EDIT: BA & some other Frys: Athlon 64 X2 3800+ CPU & ECS Geforce6100SM-M mobo for $90 extended to 4/10

[Praxis]

Edit: This deal was 1 day only, April 5th, but was in the Friday Bay Area Mercury ad, so the price is good until Tuesday, April 10th. The deal was originally apparently in the Bay Area, but there are reports of it in Houston and Socal (O.C. Register) now, and it may be elsewhere.

Link-fu

A great price for a retail X2 dual core combo. The board has 2 regular PCI slots, 2 DDR2 slots, only 1 IDE channel, SATA2, of course, and high quality Nvidia Geforce6100 onboard video. Only $89.99.

I got this board in Febriuary and its been running Sidux Linux (32 & 64 bit) with all the Beryl eye-candy 3D goodness without a hiccup. This is much better than the crummy Via onboard graphics that a lot of the cheap ECS motherboards have. There is a PCI-E slot for gamers or folks who want a dual monitor rig.

Additional goodness at Fry's until Tuesday:
2 GB (2x1) of Kingston DDR2 PC5300 for $99 after $40 MIR.
320 GB Acom External Firewire/USB 2.0 hard drive, $90 after $40 MIR.
2 GB PQI Flash drive $18 after $10 MIR.
ECS P4M800PRO-M V2 mobo and Intel Core 2 Duo E4300 CPU $150.

The processor on the later combo is somewhat faster but the onboard graphics are nowhere near as good and won't handle Compiz, XGL, Beryl or for you benighted Windohs fans, Vista Aero. Also, it costs 2/3rds again as much.

 

[Rockinacoustic]

I really need to move out west one of these days

Nice deal for both retail items!

 

[kwo]

sweet. Come on Fry's - open up a store in Mass...please...... please......

 

[isekii]

i could really use the mobo/cpu combo

 

[uhohs]

deal only good in bay area?

 

[elcamino74ss]

figures i broke down and jumped on the 3600 deal at newegg yesterday

 

[johnnycasaba]

Nice deal, when o' when will Fry's open up some places on the east coast.

 

[Bad Dude]

This deal is not showing in SO CA. That is favoritism.

 

[cheapgoose]

Originally posted by: Bad Dude
This deal is not showing in SO CA. That is favoritism.

but you guys have the sun and beautiful women.

 

[f4phantom2500]

Does the board happen to be any good at overclocking?

 

[uhohs]

but you guys have the hippes and the cows.

 

[AkumaX]

well, frys DID start in sunnyvale/san jose (those bastards!)

 

[tuffgong]

Anyone know if this is good in SoCal Fry's locations?

 

[Praxis]

Does the board happen to be any good at overclocking?

Probably not. ECS boards are not known for tons of overclocking features.

Here's a review.

ECS GeForce6100SM-M has only two overclocking options, allowing you to increase the CPU base clock up to 300 MHz in 1 MHz increments and the PCI Express clock up to 150 MHz in 1 MHz increments. Of course didn?t expect that an entry-level board to carry too many overclocking options, like voltage adjustments.
This board provides a very few memory-related adjustments, but no memory timings settings...

With this motherboard we were able to configure the base clock of our Athlon 5000+ CPU (which runs at 2.6 GHz) to run at 216 MHz externally, making its internal clock 2,808 MHz, an 8% increase on its internal clock rate. With this overclocking Quake 3 performance increased 5.25% and PCMark05 performance increased 5.72%.

Also see this review:
http://www.virtual-hideout.net/reviews/ECS_GeForce6100SM/index.shtml

Specifications:

CPU

Socket AM2 with AMD Athlon 64 FX/ Athlon 64/ Athlon 64 X2 Dual-Core/ Sempron processo

High-performance Hyper Transport CPU interface.

Support transfer rate of 2000/1600/1200/800/400 mega-transfers per second.

