Best bang for the buck on new motherboard; suggestions?

What the hell?

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J

J-bomb

n00b
Joined
Sep 8, 2004
Messages
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I'm getting worried about my cheap-ass ECS 848P-A. It's been giving me shoddy performance, and inconsistent hardware support. It's useable, but at a very basic level. So, I'll get straight to the point. I'm looking to get a new one before this one fails, which I've heard reports of here and there for many ECS boards.

I'm in college, and of course that almost always equals a tight budget, so I'm thinking $100 will be about the limit, as I'm going to also look into a SATA hard drive, among other associated miscellaneous things. The main features I want in it are basically what my current motherboard has, but just made by a little bit more trustworthy company:

Basic stuff (socket 478, 533/800MHz FSB, AGP 8x)
SATA controllers (obviously)
Dual channel RAM

The stuff I'm going to be using it with is:

P4 2.4GHz Prescott, 533Mhz, 1mb L2 (which will be overclocked)
512mb PC3200 Kingston ValueRam
Two IDE hdds, one or two optical drives
SATA hdd(s) will probably be ordered along with the motherboard
SB Live! 5.1
Radeon 9800 Pro 128mb (this information isn't really needed; I'm just throwing it in there because I'm always about half a year behind the newest and greatest technology, and I think I'm leading the pack in uber-fast graphax and want to brag to people who will most likely chortle at my expense while petting their x800 XT)

*ahem*

Sorry, I tend to go off on completely unhumorous and self-indulgent tangents.

Well anyway, all suggestions -- including those to take my own life -- are all welcomed and appreciated in advance.

P.S. Here's a funny mockery of some nondescript and stereotyped group of people that I can't fit into a funny category or anecdote about how I tried to avoid being so:

HAY GUYS WAT MOTHERBORED DO I BUY !

I LOOKING FOR TO COMPUTER PLAY ON GAMES,,,

AND MP#S LISTEN TO

PS HOW DO U CHANGE FONT TO FUSHIA COLOAR !
thx

:confused: :confused: :confused:

I apologize for my idiocy. I haven't slept in a very long time.
 
yes, no one should EVER buy ECS IMHO.

that said.. look into a Asus P4P800SE. I just got mine for $93 and I love it. Also don't forget to check Neweggs refurb area. You can get some good/decent mobos for a cheap price on occasions. For what your wanting, I think the 865 chipset is your best option. Plus that P4P that I recommended is prescott ready. Meaning it has better power for the processor since they pull more.
 
I second the P4P800SE as I also have one and it's a great board. For the price I paid on newegg, I was able to get it for around $70 or so at the middle of summer. I've been pleased by it, and it's a great overclocker!
 
Yep, I am now learning that ECS is cheapo shitto.

I got that same Fry's deal as Seongmin and Fluke, and considering the processor is $120 at newegg, I essentially got the mobo for free.
 
Get the plain IC7 mobo........it's cheap and you get the 875P chipset at the same time...Mostly people have been getting high fsb's with this mobo.....Same price as asus that was suggested earlier........
 
BOUGHT AND SOLD!

Thanks to all who provided information, except you losers who were too late. I also got an 80gb WD SATA hdd, a DVD-ROM, some other misc. shit and everything's jolly.

























Oh by the way I got the Asus P4P800SE.
 
i just got a p4p800se for a 2.4A.. havent OC'd it yet, but has all the features i wanted.

MSI PT880 is a good budget board. I warped mine pretty bad installing some RAM in a hurry. But it OC'd like mad. now i get to try the p4p800se ocing ability
 
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