Need an AMD mobo recommendation for a friend

[FlyingPenguin]

Wants a good performer, but not interested in overclocking. Willing to spend up to $120 if it has USB 2.0 and AGP 8x. What's good now? NForce2?

I was looking at the Asus A7N8X NForce2. Anyone hear anything about it?

Let me have your recommendations.

He's upgrading from an AMD Athlon 1.2 and is going with at least an AMD XP 2100+ or possibly a 2400+ if he can cough up the money.

Thanks....

[wvjohn]

anand did a roundup of these - http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.html?i=1759 - they gave the asus and the epox the nod -I have an epox but haven't had a chance to play with it but it was generally well reviewed and a better oc'r - the Asus has more features

[PreDatoR]

Either the Epox of the Asus Nforce2 board should do the trick... or the Epox 8K5A2 line of boards i think has 8x AGP and USB 2.0 can't remember for sure though.

[Jim Z]

yeah, I've heard plenty good about both the Asus and Epox nForce2 boards.

Newegg shows a $1 difference between the A7N8X (non-Deluxe) and EP-8RDA+. Were I to make the choice, I'd go Asus.

[Mike89]

As a matter of fact, I just ordered the Asus A7N8X Deluxe from Newegg today. I just had to have it. I have read all the reviews on the Nforce 2 and have settled on this one. It has everything (more than I need actually, but hey, why not?). I paid $153 for it but you can get the A7N8X (not Deluxe) for about the price you were looking for.

At the present time, the Nforce2 is so far ahead of other AMD motherboards, I can't see why someone would get anything else.

I like the Deluxe for the double Lan controllers and the Nvidia SoundStorm sound. Now I can get rid of my soundcard too.

Check this out. I really splurged on this one. I got a Christmas bonus from work ($800) and decided to treat myself to a good Christmas present (call me stingy I guess). New Egg is the only place I know that has the AMD Athlon XP 2800+. To get it from them, you have to also buy an AMD approved motherboard with it. So I bought the 2800 and the Nforce2. I also bought 2 256 meg sticks of Corsair PC3500 DDR.

Spent the whole dam bonus! Some would call me a boner for spending it all in one shot, but what the hell. Wouldn't be the first time I was called a boner.

Now my boner butt just has to wait for it to get here so I can play.

[wvjohn]

mike, make sure you're wearing sneakers when you power that up - it may be so fast you'll have to chase it around the house

[Mike89]

LOL!


I sure know one thing that is running from me now. It's my wallet! It doesn't want anything to do with me anymore. It says I invade his privacy too much and steal his livelihood.

[fearfox]

is the nforce2 motherboard have good onboard video????would it be able to play the latest games? I think it time for me to upgrade video card and mobo, i was thinking, would this board be good enough for that????????

[wvjohn]

the onboard video is of the gf4 mx440 variety I believe. not enought for gaming

the baords come in a basic , deluxe and with video flavors

[Jim Z]

the version of nforce2 with integrated video hasn't been released yet AFAIK.

[Piper]

FP-

I Just swapped out my Soyo KT400 DRAGON Ultra for an ASUS A7N8X. Installed it with no problems whatsoever. I've got 5 of the USB ports populated as well as the onboard firewire hooked up to my Sony Handycam - no conflicts - no hassles The board also has the required four mounting holes for my Alpha 8045 (some nf2 boards don't!) The only benchmark I've run is 3dmark 2002 SE. I gained 200+ points with this board when compared to my KT400 at stock speeds. So far running it a stock speeds, but may try to squeeze some more out of my 2100+