and my board comes today. Thanks.

I didn't do anything special to install my SATA drive. All I did was connect it to the motherboard and boot up. Then I loaded Windows XP onto it with no issues.

 

[WA261]

NEO 2 Plat if you will be oc'ing