Question: Integrated Vs. Add-on Options

[Ext User(kony)]

On 1 Mar 2004 14:16:45 -0800, Searcher7@mail.con2.com (Darren Harris)
wrote:

>Can anyone tell if if integrated options on a motherbaord, like video,
>audio, firewire, ect., a better idea than using add-on cards if the
>priority is to avoid configuration problems when building a system?
>
>Thanks a lot.
>
>Darren Harris
>Staten Island, New York.

Well you've received a lot of feedback about (a lot of things outside your
question).

Onboard integrated features may have their IRQs set better, which is good
for the simple old OS, but Windows can reassign IRQs so that's not as
significant anymore, plus you can always swap around PCI cards to
different slots.

Otherwise you'll have the same configuration issues with the integrated
feature(s) as you would with same chipset (or in some cases, very similar
technology or system performance requirements) add-on cards. RAID cards
are no different than integrated if they have same chipset (which many do)
except onboard RAID is often the "lite" BIOS version so only RAID 0, 1, or
0 +1 are options.

Onboard video is the same, if that particular chipset wouldn't be
problematic as an AGP card you shouldn't expect problems as an integrated
feature. Same with network adapter except they almost always work fine,
just a bit slower and higher CPU utilization (not very significant) than
high-end solutions like Intel Pro adapters. Sound can be more troublesome
but that's mostly due to quick-n-dirty drivers, either it works or else
most people abandon it for a similarly cheap $10 audio card. If you know
you need very high-end pro quality or special featured audio then you'll
want to buy the exact audio card you need.

The bottom line is that you should build the system you want, keeping your
fingers crossed but mostly putting a fair amount of research into the
particular motherboard, for example in motherboard forums like
http://forums.amdmb.com or a newsgroup dedicated to the respective
motherboard manufacturer. Don't get in a rush and impulse buy the
cheapest (thing) out there.

If you use common, fairly modern hardware from the larger manufacturers
there's a lower chance of configuration or compatibility problems, and the
better motherboard manufacturers will issue an appropriate number of BIOS
revisions to combat any bugs, sometimes even issues with particular
popular hardware that isn't really a motherboard problem per se.

Keeping the details you accumulate in mind, you can just build it any way
you want, integrated or non. For the most part building systems is TOO
easy, you'll get overconfident and overlook something obvious while
getting wrapped up in the finer details... it helps to be fully awake, no
after-midnight builds.

[Ext User(Darren Harris)]

Conor <conor_turton@hotmail.com> wrote in message news:<MPG.1aaea884f8a0320e98a08f@news.clara.net>.. .
> In article <9437a27c.0403011416.57a6a793@posting.google.com >, Searcher7
> @mail.con2.com says...
> > Can anyone tell if if integrated options on a motherbaord, like video,
> > audio, firewire, ect., a better idea than using add-on cards if the
> > priority is to avoid configuration problems when building a system?
> >
> For a low end system it's OK but for high end work no. Onboard audio
> for example may cause lower framerates in intensive action in games.
> There is NO difference with configuration problems between onboard and
> dedicated.

Dedicated?

Anyway, thanks everyone for the input. I already know about the
performance issues, which is why I said, the priority is to avoid
configuration problems.

I want to transfer my video(and audio) card to a new SCSI system I'm
building to fill in until I get a higher-end video card.(Audio is no
big deal). But just in case they give me problems, I want the system
to have audio and video built-in to fall back on. I'm assuming that
the integrated options will not be a hinderance to performance when I
have the add-on cards installed, correct?

Also, am I correct in assuming that the higher end mobos tend not to
have audio and video integrated?

I'm looking to go with a Pentium 2.4 minimum, with the option to
upgrade to a more powerful Penium 4.(So the mobo must support a 400FSB
as well as an 800FSB). The other option is to spring for an Athlon64
so I can be a little more future proof.

I say that because I may get into competitive PC gaming next year, at
which point I want to eliminate anything that will cut in to the CPU
and ram resurces.

Thanks a lot.

Darren Harris
Staten ISland, New York.

