Best Integrated Mobo

[Need4Speed]

Well Ive decided to build a low budget box for the wife and would like some opinions on the best integrated mobo. I'd like one that has onboard vid and audio...intel or amd makes no difference.

Thnks

 

[iamthesystem]

stay away...run--run fast and far from integrated mobos...

you don't save THAT much. especially when you run into headaches in the near future when

- the sound card dies
- the video card dies
- the network card dies
...and you only have ONE PCI slot with which to upgrade your system.

i had a PC-CHIPS mobo once....I'll never EVER purchase an integrated mobo again.

ever.

 

[Slapstick]

I?m not a big fan of integrated motherboards but sometimes you just want to go cheap. If you don?t mind Intel I can recommend the MSI MS-6368, ($55 from Newegg). It use the VIA PLE133 chipset, has 3 PCI slots, 2 Dimms, Trident Blade 3D and onboard audio. I recently put a PC together using it, (had most of the parts on hand, just needed a motherboard) to crack RC5. It?s been running 24/7 for the past 3 months or so and not a problem. I put and 800 Celeron on it and for basic office apps and Internet it would do a good job.

 

[o1die]

I recommend the ECS K7S5A with a 1.4 athlon cpu. The combo will cost you only $168, and all you'll have left to buy is a video card. You can get a Geforce2 Mx200 video card for only $40 plus shipping. The total setup will only cost you about $210. The other alternative is to buy the amptron or pc chips (same board) 810LM with built in sound, video and modem. With a duron 850 cpu, they are about $115 plus shipping. With the first option, you won't have to upgrade for years.

 

[vampiro]

I would agree with the ECS and Athlon 1.4 GHz. It offers the best performance and allows for replacement of the video card if anything ever goes wrong.

 

[Peter]

Hello? The fellow is trying to build a LOW BUDGET machine and you guys recommend a 1.4 GHz Athlon? Have you even read the question?

PC-Chips M810LMR plus the cheapest available Duron, that's it. You get graphics, sound, LAN and modem and by far enough CPU power to get the job done. The board has been around for a long time (it's been the first all-in-one socket A board that came out), it's reliable and performs surprisingly well. You might want to make sure you get the new rev. 5.0 that now has 4-channel sound and 133-MHz CPU bus capability.

And it has two PCI slots and an AGP. The times where the all-in-ones didn't have room for slots are over, thanks to SiS's efforts of pulling as much as possible into their single chip.

regards, Peter

 

[Tsaico]

Another vote for the MSI board... I got one and it works out great too...

 

[Killrose]

Does the Trident Blade even support OpenGL? Be nice to see a integrated board shoot-out.

 

[Need4Speed]

good morning gents....in response to some suggestions you've offered:

1. I previously owned a intal CA810 and was pleased with it...decent vid and audio, stable.
2. The 1.4 T-bird is out of the question...this box is for the wife to check emial, do some AIM, and possibly some Word. She wont be gibbing anyone in Q3


Also, I'm not too worried about a failing vid/snd card onboard, because the entire mobo will cost as much as a decent sound or vid card...so it's inexpensive to replace.

Is PC-chips a reputable mobo? Aren't they made Alton? I've had some shakey experiences with one of them back in the das of my k6-2 300 (yeah that was a while ago)...i'm going to check out that MSI.

Thnx for all of your suggestions....

 

[Peter]

Alton is a reseller of PC-Chips and ECS stuff, and the latter two are the same company nowadays.

PC-Chips has been making very decent all-in-one boards for quite a while now. From the nature of all-in-ones where you have to get everything right in one go rather than install stuff one at a time, they require some experience to get them set up right (definitely not for first-time DIY). But once that's done, they're perfectly fine, and the value is yet to be beaten.

In particular, the M810LMR is all over the place, and even those of my local resellers here that wouldn't go anywhere near a PC-Chips board previously have it and use it for their own retailer brand boxes ...

Make sure you use an AMD approved power supply unit and a well tested DIMM. Shared-memory VGA boards, especially Athlon/Duron ones, reveal surprisingly many not-really-OK DIMMs that never showed a single problem in the less demanding system they were previously in.

regards, Peter

 

[hmsrolst]

I built a nice system for someone with an Abit WB6; it was very stable and, as I recall, the board was less than $50.

 

[goraj]

I recently bought PCchips M830LRM barebone system which has onboard LAN, audio and modem. 1.4ghz athlon 340w powersupply, 256DDR ram and nvidia riva tnt2 32MB video with volcano cpu fan at a computer fair for 330$ plus taxes. I think it is pretty good no problems installing win98 or win2k. I have not done the benchmarks yet. I do not if it is a good price.

 

[cheric4]

If you really want a low budget but good system ....try, Compgeeks, they have the P!!! 550 with everything in it, could use an extra stick of memory, for around 260.00 with one year warranty.
http://www.compgeeks.com/details.asp?invtid=GEN614

Of course, i prefer the HP (they took the name plate off) better than the emachines.
Go to their site and pick out the one for your budget.
They are slow to ship it out though.