CHIPSET

Single chipset: NVIDIA GeForce 6100S

GRAPHICS

On Chip (NVIDIA GeForce6100-based. 2D/3D graphic engine)

Share memory: up to 128MB

MEMORY

Dual-channel DDR2 memory architecture

2 x 240-pin DDR2 DIMM socket support up to 16 GB

Support DDR2 800/667/533/400 DDR2 SDRAM

EXPANSION SLOT

1 x PCI Express x16 slot (runs in x8 mode)

1 x PCI Express x1 slot

2 x PCI slots

STORAGE

Support by NVIDIA GeForce 6100S

2 x Ultra DMA133/100/66 devices

2 x Serial ATA2 device

RAID 0 & RAID 1 configuration

AUDIO

Realtek ALC660 6-channel audio

Compliant with HD specification

LAN

Broadcom AC131 10/100 Lan Phy

REAR PANEL I/O

1 x PS/2 keyboard & PS/2 mouse connectors

1 x Parallel port (LPT1)

1 x Serial port1 x VGA port (COM1)

1 x RJ45 LAN connector

4 x USB ports

1 x Audio port (Line-in, Line-out, Mic-in)

INTERNAL I/O CONNECTORS & HEADERS

1 x 24-pin ATX Power Supply connector1 x 4-pin ATX 12V connector1 x FDD connector

1 x IDE connector

2 x Serial ATA connectors

2 x USB 2.0 headers support additional 4 USB Ports

1 x Front panel switch/LED header

1 x Front panel audio header

CD in header

CPUFAN/SYSFAN

1 x Buzzer connectors

SYSTEM BIOS

Award BIOS with 4Mb Flash ROM

Supports Plug and Play 1.0B, APM 1.2, Multi Boot, DMI

Supports ACPI revision 1.0 specification

FORM FACTOR

Micro-ATX Size, 244mm*224mm

 

[f4phantom2500]

Originally posted by: Praxis
Also see this review:
http://www.virtual-hideout.net/reviews/ECS_GeForce6100SM/index.shtml

Lol, that review makes me want to buy that combo and an X1600

 

[Praxis]

This rig isn't really for hard core Windows gamers though it should have enough pop for Vista Aero if you've got enough RAM. However it would be great for desktop use and as a HTPC (well, it would be even better if it had S-Video out). I'm going to install MythTV on mine when I get around to it. And the onboard video is ample for Compiz/XGL/Beryl which has much lower hardware requirements than Aero Glass (and is also much sexier to boot).

 

[Rockhound1]

This is a really hot deal. I am not impressed with the ECS motherboard, but you are essentially getting it for free with the purchase of the CPU.

 

[neovan]

Originally posted by: tuffgong
Anyone know if this is good in SoCal Fry's locations?

 

[Praxis]

Actually, you're getting the motherboard for -$2. The lowest price on PW for the retail X2 3800+ is $92 from the Egg. And it is really a pretty nice M-ATX boards with very decent onboard graphics. Arbeit macht Fry's often has combos that essentially give away an ECS motherboard, and really, I can't say I have had worse luck with ECS than I have with Asus and Epox.

 

[esquared]

Originally posted by: Bad Dude
This deal is not showing in SO CA. That is favoritism.

 

[b0red]

Originally posted by: neovan

Originally posted by: tuffgong
Anyone know if this is good in SoCal Fry's locations?

http://ads.ocregister.com/rop/web/ocr/subcategory.php?id=22&adid=20070404083706 nope, we get 4200 and k8mobo for 120

 

[trevor0323]

Why the heck don't they offer these deals online?

 

[tuffgong]

Originally posted by: b0red

Originally posted by: neovan

Originally posted by: tuffgong
Anyone know if this is good in SoCal Fry's locations?

http://ads.ocregister.com/rop/web/ocr/subcategory.php?id=22&adid=20070404083706 nope, we get 4200 and k8mobo for 120

LAME.

 

[hans007]

Originally posted by: trevor0323
Why the heck don't they offer these deals online?

well its a loss leader. it is supposed to get you into the store. that doesnt really work for them online so they never put these deals online.

 

[Schfifty Five]

They have this deal in Austin, TX fry's. Deal is from today's paper (friday th 6th) and probably is good for at least through the weekend.

Question: Can a DFI Lanparty NF4 Ultra-d support the new "energy efficient 65w" 3800+ X2 CPUs?

Question 2: Would this be a good upgrade from an AMD 64 3000+? I realize clockwise it's not a huge jump, but would the dual core make a difference?