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View Full Version : [SOLVED] Which of these motherboards would you get?



diablo75
September 30th, 2008, 08:35 AM
I recently got burned by a junk ECS motherboard that does not produce video to the monitor, does not give beep codes when powered up, though all the system fans spin up. Removing all the drives, and everything but one stick of ram, produces the same result. If I pull all of the ram, the PC speaker goes beepbeepbeepbeepbeep forever... I don't know what to make out of that.

Anyway, I have a feeling the board is a lemon (if you have other ideas, I'm all ears).

I'm thinking of buying a replacement, staying away from ECS. I'll be putting Ubuntu on this system too.

Here's what I've narrowed it down to:

Biostar MCP6P-M2 Motherboard (http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3827134&CatId=2320) - v6.0, NVIDIA GeForce 6150, Socket AM2, MicroATX, Audio, Video, 10/100 Ethernet LAN, USB 2.0, Serial ATA, RAID

MSI K9N6SGM-V Motherboard (http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3876566&CatId=2320) - NVIDIA GeForce 6100/nForce 405, Socket AM2, MicroATX, Audio, Video, PCI Express 1.0, 10/100 Ethernet LAN, USB 2.0, SATA, RAID

Abit NF-M2PV Motherboard (http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=3830756&CatId=2320) - NVIDIA GeForce 6100, Socket AM2/AM2+, MicroATX, Audio, Video, PCI Express, 10/100 Ethernet LAN, USB 2.0, Serial ATA, RAID

What would you pick?

LaRoza
September 30th, 2008, 08:37 AM
What is the system going to be used for?

I personally would go with an Intel board.

bufsabre666
September 30th, 2008, 08:40 AM
well i suggest newegg cause they tend to have better deals and theyre easier to search for what you want. but out of those since theyre generally the same, id go for the msi, its not as wide, the power plug is on the right ((a very underestimated feature, if you have a board with the plug on the far side of the board youd know the problem) and it has 2 pci cause its still the standard and a pcie 1x so you get the best of both world, plus ive never had a problem with msi


What is the system going to be used for?

I personally would go with an Intel board.
depends on price too, since this is a cheap board hes probably going to/using a cheap dual core amd which in terms of price to performance are far superior to intel

diablo75
September 30th, 2008, 08:50 AM
The system will have a AMD X2 4600 in it. I'm not trying to build a powerhouse... as a matter of fact, I'm building it for someone else, and the whole thing only cost 300 in parts. They're very pleased with that price tag... I'm not pleased with ECS.

bufsabre666
September 30th, 2008, 08:55 AM
The system will have a AMD X2 4600 in it. I'm not trying to build a powerhouse... as a matter of fact, I'm building it for someone else, and the whole thing only cost 300 in parts. They're very pleased with that price tag... I'm not pleased with ECS.

i stick with my pick on the msi

tbroderick
September 30th, 2008, 09:02 AM
How about a Foxconn 740G (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813186151)? Only $39.99 with rebate.

Scruffynerf
September 30th, 2008, 10:12 AM
If you are going a linux route, I'd ignore MSI. Its very hit or miss what linux distros will work.

I'd probably look at board by Intel, Asus or Gigabyte, in that order.

Phreaker
September 30th, 2008, 10:55 AM
Definitely Gigabyte

pelle.k
September 30th, 2008, 10:58 AM
hes probably going to/using a cheap dual core amd which in terms of price to performance are far superior to intel
Yes, but you often end up paying in time. I have nothing against AMD, it's just that intel mainboards have a tendancy to "just work" (TM) in linux.
Either way, the ubuntu HCL are an excellent resource, and so is linux-tested;
http://www.ubuntuhcl.org/browse/search+motherboards?category=7
http://www.linux-tested.com/results_server.html

diablo75
September 30th, 2008, 01:10 PM
Well I went ahead and bought the MSI motherboard before the last 3 or 4 posts showed up in here. I hope I haven't made a mistake in doing this...

Edit: Nevermind. I canceled the motherboard and opted for the Abit because it has a 5 on the Ubuntu HCL.

gn2
September 30th, 2008, 07:19 PM
Definitely Gigabyte

+1

outstanding quality control on new Gigabyte boards.

mips
September 30th, 2008, 08:00 PM
+1

outstanding quality control on new Gigabyte boards.

+2

I have never had a Gigabyte board fail on me. The same cannot be said for Intel & Asus though.

The newer Gigabyte boards are even better from a quality point of view.

diablo75
October 4th, 2008, 03:00 PM
Turns out the ECS motherboard I originally directed blame towards was perfectly fine. It was one of the two sticks of DDR2 memory that was shot.

For the record the ECS motherboard (a GeForce6100PM-M2) worked perfectly fine with Ubuntu.