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Thread: Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard

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    Not a good person scaryjim's Avatar
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    Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard

    No, I'm not going completely crazy.

    At home, due to a variety of acquisitions, I currently have (lying around doing nothing):

    1x Celeron D 345 (3.06GHz, 256K L2, 533fsb)
    2x 512MB DDR2 (667, I think)
    1x Palit 8400GS
    1x AOpen 340B low profile mATX case

    To be fair, the case isn't technically doing nothing. It currently houses my general office machine, which I've built from old components to be relatively energy efficient - a Duron 700 (30W TDP!), 512MB SDRAM, integrated SIS-based mobo, and that's about it. The whole lot pulls 60W - 70W - not half bad if I say so myself

    The thing is, it's not a very flexible machine. It's pretty much good for web browsing and word processing and not much else (although I suppose it might just about manage Diablo II). So I was considering buying this Socket 478 Mobo to stick all of the above spare bits in.Obviously, it'd give me much better all-round performance, but at the cost of some extra power draw (since I doubt the savings from a more efficient mobo and lower voltage memory can compensate the 40W+ difference just from the CPU, let alone the discrete graphics!).

    So, given that I have two other, more powerful, gaming PCs in the house anyway, would this just be a pointless waste of money? Or would this be a funky enough project to do "just for the sake of it"? And would I see enough of an improvement on my basic office and web tasks to make the additional power draw worth it? Would your opinion change if I mentioned that I do a fair bit of web design outside of work, and there's a reasonable chance I'd want to virtualise a Linux Server on this as a development / testing platform...?

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    jim
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    Re: Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard

    £40 for an upgrade of that magnitude? I'd do that in a heartbeat, but that's me all over. Can't resist something that looks good value.

    At the end of the day, this has a two-fold benefit. Firstly, you speed up day-to-day experience of browsing and word processing. If you use it a lot, that's got to be an appreciable benefit. Secondly, you open up your machine for more roles. If you want to do something that needs a bit more horsepower, say watch a video, then as things stand you're forcing yourself to either manage without or turn the main gaming PC on - which draws more power anyway. And if you want to muck around with it, get multiple operating systems and a virtual linux server, the upgrade would give you the opportunity to do that. Or maybe use it to do CPU-intensive tasks overnight like video encoding or batch file editing. For £40 you're giving yourself a heck of a lot more options.

    Otherwise, you're stuck with your old options - give up, or do it on one of the main gaming PCs. Again, neither are at all practical.

    Not to mention that leaving that kit just lying around is criminal

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    Not a good person scaryjim's Avatar
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    Re: Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard

    Quote Originally Posted by snootyjim View Post
    Not to mention that leaving that kit just lying around is criminal
    Yeah, I know - I've got a ton more too - I accumulate random gubbins then can never decide what to do with it. I've got ... I think ... 6 Celeron Ds in total, ranging from 2.4GHz to this 3.06GHz version. I might pop some of them up in a for sale thread soon...

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    Re: Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard

    I've got a 478 matx motherboard, kicking about someplace, I'll have to dig it up, I know 2 of the 4 usb are physically broken but apart from that it works. AFAIK.
    If it's any use I'll let you have it for postage.

    Personally I'd look on fleabay you can probably pick up socket 478 boards for very little.

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    Re: Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard


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    Re: Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard

    @Pob - let me know the specs, I might be interested in a second board for testing purposes at least: I've looked on fleabay but most of the s478 boards on there are overpriced, and of course the vast majority are DDR1 (my spare ram is DDR2) and AGP (my 8400GS is PCIe).

    @Blaine: that's a reasonable spot, but is DDR1 again, and with delivery (I can't pick it up because it's a web special) it'd be almost £20 more than the Biostar s478 board. The whole point is to use the spare bits I have lying around as cheaply & efficiently as possible

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    Re: Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard

    http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/BIOSTAR-P4M900...item3a574a9f6a

    fit's the bill specs wise but a bit over £40 at £47.85

    Shame it's a via chipset
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    Re: Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard

    Quote Originally Posted by scaryjim View Post
    ... I was considering buying this Socket 478 Mobo ...
    Quote Originally Posted by alsenior View Post
    http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/BIOSTAR-P4M900...item3a574a9f6a

    fit's the bill specs wise but a bit over £40 at £47.85
    I believe that's the same board, isn't it? £36 at Microdirect, and I go past one of their shops on the way to work every day

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    Re: Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard

    I've got an abit ai7 ATX s478 board, not the size you want but it's lying around not doing much.

