Recommendation for socket 754 Motherboard

[cpotter]

I've decided to build my first computer. After much research, have decided to go with an AMD Athalon 64 2800+ which will require a socket 754 Motherboard. The computer I'm building will be used for business and family use. Do not do any high end gaming. Also have a budget of around $600 for the system. Have no need to overclock at this point.

I basically need assistance in choosing a Motherboard and video card. As I do not do any serious gaming, I thought that choosing a motherboard with onboard video capabilites would be the least expensive route to go.

As this is my first build, I'm looking for a motherboard that is
1) Stable
2) Has decent documentation and somewhat easire to set up.

The motherboard will need to have onboard video, or I will have to purchase a lower end video card. Perusing newegg.com it looks like I could get a low end video card for around $40. Would this be enough for my needs? Here are a few MOBO options I have looked at this far:

1) $76.50 ASRock "K8S8X" SiS755 Chipset Motherboard for AMD Socket 754 CPU -RETAIL
Every review I've read on this MOBO has been positive. And thought of going with this one. But as far as I can tell, this does not have onboard/intergrated video.

2) $89.00 ASUS "K8N" NVIDIA nForce3 Chipset Motherboard For AMD Socket 754 CPU -RETAIL
This also seems to be a reliable motherboard. But again, as far as I can tell, this does not have integrated/onboard video.

3) $99.00 GIGABYTE "GA-K8S760M" SiS760 Chipset Motherboard for AMD Socket 754 CPU
This does have onboard video, but I'm less sure about the product in general.

Part of me thinks that seperating the video from the motherboard might be beneficial in the long run. If the video card breaks, just have to replace it instead of the whole MOBO.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks. Chad

 

[broly8877]

VNF3-250

If you love god, kittens, and your family alive, don't get onboard video.

 

[Neptune3000]

if you love your sanity, ears, and life dont get the Vnf3-250! I have it and it makes weird noises and all types of crap. It's a documented problem many ar ehaving with no cure. And when you do get teh mobo and it starts behaving like crap dont expect anymore here to help you. They'll recommend it, but when it's time to help you out, no one can be found. This is exactly what happend to me.

If i were you i'd get the MSI board it's 100bucks
http://www.newegg.com/app/View...=13-130-470&depa=0

. I'm RMAing my Vnf3-250 tomorrow and it's going to cost me 30bucks! to ship it with pickup and so forth. And seeing as i piad 80 for it, it's easy to see that I would of been better off just getting the MSI board because now i will endup paying 110 for a board that wont he guranteed not to screw up again when i get it in the mail. And if it screws up again, guess what? Another 30bucks to RMA it! newegg is'mt going to refund me. stay away from the chaintech! ANYTHING but chaintech!

Although, If you do decide to go with the Chaintech board i'd be more than happy to sell you mines brand new back from RMA for 68Bucks! I f.u.c.king hate chaintech :/

http://forums.anandtech.com/me...key=y&keyword1=754

 

[cpotter]

Why not onboard video? I understand it would not be ideal for high level gaming. But why not for my needs? If you still don't recommend onboard video, do you have a low end video card to suggest? Thanks. Chad

 

[dariob]

Neptune is not lying, some of the Chaintech VNF3-250 boards have a horrible high-pitched noise problem. I would recommend getting another motherboard.

 

[BW86]

Some batches of the chaintech vnf3 do have a high pitch noise, so if your interested in a vnf3 try and purchase it locally so you dont have to rma it. If you need to order online get an epox 8kda3j

 

[cpotter]

For my needs, I'm leaning towards the epox 8kda3j. Looking through mulitple threads, the memory problems that some people have been experiencing make me question this board. Are there any lists available from Epox that list memory that is verified to work with this MOBO. This is my first build. Would prefer a motherboard manufacture with decent customer support in case I run into any problems. Would you still recommend this Epox board or something else? Thanks.

Chad

 

[Neptune3000]

Hmmm, I've heard good thing about the MSI board. But for your budget, The Asrock board is pretty cool. U get a 2in one for next to nothing. ALl teh reviews have been good as well. From what i've heard the BEST board overall is the DFI board. But since you have such a tight budget I'd settle in hte middle for a MSI board. Thats all i can recoemmend from MY POV. I encourage other members to post suggestions

 

[CraigRT]

Soltek K8AN2E-GR
they are selling for $99 Canadian on NCIX.com right now.

I have one in my system right now, I love it...

 

[globalcitizen]

i recommend the vnf3-250. Been using it more a month without a problem. No problem setting it up either.

 

[bim27142]

Originally posted by: cpotter
Why not onboard video? I understand it would not be ideal for high level gaming. But why not for my needs? If you still don't recommend onboard video, do you have a low end video card to suggest? Thanks. Chad

on-board video gets a chunk from your system memory and your processor... having a discrete video card makes the later two dedicated to what they are suppose to do and not sharing something for the video processing... im not quite sure of pretty good chipsets with on-board video for AMD platforms, but for intel platforms RS300 or RS350 from ATI are quite enough as an on-board solution...

just go for a discrete video card, you won't regret it... try radeon 9200 series or even 9550, they are not that expensive and that would be enough for your apps and very very much better than any on-board solution out there...

 

[slag]

Originally posted by: cpotter
For my needs, I'm leaning towards the epox 8kda3j. Looking through mulitple threads, the memory problems that some people have been experiencing make me question this board. Are there any lists available from Epox that list memory that is verified to work with this MOBO. This is my first build. Would prefer a motherboard manufacture with decent customer support in case I run into any problems. Would you still recommend this Epox board or something else? Thanks.

Chad

Chad,

I have the 8kda3j board and am using it with 2 sticks of ds ram, corsair pc3500 stuff, and it absolutely rocks! Zero problems. I know you dont overclock, but my 1.8 2800+ is rock solid stable at 2.4 ghz, no noise problems, no memory problems, no problems at all.

Joe

 

[Uhtrinity]

I have to second (or third) the VNF3-250. Had mine running almost 2 months with no problems other than have problems getting the 2.0 or 3.0 bioses to run right (might be my DVD drive or DVD burner causing the problem).

 

[Goi]

I'd recommend the VNF3-250 too, but since I own one, I could be biased. It's the most bang for the buck S754 mobo you can get, but since there are quite a number of people experiencing the whining problem, you might wanna look into that. Personally mine doesn't do that. If you're running SATA drives, especially if you're booting off a SATA drive, this mobo has bad documentation on doing that though, and the earlier shipping BIOS is especially difficult to get to work with a SATA boot HDD. The manual is also one of the worst I've seen in recent times, but for <$80, I guess you can't expect too much. Performance, reliability and features are up there with the best once you get things working.

 

[cyberknight]

I have teh Soltek SL-K8AN2E-GR. Great budget board if you don't plan on overclocking. It also has the gigabit lan compared to the VNF250's 100 megabit lan. But lacks a Firewire (not a problem for me since I have an Audigy 2 soundcard)

 

[cpotter]

Ended up going with the Soltek. Thanks for all the help. Chad

 

[Ketchup]

For anyone else looking at this thread, I would recommend the Epox. but make sure you get the Revision 2. I have revision 1, which has all of the problems you have heard about this board. According to slag, the problems have been fixed with revision 2, which sounds like a great board. Despite the voltage problems, my board is still a great overclocker.