shuttle AK31A or epox 8KHA+

[bustone]

hmmmm, which one of these boards do you think is the better buy?
anandtech says the epox board is faster (at what?), shuttle has
4 DDR slots and what else? money is very tight at the moment, so
the $20 i would save by going with shuttle would come in mighty
useful. any opinions guys?

im upgrading from sdram to DDR Ram, and think that the shuttle
might be better since it has 4 slots, so i can buy my ram a little
at a time (does it really hold 4GB of ram?).

another question i have has to deal with graphics cards...
i own a TNT2 Riva 32MB AGP (unused) and a GeForce 2 MX 32MB PCI card that im currently using. will the difference between agp and pci be enough to overcome the dated TNT2 card even though it's AGP?

 

[PeteyPete]

both are great boards, i was in your situation contemplating which one to get, but i decided on the Shuttle, the $20-25 difference didn't justify the extra .5 fps in quake.....

 

[human2k]

The shuttle is an awesome choice at $81 (newegg.com).

 

[LXi]

First of all I wouldnt take the Anandtech roundup all that seriously, because it's initial, and I don't believe they properly tested each board. Especially the MSI board which performs right up there with Shuttle and Epox. But regardless, if you're on tight budget you dont really need to anywhere other than Shuttle.

 

[bustone]

::cough cough::

 

[Transistor]

The EPoX EP-8KHA+ is the board I would go with. It's Quake III benchark score was about (10FPS) 5% higher than Shuttles. If you are purchasing an expensive CPU, it makes sense to get the EPoX. But if you are purchasing a cheap CPU, then it makes more sense to invest that extra $20 into a more expensive CPU. So, the extra performance of the EPoX board is sort of like getting another 50Mhz out of your CPU. You just have to do a cost benefit analysis and see if it makes sense to spend the $20 bucks for another 50Mhz. For example if you have purchased one of the more expensive 1600+ 1700+ 1800+ or 1900+ XP CPUs that 50Mhz is a bargain at $20. But if you are going with one of the $100 AMD CPUs, then you would be better off getting the Shuttle and then buying a $120 dollar CPU. The difference between a $100 cpu and a $120 cpu is 100Mhz or more.

Choosing between the TNT2 AGP and the Geforce 2 MX PCI is easy. I would definately go with the Geforce 2 MX PCI.