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    Re: Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard

    Quote Originally Posted by scaryjim View Post
    I believe that's the same board, isn't it? £36 at Microdirect, and I go past one of their shops on the way to work every day
    you're right must remember to pay attention
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    Moosing about! CAT-THE-FIFTH's Avatar
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    Re: Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard

    I would probably get a secondhand Celeron 430:

    http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Intel-Celeron-...item2eaad872fc

    http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Celeron-430-1-...item3caa61bb3f

    You could also get a secondhand E2140:

    http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Intel-Pentium-...item2c534a3414

    I would then look for the cheapest Intel DDR2 motherboard with PCI Express which can use one of these processors as you already have an 8400GS.

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    Re: Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard

    I can highly recommend this socket 478 mATX motherboard:

    http://www.ebuyer.com/product/156165

    I bought one last year and used it to create a HTPC for my living room using an Antec case and old stuff that had been unused for years: a 2.4 ghz Pentium 4, 2 x 512mb DDR memory, 10gig HD
    I initially put in an old Geforce 4 Ti4600 graphics card (£220 in 2002!!) but it was too noisy so now I just use the onboard Intel graphics and this handles everything with ease. The CPU is passively cooled with a copper heat sink and the whole system is almost silent. I mostly have used this system for BBC iPlayer and Youtube stuff but also for some gaming - it handles Guild Wars easily, with good frame rates.
    *
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    Re: Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard

    I really appreciate that you're trying to help, guys, but you all probably should read the OP properly, y'know? I state quite clearly that I have a socket 478 CPU, DDR2 RAM and a PCI-E gfx card that I intend to reuse: so DDR1, AGP, and S775 motherboards really aren't any interest to me, because I don't have any more money to spend on those components. I can, at the very most, afford £36.50 for the motherboard from Microdirect that I linked to in the OP.

    Anyway, many thanks to snooty for actually reading the post I'm inclined to agree with you that it's a damn fine upgrade for the low cost, and I recall from an earlier thread thread that the 8400GS is roughly equivalent to a Radeon 9800 Pro, so it should be a reasonable gaming machine @ 1024x768 for the type of games I play (i.e. oldish ones ) so I'm probably going to go for it. I might even do some kind of build thread, as it might involve mild modifications

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    Moosing about! CAT-THE-FIFTH's Avatar
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    Re: Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard

    Quote Originally Posted by scaryjim View Post
    I really appreciate that you're trying to help, guys, but you all probably should read the OP properly, y'know? I state quite clearly that I have a socket 478 CPU, DDR2 RAM and a PCI-E gfx card that I intend to reuse: so DDR1, AGP, and S775 motherboards really aren't any interest to me, because I don't have any more money to spend on those components. I can, at the very most, afford £36.50 for the motherboard from Microdirect that I linked to in the OP.
    I still don't get why you would want to spend so much money on a socket 478 motherboard. If you looked at the links in my post a Celeron 430 can be had for well under £20 and the fact is that you can a suitable secondhand motherboard for under £20 too off Ebay. You are gaining more processor power at a lower TDP!

    Considering I got my P35 based motherboard for something like £25 over 18 months ago it is not hard to get a decent secondhand socket 775 motherboard on a small budget and 945 and 965 based motherboards can be had for even less money. The P35 based motherbaord is an Asus one with all solid capacitors too. Even my E2140 cost me under £20 last year IIRC.
    Last edited by CAT-THE-FIFTH; 28-02-2010 at 11:53 PM.

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    Not a good person scaryjim's Avatar
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      • 2x 4GB DDR4 2666
      • Storage:
      • 128GB M.2 SSD + 1TB HDD
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      • Windows 10
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    Re: Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard

    True CAT, but I'd need to get the motherboard for < £15 for that to be a cheaper upgrade, and there's not a lot of DDR2 / PCIe 775 boards on ebay at that price. The point here is to use as many component I have lying around as possible, at as cheap a price as possible.

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    Moosing about! CAT-THE-FIFTH's Avatar
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    Re: Opinions Invited on S478 Motherboard

    I would look at this motherboard:

    http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/B4269-MSI-MS-7...item5885d48652

    Here are the specifications:

    http://support.packardbell.com/uk/it...ppn=PB80100201

    With any of the CPUs I listed the cost should be around the same as getting the socket 478 motherboard. If you actually lived near to me I could probably sell you a socket 775 motherboard as I have a few lying around doing nothing ATM and one of them was only used for a few months too!!

    OTH,you should be able to get the parts cheaper bidding on some auctions instead of using a BIN.

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