Need motherboard advice

sabwafare2001 · Post by **sabwafare2001** » Wed Aug 07, 2002 5:21 am

What is the best board, besides ECS's products, are the best for the Athlon XP cpu's and that are less than $100? I prefer one that has on-board audio. Also one with on-board LAN or/and an AMR/CNR slot, a board with one or both.

wpublic · Post by **wpublic** » Wed Aug 07, 2002 5:51 am

i have been looking at a MSI 8318E for a system i am building for someone. They are mainly using it for office stuff. but that model has DDR memory, Onboard LAN, Video and Audio, and i am sure you can get one for less than $100. more like $50-$85 . i saw it in a local shop's price list for $75, but i am not sure it is new(unopened.)

canton_kid · Post by **canton_kid** » Sat Aug 10, 2002 2:17 am

What is AMR/CNR slot used for?

I have one on my biosstar board, but it seems a little offset compared to the rest of the slots on the board so I figure a standard card like modem/network won't match up to the case slot properly. Not even sure if it is a standard card type slot.
Haven't actually seen any hardware stating it uses that slot in particular either yet.

So my slot goes unused.

I've got a Iwill Xp 333 I am happy with, onboard sound sounds good, supposed to be 6.1 but I just have a standard 2 speaker set for now. No onboard lan, but for the $10-$20 I preffer cards anyway myself. Not sure, but I think this Iwill has a AMR/Cnr slot too.

canton_kid

Busby · Post by **Busby** » Sat Aug 10, 2002 2:34 am

AMR/CNR are proprietary slots that were supposed to catch on for use with modems, sounds cards, and networks devices. AMR, stands for Audio Modem Riser, is an Intel design that is supposed to be used for sound cards and modems. However, very few, to my knowledge, are made for the AMR design and the slot is not generally used. Some motherboard companies provide extended ports for onboard sound via an AMR card. This is taken from SoundMax's FAQ pages because they summed it up very well, "CNR stands for Communications Network Riser. The CNR specification is an open industry standard from Intel that defines a hardware-scalable OEM motherboard riser interface that supports audio, modem, USB and LAN interfaces of core logic chipsets. The CNR card can be thought of as an extension of the PC's motherboard that adds additional features and functionality to the system." Again I know of very few components that take advantage of a CNR slot.

Please someone correct me if I am wrong on anything.

*EDIT*
Intel links for AMR and CNR slots,
http://developer.intel.com/update/archi ... s/top2.htm
http://developer.intel.com/technology/cnr/

Here's a link that compares them along with PCI and ISA and ANR
[url]ftp://download.intel.com/technology/cnr/riser_comparison.pdf[/url]

It also appears that Intel is fading out AMR slots to use CNR slots.

*EDIT* Again

The Iwill XP333/XP333-R does not have an AMR slot. Iwill has expansion card type thing that plugs into your motherboard to give the full surround sound effect. There are also two different ones, one that adds digital (optical) out and one that just has analog out.

Post by **FlyingPenguin** » Sat Aug 10, 2002 9:52 am

I just bought the IWill XP333 after a lot of good reviews from folks here on the forum. I must say it's a gorgeous looking board. It's got onboard C-Media audio with digital out.

So far zero hassles getting it running, and it's a dream to work on - everything is very well engineered and well designed ergonomically (for instance there's a LOT of room around the CPU socket so you don't have to worry about breaking a cap when you install your heat sink).

I paid $88 at NewEgg