[Ext User(Gary Tait)]

On 3 Mar 2004 09:36:02 -0800, Searcher7@mail.con2.com (Darren Harris)
wrote:

>Conor <conor_turton@hotmail.com> wrote in message news:<MPG.1aaea884f8a0320e98a08f@news.clara.net>.. .
>> In article <9437a27c.0403011416.57a6a793@posting.google.com >, Searcher7
>> @mail.con2.com says...
>> > Can anyone tell if if integrated options on a motherbaord, like video,
>> > audio, firewire, ect., a better idea than using add-on cards if the
>> > priority is to avoid configuration problems when building a system?
>> >
>> For a low end system it's OK but for high end work no. Onboard audio
>> for example may cause lower framerates in intensive action in games.
>> There is NO difference with configuration problems between onboard and
>> dedicated.
>
>Dedicated?
>
>Anyway, thanks everyone for the input. I already know about the
>performance issues, which is why I said, the priority is to avoid
>configuration problems.
>
>I want to transfer my video(and audio) card to a new SCSI system I'm
>building to fill in until I get a higher-end video card.(Audio is no
>big deal). But just in case they give me problems, I want the system
>to have audio and video built-in to fall back on. I'm assuming that
>the integrated options will not be a hinderance to performance when I
>have the add-on cards installed, correct?
>
>Also, am I correct in assuming that the higher end mobos tend not to
>have audio and video integrated?
>

In my looking, all current motherboards have sound, and all full ATX
board have no video (you have to go micro ATX for that AFAIK). You can
disable most on board resouces in favour of add-in card.

>I'm looking to go with a Pentium 2.4 minimum, with the option to
>upgrade to a more powerful Penium 4.(So the mobo must support a 400FSB
>as well as an 800FSB). The other option is to spring for an Athlon64
>so I can be a little more future proof.
>
>I say that because I may get into competitive PC gaming next year, at
>which point I want to eliminate anything that will cut in to the CPU
>and ram resurces.
>
>Thanks a lot.
>
>Darren Harris
>Staten ISland, New York.

I'd consider a full ATX system, and get a budget 3D card, which will
be much better than on-board video, for gaming.

[Ext User(Darren Harris)]

Conor <conor_turton@hotmail.com> wrote in message news:<MPG.1aaea884f8a0320e98a08f@news.clara.net>.. .
> In article <9437a27c.0403011416.57a6a793@posting.google.com >, Searcher7
> @mail.con2.com says...
> > Can anyone tell if if integrated options on a motherbaord, like video,
> > audio, firewire, ect., a better idea than using add-on cards if the
> > priority is to avoid configuration problems when building a system?
> >
> For a low end system it's OK but for high end work no. Onboard audio
> for example may cause lower framerates in intensive action in games.
> There is NO difference with configuration problems between onboard and
> dedicated.

Dedicated?

Anyway, thanks everyone for the input. I already know about the
performance issues, which is why I said, the priority is to avoid
configuration problems.

I want to transfer my video(and audio) card to a new SCSI system I'm
building to fill in until I get a higher-end video card.(Audio is no
big deal). But just in case they give me problems, I want the system
to have audio and video built-in to fall back on. I'm assuming that
the integrated options will not be a hinderance to performance when I
have the add-on cards installed, correct?

Also, am I correct in assuming that the higher end mobos tend not to
have audio and video integrated?

I'm looking to go with a Pentium 2.4 minimum, with the option to
upgrade to a more powerful Penium 4.(So the mobo must support a 400FSB
as well as an 800FSB). The other option is to spring for an Athlon64
so I can be a little more future proof.

I say that because I may get into competitive PC gaming next year, at
which point I want to eliminate anything that will cut in to the CPU
and ram resurces.

Thanks a lot.

Darren Harris
Staten ISland, New York.

[Ext User(Darren Harris)]

> Well you've received a lot of feedback about (a lot of things outside your
> question).
>
> Onboard integrated features may have their IRQs set better, which is good
> for the simple old OS, but Windows can reassign IRQs so that's not as
> significant anymore, plus you can always swap around PCI cards to
> different slots.

Yeah, but after I spend all that time swapping between slots and it
still doesn't work...(I've had a lot of bad luck).

> Otherwise you'll have the same configuration issues with the integrated
> feature(s) as you would with same chipset (or in some cases, very similar
> technology or system performance requirements) add-on cards. RAID cards
> are no different than integrated if they have same chipset (which many do)
> except onboard RAID is often the "lite" BIOS version so only RAID 0, 1, or
> 0 +1 are options.

