M/B survey .... Pick one !

[DAMIAN2269]

Ok, small survey,

What would you buy:

Using a PIII 600 FC-PGA (cB0)
V3 3000 AGP ( geforce 256 soon )


Asus P3V4X
Asus CUVX
Soyo 6VCA
Soyo 7VCA
MSI 6309
Tyan 1854
IWill V133

I currently run a BE6-II

I would like the 1/2 AGP divider.

Should I stay with BE6-II and go for the
geforce which will be more stable at 140-150 bus?

The more reviews I read the more confused I am, they are all pretty good really.

 

[compuwiz1]

MSI BX Master, but probably the P3V4X for AGP compatibility.

 

[resinboy]

Damian:I did the same pondering with the same board as you did. I had found that with the be6/2, I had to leave the clock settings on my gforce card almost stock, because of the already overclocked AGP bus. My 3DMark 2K scores were around 4300 or so. If I even tried to bump the card a little bit, it became real twitchy, with frequent lock-ups. I bought the Asus, and have been happy as hell. My scores are now in the 5200 area, and i am sure the card still has some elbow room left. Fortunately for you, if you buy the Asus, there has been adequate use of it in this and other forums, so if you hit a snag, we can help .
I need to add that the Asus is definitely finicky about your ram, it likes cas2 133 to run it's best .( yeah,I know, they all do

 

[BGod]

DAMIAN2269, I've got three systems built on boards you'd like to try. 2 on Asus P3V4X and 1 on Tyan S1854. If I had to do it all over again I would dump the Tyan. Not having any health monitoring SUX BIG TIME!!!

Asus P3V4X
Intel Retail boxed FC-PGA 600E @ 800
Alpha PEP-66 | Factory fan
Iwill Slocket II | Tekram Slocket
Apacer 128MB PC133 CAS 2 Infineon chips (all the way to 146 FSB)
Asus V6800 Deluxe | Asus V6800 Pure
Creative Live! Platinum | Creative Live! MP3+
Creative 48x | Pioneer 6x SCSI slot load DVD
Pioneer 10x slot load DVD | Yamaha SCSI 8x4x24 burner
Maxtor 40.9GB ATA/66 | Quantum 20GB ATA/66
Netgear FA-310TX
USR 5610 56K v.90 hardware modem

Both these systems rock for Unreal Tournament and RC5-64, when we're not playing UT that is.

 

[AdamK47]

I'd have to vote for the P3V4X too, if your taking the VIA133A route. A lot of people who go to this forum have the board and for good reason too. The Asus P3V4X has awsome stability and only lags the BX boards in terms of performance by a small margin.

I have both the Asus P3V4X and the Asus P3B-F, and I must admit that the P3V4X is running awsomely in my system. This might be the motherboard I keep in my box.

 

[birddog]

I have both the P3V4X and the Tyan s1854 Trinity 400. Both are good boards. It appears you want to overclock to the max, so I'd leave teh Tyan out of the picture. The tyan board is probably one of the most stable boards at the 'normal' clockspeeds (66, 100, 133). The tyan board is not in my #2 system. My main gamer has the P3V4X & a P3 550 at 733mhz (will run at 804 if I crank up the voltage, but My GeForce DDR does not like it that high when running in D3D). at 733mhz, without overclocking the Geforce, I can get 5800 3d marks on 3dmark2000. If I take all my cd-burner stuff off the bottom task tray, turn my backgound off, close all non essential programs running in the background, I have hit 6300 3d marks. I'd go with the P3V4X for your clocking project/gaming system


-------------------------------
Asus P3V4X
P3 550e @ 733mhz (golden orb)
Visiontek GeForce DDR
192 MB Micron PC 133
SB Live Value
WD 20 GB 7200 rpm HD
Memorex 48x CD-ROM
HP 8250 CD-RW


Tyan s1854 Trinity 400
P3 500 @ 665mhz
Voodoo 3 2000
128 MB Micron PC 133
SB Live Value
Maxtor 10GB 7200rpm HD
Memorex 48x CD-ROM

 

[Akkan]

Motherboards aren't my specialty, but I do know at least a little.

I run my 'puter on the iWill VD133, and it has been great, for the most part. There are a few problems: 1. Weak voltage settings (only 5 and 10% increase options) 2. Sparse FSB settings between 133 and 150, other small things. I'm not sure what improvements the newer VD133a board has, but it might be worth looking into. If i were honestly going to get another mobo, I would probably go with either the Asus P3V4X or the Tyan board.

 

[Painman]

If you gotta have the 1/2 AGP divider, why not hold out for the ASUS CUSL2 or grab an ABIT SE6 (i815 boards). It looks like the i815 is going to make it so there's no good reason to go the 133A route anymore. I feel bad saying that because my P3V4X has served me well, but the 133A has the memory performance problem (yes it can be tweaked, but no, it doesn't really make it run neck and neck with an equally clocked BX, sorry) and it has a problem with the GF2 chip at oc'ed AGP speed even with the 1/2 divider. I can't get a GF2/133A combo to run stably over 71 MHz AGP clock.

On the other hand, since you're going to get a Geforce based card, AGP speed is mostly irrelevant. They can all handle at least 89 MHz, some can take over 100 MHz. GF2 can take the torture on a BX also.

Having said that... maybe you should keep the BE6-II I admit that in the last couple of days I've gone from being a P3V4X nut to a BX evangelist, but what can I say... I've seen the light! (Well, maybe not that, but I have seen the benchmarks with my own two eyes now as well as my GF2 happily taking a 93.3 MHz beating on the AGP bus.)

-Pain

 

[Quickfingerz]

CUVX? your CPU is the flip-chip version?

I'd go p3v4x.

 

[StanTheMan]

why not ASUS CUBX instead of CUVX?
CUBX uses the mighty BX chipset

 

[AndyHui]

Given that you have an FC-PGA processor, I would have to recommend the ASUS CUSL2. Got one today.....very very nice. Stable, fast, it's the most flexible ASUS board I've ever used.

 

[Aboroth]

Painman is right, the P3V4X does not perform equally with good BX boards even with tweaks. This just reinforces my displeasure with all things VIA. I recommend the MSI BX Master. I unfortunately didn't buy one, and I am sorry for it. Instead I got this P3V4X and BE6. The P3V4X is just disappointing, and the BE6's onboard ATA66 controller has issues with my hard drive. (Pain in the butt!)
The controller on the BX Master is the Promise one, which is supposed to be the best add in controller available.