Need advice on P4 motherboard

[MoxManiac]

Building a new rig with my tax return :D Anyways i've decided on a P4 2.4 obivously to be paired with an 845PE board, with 512MB PC2700 ram of course.

I've decided on this one, actually:

http://www.giga-byte.com/products/8pe667ultra2_spec.htm

Everything I want, most importantly 4 IDE ports AND 2 serial ATA ports. Onboard lan, PC2700 support, dual bios, etc, the thing's loaded. Anyone have experience or reviews for this board? Or alternate suggestions? I'm aware of the board's price and am willing to spend that much for what it offers for features.

Also, am I making a big mistake on not getting one with 8x AGP? I'm not too convinced of the worth of getting it, esp with it seemingly not available widely yet..

[omega31]

You don't need AGP 8x. It's all hype at this point.

I've never used Gigabyte, but I have used MSI and Asus, so I can make recommendations on those based on personal experience. MSI 845PE Max2-FIR (http://direct.mwave.com/mwave/doSearch.hmx?bop=and&scriteria=845pe+max2-fir&UID=&CID=&Back=&n=1) and Asus P4PE/R/L/F/SATA (http://direct.mwave.com/mwave/doSearch.hmx?bop=and&scriteria=Asus+P4PE&UID=&CID=&Back=&n=1) have the specs you listed (except for Dual BIOS).

[bushmaster]

The MSI board omega's talking about is a great board. I've built with alot of different boards in the past but have been faithful to MSI for awhile now.

[deadkenny]

I would also prefer MSI or ASUS over Gigabyte. If you don't plan on OC'ing then you might also consider an Intel board.

Regarding AGP 8X, depends on your long term plans and how important gaming is. For now there's very little difference between 8X and 4X for practical purposes. In the future it will be similar to what having AGP 2X is right now.

[Zimmer]

Am currently building a system P4 Intel/AMD. Was looking at Gigabyte GA7VAXP but concerned about overheat using AMD2000/2100 or constant fail due to OC'ing. Do you have any specific model #'s for Asus/MSI that work well AMD?



Originally posted by deadkenny
I would also prefer MSI or ASUS over Gigabyte. If you don't plan on OC'ing then you might also consider an Intel board.

Regarding AGP 8X, depends on your long term plans and how important gaming is. For now there's very little difference between 8X and 4X for practical purposes. In the future it will be similar to what having AGP 2X is right now.

[papalion]

There is something you should know about the ASUS P4PE/L/R:

It claims RAID 0, RAID 1 and RAID 0+1 support but, (not counting serial ATA), comes with, only one RAID IDE port on the board. :rolleyes:

The manual clearly states that in order to enable RAID, both hard drives have to be set as Master. How can you do this using only one IDE channel? :x

Serial ATA is not an option because there are no drives available yet using this technology.

So in other words, this board has NO RAID SUPPORT WHATSOEVER. :mad:

I just bought this board and in my mind it is one of the most STUPIDLY DESIGNED BOARDS EVER! :(