Cheap and effective | Motherboard Amd AM2 U-atx 2GB Dualcore 2DDR2 8XAGP 2PCI

MSI, Dual core with AGP8X | Motherboard Amd AM2 U-atx 2GB Dualcore 2DDR2 8XAGP 2PCI

electronics:


	• Motherboard Amd AM2 U-atx 2GB Dualcore 2DDR2 8XAGP 2PCI MSI COMPUTER MSI COMPUTER average customer review:based on 5 reviews view larger image
	for more information click here

good enough for me!

this motherboard is the best it could possible be for $[...]. the only reason i got this board was because of a lack of money to build a computer with. i am very happy with it. my computer is finshed now and it has an AMD Athalon 64 proceesor 960mb 2.2 GHz 960mb RAM(soon to upgrade) 320 gb hdd 2 cd drives a floppy drive and an antec 500 blaxk mini case. i am not really a gamer, but this was prefect for a firsttime costom pc. i recommend this to anyone who is learning to put a pc together

Cheap and effective

If you're looking for a cheap AM2 motherboard with onboard video and/or AGP, you've just found it. It only allows overclocking to 232 MHz FSB, but even this is more than you'd get from, say, ECS or with Intel's reference boards for P4. It has 5.1 sound on board as well, though I prefer a discrete sound card to onboard in almost all cases.

If you want to do high-end gaming, look elsewhere, as your video upgrade path will be crippled by the lack of PCIe. But if you're a light gamer or have a console for games, you may find the onboard video adequate. I installed a GeForce FX 5600 (which I already had, thus why I chose a board with AGP and not PCIe) just to get a DVI port because I don't like my video signal going digital-to-analog-to-digital unnecessarily, but the analog output is not half bad.

One of this board's strengths is that it has a little bit of everything -- PATA and SATA, support for 1 GB modules, support for dual core processors, and 8 USB ports (four in back and four sets of pinouts on the board itself). The greatest weakness is also that it has a little bit of everything, namely just one PATA channel and two SATA channels, and only two DDR2 slots. It supports RAID, but with just two SATA channels your options are few. But it is small and has adequate video (and presumably sound), which means it could star center stage in a lunchbox-size PC. In fact that may be what I do with it when it is time to upgrade again. It also has an ATX-24 power connector but will function with ATX-20 (leaving four socket holes empty) as well, which may be necessary to do with an ultra-slim power supply -- and this dinky board is just screaming to be paired with the smallest possible parts. In my full-size case it looks a bit like Kate Moss at a Las Vegas buffet -- totally lost and out of place.

The heatsink mounting is very secure, and the hefty plastic slab on the back to reinforce it is reassuring. You could attach a big, l33t heatsink, but I didn't since the stock AMD cooler is adequate with only a 16% maximum overclock. It is impossible to mount/dismount memory without pulling out the video card (assuming you install one), but this is probably unavoidable given the limited surface area available.

I wish they'd done away with the floppy port and put a second PATA there instead, or used the space for a couple more SATA connectors, but hey, it's a $50 motherboard.

I only knock a star off would-be perfection because of its limited memory capacity and small number of supported drives (two PATA, two SATA). For the price, it is more than satisfactory.

for more information click here

MSI, Dual core with AGP8X

MSI, i guess i could start off by saying thank you for not forgetting about us AGP guys.

i have this motherboard with 2gb OCZ gold edition ram

AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual-Core 6000+ 3.0 GHz Processor

Ati Radeon sapphire X1950 pro 512 AGP8x

AC-1 Barracuda 7.1 gaming card

WD Caviar 7,500 rpm HD

Apevia custom case

Lite-on dvd burner W/ lightscribe

Let me start off by saying this mobo really takes a lot of time to get just right in the Bios, and especially running windows vista, it reads the memory incorrectly so you must do it manually, as well as set the right voltage, i had problems with the BSOD a lot of times till i got it all just right. After everything was working great i tried to over clock, a bit.
the mobo wouldnt OC to 202, everytime it would have a bsod on startup of windows, then the 2nd reboot would work fine, but if i left it at 200 all is well. doesnt really matter with this processor, it is very fast, i have been an intel guy forever, this was my first AMD setup, and i am a believer, this combo really is a great setup, i play high end games on med/high setting COD4, Crysis, FEAR, Prey. ect. They all run great, and i also use the computer as a media center with a second HDTV as the display.

all in all great price, and awesome potential.

for more information click here

If you're looking to replace the motherboard in an older system the MicroStar K9MM-V is the right choice for you. It has an AGP slot to support older graphic cards and even if you don't, you can use the Intergrated S3 Graphics Unichrome 2D/3D. You get video, audio, LAN all built-in, making finishing the new desktop computer easier and cheaper. Supports RAID 0 & 1 1 x AGP 4x/8x, 3 x PCI Integrated S3 Graphics Unichrome 2D/3D with motion compensation with up to 64MB shared video memory Realtek 8201CL LAN supports 10/100Mb/s 6-Channel Realtek ALC655 Audio Supports boot from LAN, USB Device 1.1 & 2.0, and SATA HDD Back Panel I/O Ports - PS/2 (Keyboard), PS/2 (Mouse), Parallel port, Serial Port, VGA, RJ-45, 4 x USB 2.0/1.1, Audio Jacks micro-ATX form factor

for more information click here