I have RAID hardware, but it appears to be a pain in the butt. My
overiding goal is to be able to manually copy my entire "C" drive to
an equal sized drive/partition. And use siad drive in place of the "C"
if something goes wrong. That sounds simple, but in six years I've yet
to find an *easy* way to do this.

> Onboard video is the same, if that particular chipset wouldn't be
> problematic as an AGP card you shouldn't expect problems as an integrated
> feature. Same with network adapter except they almost always work fine,
> just a bit slower and higher CPU utilization (not very significant) than
> high-end solutions like Intel Pro adapters. Sound can be more troublesome
> but that's mostly due to quick-n-dirty drivers, either it works or else
> most people abandon it for a similarly cheap $10 audio card. If you know
> you need very high-end pro quality or special featured audio then you'll
> want to buy the exact audio card you need.
>
> The bottom line is that you should build the system you want, keeping your
> fingers crossed but mostly putting a fair amount of research into the
> particular motherboard, for example in motherboard forums like
> http://forums.amdmb.com or a newsgroup dedicated to the respective
> motherboard manufacturer. Don't get in a rush and impulse buy the
> cheapest (thing) out there.

I've spent over 100 hours already "researching". So I don't think I'm
rushing. :-) This is why Dell, Compaq, ect. make so much money. People
just don't want to be, or can't be bothered with the perils of
building their own systems. The day that everything is *really* easy
to install, and "plug and play" is the norm, is the day companies like
Dell go out of business.

> If you use common, fairly modern hardware from the larger manufacturers
> there's a lower chance of configuration or compatibility problems, and the
> better motherboard manufacturers will issue an appropriate number of BIOS
> revisions to combat any bugs, sometimes even issues with particular
> popular hardware that isn't really a motherboard problem per se.

Yeah, there's that compatability thing again.

> Keeping the details you accumulate in mind, you can just build it any way
> you want, integrated or non. For the most part building systems is TOO
> easy, you'll get overconfident and overlook something obvious while
> getting wrapped up in the finer details... it helps to be fully awake, no
> after-midnight builds.

I don't think building systems is "too easy". Questions like mine on
the newsgroups prove that.

Nevertheless, I'm basically looking for a mobo that will support The
Pentium Extreme Edition, which I plan to get when the price comes
down. :-)

But in the meantime I want to use a cheaper CPU on the board. This is
just me attempting to be a little "future-proof". I don't want to
spend a lot initially, but don't want to have to upgrade the
motherboard anytime soon.

I'm looking at getting and cannabalizing a barebones system for
this(See below). But the chipset may cause problems, because I don't
think Dual Chanel ram is supported.:

DOF PCPC-533V Intel Celeron (400FSB/DDR/32V/S/L/USB2.0) Tested Value
Barebone Systems
• Boxed Intel Celeron Socket 478 2.4GHz (400FSB) CPU w/128K L2 Cache
• U8668D P4 Socket 478 P4M266A/8235 (400FSB/ATA133/USB2.0) uATX
Motherboard
• Integrated S3 SavagePro Graphics upto 32MB Video
• In-Win V500 Mini Tower Micro ATX Case w/250Watts Power Supply P4 &
USB2.0
• Integrated AC 97 6Ch Digital Audio
• Integrated 10/100BaseT Network Lan

Thanks a lot.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

[Ext User(Gary Tait)]

On 3 Mar 2004 09:36:02 -0800, Searcher7@mail.con2.com (Darren Harris)
wrote:

>Conor <conor_turton@hotmail.com> wrote in message news:<MPG.1aaea884f8a0320e98a08f@news.clara.net>.. .
>> In article <9437a27c.0403011416.57a6a793@posting.google.com >, Searcher7
>> @mail.con2.com says...
>> > Can anyone tell if if integrated options on a motherbaord, like video,
>> > audio, firewire, ect., a better idea than using add-on cards if the
>> > priority is to avoid configuration problems when building a system?
>> >
>> For a low end system it's OK but for high end work no. Onboard audio
>> for example may cause lower framerates in intensive action in games.
>> There is NO difference with configuration problems between onboard and
>> dedicated.
>
>Dedicated?
>
>Anyway, thanks everyone for the input. I already know about the
>performance issues, which is why I said, the priority is to avoid
>configuration problems.
>
>I want to transfer my video(and audio) card to a new SCSI system I'm
>building to fill in until I get a higher-end video card.(Audio is no
>big deal). But just in case they give me problems, I want the system
>to have audio and video built-in to fall back on. I'm assuming that
>the integrated options will not be a hinderance to performance when I
>have the add-on cards installed, correct?
>
>Also, am I correct in assuming that the higher end mobos tend not to
>have audio and video integrated?
>

In my looking, all current motherboards have sound, and all full ATX
board have no video (you have to go micro ATX for that AFAIK). You can
disable most on board resouces in favour of add-in card.

