Gigabyte GA-7N400 Pro2 Question

[dfloyd]

I have heard this is a pretty nice motherboard. Lots of features and a decent price. But have had a very hard time finding many reviews around the net on it.

Anyone have one and can post any good bad info about it? Or does anyone know of a few good sites around with reviews of the board.

Thanks up front.

Also I heard it has a feature that you can double click your mouse to turn the PC on. Is this a pretty standard feature with new mothersboards? Am guessing its bios releated and pretty sure the above uses AMI bios. Not required of course but would be a nice feature for me considering my PC is usually more so out of the way. If anyone knows if this is true or if other boards support that please post as well.

 

[3sixes]

dfloyd
So, you want to know about giagbyte?
I have the original Pro since 06/03, setup up perfect right out of the box, running my xp 1700 at 11x200 for 2.2ghz.
I got mine for the extra Ide ports, I dont do raid, and for the dual bios and soundstorm and have enjoyed all 3 features.
Stable as can be, not a single problem, not one.

The down side of all of the gigabyte nforce2 boards: Slow Ide raid performance, not a problem if your not intending on
using raid.
On the Pro2, because it is a 4 layer pcb design it does not have all of the features of the Pro and the 7nnxp, multi's have to be set my dip switches, and by design the cpu voltage is overvolted to 1.71v instead of the 1.65 that a cpu today would require(not a problem if youre and overclocker, but it does tend to make cpu temps read higher)

The Pro2 also does not utilize the nvidai apu -aka soundstorm.
And yes power on by mouse and kbd are both options in cmos, I use the power on by kbd, works well.

The key thing about the giga nforce2 boards, and all nforce2 boards is that you must have good quality, name brand ram and power supply, neglecting either will be a recipe for continous trouble shooting.

If you need any more info on the giga boards send me a pm, will be happy to answer.

 

[dfloyd]

Thanks for all the info. Am still in the shopping stage but it sounds like the Gigabyte would be a great board. I will not be overclocking though (Or at least I dont think I will). Just never saw enough of a gain to make it worth risking my chip.

Question about the sound if I could. I have a soundblaster live in current comp and just wondering how the soundstorm compares. As in sound quality and such. One thing that really confuses me about Nforce boards is the fact that they state they have Nvidia sound but also state they have C-Media sound. Not sure why or what that means.

As far as Name brand ram goes have been using Crucial\Micron for all of my AMD days and had no problems with it. On power supplies I have always used Enlight cases but am purchasing a different one this time. Case I like is all aluminum with nice Q-Window on the side and front panel usb, firewire, game port, headphone, and mic ports. It does not come with a power supply though so adding a after market one will not be a problem. Will be looking for a decent quite one. Does not have to be the best just one that works and is stable. But quite is what I am aiming for with my new system.

But thanks again for info friend. Definetly helps out.

 

[Gravity]

I have the ac97 sound on my 7vac gigaboard and I find it very good.

 

[TGHI]

If you have the extra green, splurge on a 7NNXP. I just got mine up and running, and I love it.



TGHI