Motherboard?

[benevolent]

Hi! i am looking to upgrade my Pc, and was wondering how much it would cost, to buy a new motherboard. As i am a beginner, could you please explein to me what the different types are and why the prices vary between them?

Thanks in advanced.

[Spunkey]

Well to find the motherboard you need, you want to ask yourself 3 questions:

1. What type of processor do i want to use/have the money for?
2. What features do i want (do i want to use SATA/IDE, RAID, SLi)?
3. Am I going to overclock?

If you're just starting out it can be a bit baffling, but if you tell us what you want to use your machine for, and how much money you've got to play with we can suggest a few.

[benevolent]

I have got £150.00 to spend. Do you think that that much will be enough to buy a motherboard, and a processor?

[sawyen]

hmn... 150 quid a pretty slim budget... but I suppose it can be done..

How much horsepower do you need? and what is it used for?

Probably you can get stuff 2nd hand.. that should get a good mobo/cpu combo within your budget...

2nd hand stuff such as,
3500+(winnie)/MSI Neo2 Plat or ABIT AV8 -- if ur using AGP
3200+(winnie)/ABIT AN8 or ASUS A8N -- if ur using PCI-E

[Pirate Pete]

really you just wanna get a venice 3000+ for 80 and a cheap and cheerful socket 939 mobo for 70

the venice will give you excellent performance for the money, it can be overclocked easily to 3200+/3500+ speeds

links

Abit AN8

Venice 3000+

the 3000+ is 20 pounds over at scan there, but there are places that will get much closer to 80 pounds

the abit is a great board, have a friend that has the model just up from that one, the ultra version and he has never had any probs

Pete

[krazy_olie]

£150 is plenty for a decent motherboard, a recent article somehwere, might actually have been hexus proved that different motherboards have virtually no performance difference. Only once you bring overclocking in to it does it matter much. The above suggestions are good.

[benevolent]

What is the true meaning of overclocking?

[krazy_olie]

When you increase the clock speeds above what they are originally set to be of a component.

[nvening]

to make it slightly faster but unstable and very hot, so much that you end up spending loads on special parts and cooling when you could have just bought the faster componant in the first place, it may seem stupid now, but it will make perfect sense in the end

What make and model number is your current pc?

[pengellyd]

Have you already got a graphics card that you are going to use? If you have, is it AGP or PCIe? You don't want to spend £150 and find out you can't use it

For the CPU I would suggest getting the AMD 64 3000+ Venice from Lowestonweb.com for £82.29, Remember that you will have to get a fan and heatsink and it is OEM.

The motherboard choice depends on the type of graphics card that you have.

PCIe route
MSI K8N NForce 4 again from Lowestonweb.com for £69.99
Total for CPU and motherboard = £152.28 Postage is free from Lowestonweb.com

AGP route
ASRock Dual-SATA2 from Microdirect.co.uk for £48.12. The good feature about this board is that it has both a full agp slot and a full PCIe slot so that when you upgrade you won't have to replace the motherboard. Here is a review of the board as it is quite new.
Total for CPU and motherboard = £136.27 (includes standard delivery for microdirect)

Other members are welcome to comment on my suggestions as i am also in the predicament of upgrading

[0iD]

Always try e-buyers blowout deals or dabs's used stock etc for a good deal. Have picked up the odd sweet purchase myself. Many sites have them, most are listed on daveham's website.

linky>>http://www.daveham.plus.com/

[k0nigen]

Hi Benevolent

I think you need to say what system you have now so a decent upgrade can be suggested

You may well have a Pentium 3 for all anyone knows!!

[michaels]

AGP route
ASRock Dual-SATA2 from Microdirect.co.uk for £48.12. The good feature about this board is that it has both a full agp slot and a full PCIe slot so that when you upgrade you won't have to replace the motherboard. Here is a review of the board as it is quite new.

Does anyone know if this board supports overclocking?

[sawyen]

Does anyone know if this board supports overclocking?

Read the review m8...

[kevpuk]

Biostar K8NHA Grand is a good budget choice.....just using one in a PC build now.....s754 nForce3 chipset for less than £40 ! Pick up something like a 3400+ and you are close to budget......

[rajindergill]

If you look on ebuyer, they have a brand new asus p5p800 motherboard (to use your old AGP graphics card which I assume you have) and an intel 530 3.0ghz processor in clearance. Both will come to £150.