>I'm looking to go with a Pentium 2.4 minimum, with the option to
>upgrade to a more powerful Penium 4.(So the mobo must support a 400FSB
>as well as an 800FSB). The other option is to spring for an Athlon64
>so I can be a little more future proof.
>
>I say that because I may get into competitive PC gaming next year, at
>which point I want to eliminate anything that will cut in to the CPU
>and ram resurces.
>
>Thanks a lot.
>
>Darren Harris
>Staten ISland, New York.

I'd consider a full ATX system, and get a budget 3D card, which will
be much better than on-board video, for gaming.

[Ext User(Darren Harris)]

> Well you've received a lot of feedback about (a lot of things outside your
> question).
>
> Onboard integrated features may have their IRQs set better, which is good
> for the simple old OS, but Windows can reassign IRQs so that's not as
> significant anymore, plus you can always swap around PCI cards to
> different slots.

Yeah, but after I spend all that time swapping between slots and it
still doesn't work...(I've had a lot of bad luck).

> Otherwise you'll have the same configuration issues with the integrated
> feature(s) as you would with same chipset (or in some cases, very similar
> technology or system performance requirements) add-on cards. RAID cards
> are no different than integrated if they have same chipset (which many do)
> except onboard RAID is often the "lite" BIOS version so only RAID 0, 1, or
> 0 +1 are options.

I have RAID hardware, but it appears to be a pain in the butt. My
overiding goal is to be able to manually copy my entire "C" drive to
an equal sized drive/partition. And use siad drive in place of the "C"
if something goes wrong. That sounds simple, but in six years I've yet
to find an *easy* way to do this.

> Onboard video is the same, if that particular chipset wouldn't be
> problematic as an AGP card you shouldn't expect problems as an integrated
> feature. Same with network adapter except they almost always work fine,
> just a bit slower and higher CPU utilization (not very significant) than
> high-end solutions like Intel Pro adapters. Sound can be more troublesome
> but that's mostly due to quick-n-dirty drivers, either it works or else
> most people abandon it for a similarly cheap $10 audio card. If you know
> you need very high-end pro quality or special featured audio then you'll
> want to buy the exact audio card you need.
>
> The bottom line is that you should build the system you want, keeping your
> fingers crossed but mostly putting a fair amount of research into the
> particular motherboard, for example in motherboard forums like
> http://forums.amdmb.com or a newsgroup dedicated to the respective
> motherboard manufacturer. Don't get in a rush and impulse buy the
> cheapest (thing) out there.

I've spent over 100 hours already "researching". So I don't think I'm
rushing. :-) This is why Dell, Compaq, ect. make so much money. People
just don't want to be, or can't be bothered with the perils of
building their own systems. The day that everything is *really* easy
to install, and "plug and play" is the norm, is the day companies like
Dell go out of business.

> If you use common, fairly modern hardware from the larger manufacturers
> there's a lower chance of configuration or compatibility problems, and the
> better motherboard manufacturers will issue an appropriate number of BIOS
> revisions to combat any bugs, sometimes even issues with particular
> popular hardware that isn't really a motherboard problem per se.

Yeah, there's that compatability thing again.

> Keeping the details you accumulate in mind, you can just build it any way
> you want, integrated or non. For the most part building systems is TOO
> easy, you'll get overconfident and overlook something obvious while
> getting wrapped up in the finer details... it helps to be fully awake, no
> after-midnight builds.

I don't think building systems is "too easy". Questions like mine on
the newsgroups prove that.

Nevertheless, I'm basically looking for a mobo that will support The
Pentium Extreme Edition, which I plan to get when the price comes
down. :-)

But in the meantime I want to use a cheaper CPU on the board. This is
just me attempting to be a little "future-proof". I don't want to
spend a lot initially, but don't want to have to upgrade the
motherboard anytime soon.

