Time to build a new computer
With all the problems I see people having I
have to ask the question,
Do motherboard manufacturers test there products before release?
I think not or at least not enough in some cases.
Which prompts me to ask the question Which motherboard to buy?
I suppose S ATA is a must
But what I am interested in is success stories
after all what we all don't need is computer problems.
Any help would be great
You don't have to buy a motherboard loaded with peripherals if you
don't want to. If you do buy such a board, you don't have to use the
peripherals. If you don't want to overclock, you could buy an Intel
board. If you want to save money, you could get an asrock.com.tw
board, as they make "value" motherboards. For least trouble, I
recommend a motherboard with an Intel chipset (for a P4 board) or
an Nforce or AMD chipset (for an Athlon board). If you buy a
motherboard with a Sis, Ali, or Via chipset, buy from a local retailer,
so you can return it if you have problems with the AGP slot.
Some video cards seem to have more problems than others. I detect
a slightly higher than normal incidence of problems with cheap
Ti4200 video cards. There are now many vendors who make these, and
I guess they are very popular. Someone in this group burnt out a
motherboard in the last few days with a new 4200.
When it comes to memory recommendations, take the Asus qualified
memory list with a grain of salt. If using PC3200, results vary anyway,
so no matter what you buy, you may have to return it, no matter
who makes it.
The future is certainly SATA, but for the next couple of years, there
will still be PATA drives for sale. SATA cables are thinner, which is
an advantage for air movement in your case. Otherwise, the current
generation of SATA drives don't offer much in the way of additional
performance. When native SATA controller boards are placed on disk
drives, and the SATA interface is inside the Southbridge, there is
a chance you'll see better performance from SATA. So, the SATA
interface right now is more for future compatibility than performance.
I would sooner have a PATA RAID card that can take four PATA drives
right now.
Personally, I think you can avoid problems, by shopping for separate
plugin peripheral boards, as then you can buy the ones that don't
have problems. All the motherboard really needs is processor, memory,
and a working AGP interface, and there are many choices that will
give you that as a stable solution. Buying $200 worth of onboard
peripherals and expecting them all to work perfectly is wishful
thinking, especially as the drivers and software come from third
parties. All Asus does is "host" other companies silicon/software.
HTH,
Paul
