Socket A MBO Options.

[Heffty]

I was looking at a bid on a Gigabyte GA7N400 Pro 2 Socket A motherboard on ebay that was up for bid yesterday but then I got onto the idea of upgrading my mbo/cpu which was stupid of me cause I didn't even end up going with the idea and now I missed the bid. Really kicking myself for that. Anyway, now the bid is gone and it went for $24. What a piss off. There is another one up for bid Monday but it is more than I am willing to pay. So now I will have to be patient.

In anycase, are there any other mbo's for my AMD XP 3200+ that have raid, sata, dual channel, and the ultra 400 chipset or an equivalent chipset?

Below are the Gigabyte specs...again, the important things to me are the raid, sata, dual channel and the good chipset (ie Ultra400). If the motherboard you are thinking of doesn't have these 4 things then it's not what I'm looking for.

Processor
Socket A for AMD AthlonXP / Athlon / Duron processor


Chipset
NVIDIA nForce2 Ultra 400 System Platform Processor (SPP)
Media and Communications Processor(MCP)
Super I/O: ITE IT8712F chip
Integrated Peripherals
Silicon Image sil3112A controller
GigaRAID ATA 133 RAID controller
Realtek 8110S Gigabit LAN controller
Realtek ALC650/655 Audio AC'97 Codec
TI IEEE 1394 controller

Front Side Bus
400/333/266 MHz FSB

Memory
Typeual Channel DDR400/ 333/ 266- 184pin
Max capacity: Up to 3GB by 4 DIMM slots

Internal I/O Connectors
2 x Serial ATA connectors
4 x UDMA ATA 133/100/66 Bus Master IDE connectors
1 x FDD connector
1 x USB 2.0/1.1 connector (supports 2 ports)
2 x IEEE 1394 connectors ( supports 3 ports)
S/P DIF input/output pin header
3 x cooling fan pin headers
WOL pin header
CD/AUX in
1 x Game/Midi connector


Expansion Slots
1 x AGP slot (8x/4x-AGP 3.0 compliant), supports 1.5v display card only.
5 x PCI slots (PCI 2.2 compliant)
Rear Panel I/O
PS/2 Keyboard / Mouse
4 x USB 2.0/1.1 ports
1 x RJ45 port
2 x COM ports
1 x LPT
Audio (1 x Line-in / 1 x Line-out / 1 x Mic)
connectors

CPU/AGP/DIMM setting
CPU FSB / Vcore Voltage adjustable via BIOS
Multiplier adjustalble via DIP Switch
AGP Voltage / Clock adjustable via BIOS
DIMM Voltage / Clock adjustable via BIOS
Power
ATX power connector and ATX 12V connector
Power-off by Windows 98/ Me/ 2000/ XP shut down and switch
Form Factor
ATX form factor
30.5 x 24.4 cm
H/W Monitoring
System health status auto-detect and report by BIOS
Hardware detecting and reporting for case open, CPU voltage, and fan speed.
BIOS
Dual BIOS, 2 x 4M bit flash ROM, Award BIOS

 

[WobbleWobble]

PATA RAID or SATA RAID?

Many had SATA RAID, the Gigabyte was one of the few that had PATA RAID.

 

[imported_Kiwi]

Originally posted by: WobbleWobble
PATA RAID or SATA RAID?

Many had SATA RAID, the Gigabyte was one of the few that had PATA RAID.

However, when I suggested it as an alternate to the more usual NF2 Ultra suggestions of Abit & Asus, *because of* that PATA raid capability, someone (more than one, as I recall) advised that Gigabyte's version of PATA raid {for the OM, it means the same as "IDE", or EIDE, actually} was possibly an unsatisfactory option. I changed my choice to Abit, got the "wrong" NF2 Abit MB, and later ended up getting a variation of the Gigabyte MB that didn't have the RAID, either kind, as I recall.

Overall, I've been happier with my various Gigabyte systems I've had than with any other brand.


:heart:

 

[Heffty]

Well actually I was talking about IDE raid...but if there is a sata or pata raid all the better.

 

[Spike]

I personally use the Abit NF7-S V2.0 which was probably one of the most reccomended Socket A boards. It does NOT have IDE raid but does have SATA, SATA raid, the ultra 400 chipset, firewire, and the MCP southbridge, otherwise known as Soundstorm audio. This was (until recently) considered the BEST on-board audio you could get.

I have a 2500+ barton @ 3200+ in mine and it has been stable since I upped the voltage to the core. I have no complaints about the board, it was easy to setup on day one (over 2 years ago). I payed over $100 for it then and I have no idea what it goes for today, just that it is a kick-butt board.

-spike

PS And yes, it does have dual channel. I did remember one complaint I had about the board. After a little over a year the NB chipset fan started to make that annoying "i'm gonna die" noise that fans do. I replaced it with a passive Zalman HS and have had no more issues.

 

[Fern]

Originally posted by: Heffty
Well actually I was talking about IDE raid...but if there is a sata or pata raid all the better.

Here's another vote for the NF7-S v2 (do not get the similarly named NF7-S2).

If you wanna use your IDE HDDs in SATA RAID just get a couple of IDE>SATA converters from Syba (sp?). Then you can hook up IDE HDDs to SATA/Raid on the mobo.

Fern

 

[coomar]

nf7-s, i've had so many

 

[tweekah]

Thumbs up for abit nf7-s 2.0. One of the best boards of all time, I dare anyone to argue otherwise =)