I'm looking at getting and cannabalizing a barebones system for
this(See below). But the chipset may cause problems, because I don't
think Dual Chanel ram is supported.:

DOF PCPC-533V Intel Celeron (400FSB/DDR/32V/S/L/USB2.0) Tested Value
Barebone Systems
• Boxed Intel Celeron Socket 478 2.4GHz (400FSB) CPU w/128K L2 Cache
• U8668D P4 Socket 478 P4M266A/8235 (400FSB/ATA133/USB2.0) uATX
Motherboard
• Integrated S3 SavagePro Graphics upto 32MB Video
• In-Win V500 Mini Tower Micro ATX Case w/250Watts Power Supply P4 &
USB2.0
• Integrated AC 97 6Ch Digital Audio
• Integrated 10/100BaseT Network Lan

Thanks a lot.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

[Ext User(Dick Sidbury)]

Darren Harris wrote:
> I've spent over 100 hours already "researching". So I don't think I'm
> rushing. :-) This is why Dell, Compaq, ect. make so much money. People
> just don't want to be, or can't be bothered with the perils of
> building their own systems. The day that everything is *really* easy
> to install, and "plug and play" is the norm, is the day companies like
> Dell go out of business.
>
I disagree. These companies will stay in business simply because they
can build systems of equal quality to home built cheaper because they
buy in such quantity that they get better prices.

Now homebuilt systems will always be around because it's fun to build
them AND even though they (Dell and others) COULD build what I want and
sell it to me for less than I could build it, they don't.

dick

[Ext User(kony)]

On 3 Mar 2004 15:32:51 -0800, Searcher7@mail.con2.com (Darren Harris)
wrote:


>Yeah, but after I spend all that time swapping between slots and it
>still doesn't work...(I've had a lot of bad luck).

Apparently you have had a lot of bad luck. For the most part you could
just throw the cards in without a care in the world and they'd work,
though in some cases there were issues like sound or video cards hogging
the bus or chipsets with flaky/slow PCI bus (Via 686 southbridge in
particular). Of course there are other possibilities, but for the most
part you are taking a gamble either way, moreso if you don't do the
researching of parts first, but most people do set up (both, integrated or
non-integrated) without significant problems.


>I have RAID hardware, but it appears to be a pain in the butt. My
>overiding goal is to be able to manually copy my entire "C" drive to
>an equal sized drive/partition. And use siad drive in place of the "C"
>if something goes wrong. That sounds simple, but in six years I've yet
>to find an *easy* way to do this.

Huh? The software that comes with the retail packaged drives should do
so. You don't mention your RAID config though. Popular cloning programs
like DriveImage or Ghost are also widely used.


>I've spent over 100 hours already "researching". So I don't think I'm
>rushing. :-) This is why Dell, Compaq, ect. make so much money. People
>just don't want to be, or can't be bothered with the perils of
>building their own systems. The day that everything is *really* easy
>to install, and "plug and play" is the norm, is the day companies like
>Dell go out of business.

Not necessarily, some people don't want to do it themselves... two kinds
of people in the world: hands-on and, not.

There are a lot of other reasons to pick homebuild or OEM besides
configuration "issues". Price, part selection, features, expandability,
customization, out-of-warranty repair costs, no need for OEM-bundled
software (added cost of it), desire to overclock, the overall feeling that
OEMs build systems out of polished mid-grade parts for the most part, not
really GOOD parts except with very limited selection and at a price
premium.



>
>> If you use common, fairly modern hardware from the larger manufacturers
>> there's a lower chance of configuration or compatibility problems, and the
>> better motherboard manufacturers will issue an appropriate number of BIOS
>> revisions to combat any bugs, sometimes even issues with particular
>> popular hardware that isn't really a motherboard problem per se.
>
>Yeah, there's that compatability thing again.

Let me put it like this-

I have drawers full of hardware, and enough systems that I lost count long
ago. For the most part I can just throw any combination of parts together
and expect it to work, it's unusual for any problems to arise, and even
more unusual to have problems that aren't well-known issues with the
particular hardware (where the research comes into play beforehand).


>> Keeping the details you accumulate in mind, you can just build it any way
>> you want, integrated or non. For the most part building systems is TOO
>> easy, you'll get overconfident and overlook something obvious while
>> getting wrapped up in the finer details... it helps to be fully awake, no
>> after-midnight builds.
>
>I don't think building systems is "too easy". Questions like mine on
>the newsgroups prove that.

But you're not really asking a specific question regarding a problem,
you're expecting a problem with no specific reason to yet (jumping into
the great black hole of "what if" abyss).

>Nevertheless, I'm basically looking for a mobo that will support The
>Pentium Extreme Edition, which I plan to get when the price comes
>down. :-)

Why? It'll always be disproportionately priced, horrible value, and given
your apprehension of the whole build-a-system process, you'll probably
wait too long before upgrading again so you'd be paying premium price for
just a moment's worth of great performance instead of upgrading again on a
regular interval.

>But in the meantime I want to use a cheaper CPU on the board. This is
>just me attempting to be a little "future-proof". I don't want to
>spend a lot initially, but don't want to have to upgrade the
>motherboard anytime soon.


But this doesn't really have much to do with whether you get a board with
a lot of integrated features. Any decent board will allow disabling any
integrated features if you don't want to use them. Just don't lock
yourself into a system with limited expansion capability (too few PCI
slots and/or no AGP slot) unless reducing the size of the system case is
the most important factor.

>I'm looking at getting and cannabalizing a barebones system for
>this(See below). But the chipset may cause problems, because I don't
>think Dual Chanel ram is supported.:
>
>DOF PCPC-533V Intel Celeron (400FSB/DDR/32V/S/L/USB2.0) Tested Value
>Barebone Systems
>• Boxed Intel Celeron Socket 478 2.4GHz (400FSB) CPU w/128K L2 Cache
>• U8668D P4 Socket 478 P4M266A/8235 (400FSB/ATA133/USB2.0) uATX
>Motherboard
>• Integrated S3 SavagePro Graphics upto 32MB Video
>• In-Win V500 Mini Tower Micro ATX Case w/250Watts Power Supply P4 &
>USB2.0
>• Integrated AC 97 6Ch Digital Audio
>• Integrated 10/100BaseT Network Lan


It looks cheap. Biostar.

Did your last system have these low-end parts? If so, no wonder you had
problems. Testing and followup support, bios upgrades, etc, cost the
manufacturer $, and so the buyer as well.

Don't buy junk. Don't buy a barebones assembled to be very cheap else
you're asking for more problems. That's more likely to give you grief
than whether things are integrated onto a board or not.
Buy a decent foundation for a system. Intel or Asus motherboard, 300+W
name-brand power supply, decent heatsink, memory, etc.

Prosavage video is poor performance but IS ok if you don't need to do
gaming or anything else demanding... would be fine for 4 year old games or
DVD/video, median sized image editing, office/'net/email/etc.

[Ext User(Dick Sidbury)]

Darren Harris wrote:
> I've spent over 100 hours already "researching". So I don't think I'm
> rushing. :-) This is why Dell, Compaq, ect. make so much money. People
> just don't want to be, or can't be bothered with the perils of
> building their own systems. The day that everything is *really* easy
> to install, and "plug and play" is the norm, is the day companies like
> Dell go out of business.
>
I disagree. These companies will stay in business simply because they
can build systems of equal quality to home built cheaper because they
buy in such quantity that they get better prices.

Now homebuilt systems will always be around because it's fun to build
them AND even though they (Dell and others) COULD build what I want and
sell it to me for less than I could build it, they don't.

dick

[Ext User(~misfit~)]

kony wrote:
> Keeping the details you accumulate in mind, you can just build it any
> way you want, integrated or non. For the most part building systems
> is TOO easy, you'll get overconfident and overlook something obvious
> while getting wrapped up in the finer details... it helps to be fully
> awake, no after-midnight builds.

LOL. I attempted to build a machine after midnite last night, decided I
wanted a Win98SE machine to play some of my older games and to put a SCSI
card in so I can use my old SCSI scanner (no XP/2k drivers available for
it). Just used a cheapo desktop case I had lying around that has good
ventilation, not many older desktops that have places for two 90mm fans (I
get sick of towers everywhere). It's based on a Gigabyte/Via mobo that I
know worked last time I used it, with a Celly Tualatin 1.3GHz CPU. Well,
after gashing myself twice on sharp edges on the case (but making sure no
blood got on any components) I just couldn't get it to work. Fans spin up as
soon as I plug the PSU in, monitor indicator light flicks on, then nothing,
nada, dead. If I unplug the PSU for 30 secs and plug it back in it does the
same thing. Tried less RAM, different RAM, different PSU, different AGP
card, PCI graphics card, unplugging the HDD, CDROM and floppy, different CPU
(Celly 600 coppermine, the board supports them) removed the NIC, checked for
mobo shorts. No luck at all. I cleared CMOS, you name it, I tried it. I went
to bed annoyed and didn't sleep for ages. I'm gonna frisbee the board. I
wasn't using it as it's a dog, it's this board that put me off Via, it's had
all of 100 hours use. I stopped using it as, with the 1.3GHz tui, it only
benchmarked 10% better than a Celly coppermine 900MHz (with half the L2
cache) on a BX board. I just wish I had another board that could run the
tui, I haven't got one and I like tuis, I hate having the CPU on the shelf.

Looks like my 98SE machine will be a Celly 600 instead, the problem is, the
board I have for that has integrated graphics and no AGP slot. Oh well, the
games I have that won't run on XP (mainly Dungeon Keeper 2) aren't all that
demanding of graphics. The problem is, the integrated board I have only
allocates 2MB RAM for graphics and I can't find a setting in BIOS to change
it, and I've looked hard.

If it didn't mean re-formatting my main machine and starting from scratch
I'd just set it up to dual-boot. It took me weeks to get my XP installation
and apps just how I like them. I wish now I'd put 98SE on it first on a 5 -
10GB partition then installed XP on the rest of the drive.

I don't think this was a case of lack of attention due to the hour though,
I'm an insomniac and do my best work at night usually. A few hours after the
sun goes down my brain wakes up. Bloody annoying if I have to get up early.
--
~misfit~

[Ext User(kony)]

On 3 Mar 2004 15:32:51 -0800, Searcher7@mail.con2.com (Darren Harris)
wrote:


>Yeah, but after I spend all that time swapping between slots and it
>still doesn't work...(I've had a lot of bad luck).

Apparently you have had a lot of bad luck. For the most part you could
just throw the cards in without a care in the world and they'd work,
though in some cases there were issues like sound or video cards hogging
the bus or chipsets with flaky/slow PCI bus (Via 686 southbridge in
particular). Of course there are other possibilities, but for the most
part you are taking a gamble either way, moreso if you don't do the
researching of parts first, but most people do set up (both, integrated or
non-integrated) without significant problems.


>I have RAID hardware, but it appears to be a pain in the butt. My
>overiding goal is to be able to manually copy my entire "C" drive to
>an equal sized drive/partition. And use siad drive in place of the "C"
>if something goes wrong. That sounds simple, but in six years I've yet
>to find an *easy* way to do this.

Huh? The software that comes with the retail packaged drives should do
so. You don't mention your RAID config though. Popular cloning programs
like DriveImage or Ghost are also widely used.


>I've spent over 100 hours already "researching". So I don't think I'm
>rushing. :-) This is why Dell, Compaq, ect. make so much money. People
>just don't want to be, or can't be bothered with the perils of
>building their own systems. The day that everything is *really* easy
>to install, and "plug and play" is the norm, is the day companies like
>Dell go out of business.

Not necessarily, some people don't want to do it themselves... two kinds
of people in the world: hands-on and, not.

There are a lot of other reasons to pick homebuild or OEM besides
configuration "issues". Price, part selection, features, expandability,
customization, out-of-warranty repair costs, no need for OEM-bundled
software (added cost of it), desire to overclock, the overall feeling that
OEMs build systems out of polished mid-grade parts for the most part, not
really GOOD parts except with very limited selection and at a price
premium.



>
>> If you use common, fairly modern hardware from the larger manufacturers
>> there's a lower chance of configuration or compatibility problems, and the
>> better motherboard manufacturers will issue an appropriate number of BIOS
>> revisions to combat any bugs, sometimes even issues with particular
>> popular hardware that isn't really a motherboard problem per se.
>
>Yeah, there's that compatability thing again.

Let me put it like this-

I have drawers full of hardware, and enough systems that I lost count long
ago. For the most part I can just throw any combination of parts together
and expect it to work, it's unusual for any problems to arise, and even
more unusual to have problems that aren't well-known issues with the
particular hardware (where the research comes into play beforehand).


>> Keeping the details you accumulate in mind, you can just build it any way
>> you want, integrated or non. For the most part building systems is TOO
>> easy, you'll get overconfident and overlook something obvious while
>> getting wrapped up in the finer details... it helps to be fully awake, no
>> after-midnight builds.
>
>I don't think building systems is "too easy". Questions like mine on
>the newsgroups prove that.

But you're not really asking a specific question regarding a problem,
you're expecting a problem with no specific reason to yet (jumping into
the great black hole of "what if" abyss).

>Nevertheless, I'm basically looking for a mobo that will support The
>Pentium Extreme Edition, which I plan to get when the price comes
>down. :-)

Why? It'll always be disproportionately priced, horrible value, and given
your apprehension of the whole build-a-system process, you'll probably
wait too long before upgrading again so you'd be paying premium price for
just a moment's worth of great performance instead of upgrading again on a
regular interval.

>But in the meantime I want to use a cheaper CPU on the board. This is
>just me attempting to be a little "future-proof". I don't want to
>spend a lot initially, but don't want to have to upgrade the
>motherboard anytime soon.


But this doesn't really have much to do with whether you get a board with
a lot of integrated features. Any decent board will allow disabling any
integrated features if you don't want to use them. Just don't lock
yourself into a system with limited expansion capability (too few PCI
slots and/or no AGP slot) unless reducing the size of the system case is
the most important factor.

>I'm looking at getting and cannabalizing a barebones system for
>this(See below). But the chipset may cause problems, because I don't
>think Dual Chanel ram is supported.:
>
>DOF PCPC-533V Intel Celeron (400FSB/DDR/32V/S/L/USB2.0) Tested Value
>Barebone Systems
>• Boxed Intel Celeron Socket 478 2.4GHz (400FSB) CPU w/128K L2 Cache
>• U8668D P4 Socket 478 P4M266A/8235 (400FSB/ATA133/USB2.0) uATX
>Motherboard
>• Integrated S3 SavagePro Graphics upto 32MB Video
>• In-Win V500 Mini Tower Micro ATX Case w/250Watts Power Supply P4 &
>USB2.0
>• Integrated AC 97 6Ch Digital Audio
>• Integrated 10/100BaseT Network Lan


It looks cheap. Biostar.

Did your last system have these low-end parts? If so, no wonder you had
problems. Testing and followup support, bios upgrades, etc, cost the
manufacturer $, and so the buyer as well.

Don't buy junk. Don't buy a barebones assembled to be very cheap else
you're asking for more problems. That's more likely to give you grief
than whether things are integrated onto a board or not.
Buy a decent foundation for a system. Intel or Asus motherboard, 300+W
name-brand power supply, decent heatsink, memory, etc.

Prosavage video is poor performance but IS ok if you don't need to do
gaming or anything else demanding... would be fine for 4 year old games or
DVD/video, median sized image editing, office/'net/email/etc.

[Ext User(Bob Adkins)]

On 1 Mar 2004 14:16:45 -0800, Searcher7@mail.con2.com (Darren Harris) wrote:

>Can anyone tell if if integrated options on a motherbaord, like video,
>audio, firewire, ect., a better idea than using add-on cards if the
>priority is to avoid configuration problems when building a system?

Of course this depends on your needs. Generally speaking, onboard LAN is OK,
onboard sound is fair, and onboard video is not so great.

Having said that, an integrated board is a cheap and a good way to build a
system on the cheap.

Always buy a board with an AGP slot, at least 5 additional PCI slots, and 3
RAM slots. You can always disable the onboard stuff and add better sound,
video, etc. later on if you feel you need it.

Bob

Remove "kins" from address to reply.

[Ext User(Darren Harris)]

Dick Sidbury <drjamessidbury@hotmail.com> wrote in message news:<c263e9$1p5hve$1@ID-109339.news.uni-berlin.de>...
> Darren Harris wrote:
> > I've spent over 100 hours already "researching". So I don't think I'm
> > rushing. :-) This is why Dell, Compaq, ect. make so much money. People
> > just don't want to be, or can't be bothered with the perils of
> > building their own systems. The day that everything is *really* easy
> > to install, and "plug and play" is the norm, is the day companies like
> > Dell go out of business.
> >
> I disagree. These companies will stay in business simply because they
> can build systems of equal quality to home built cheaper because they
> buy in such quantity that they get better prices.

Yeah, but we don't get those better prices. Their profit margin would
have to drop significantly in order for them to survive under the
conditions I mentioned.

> Now homebuilt systems will always be around because it's fun to build
> them AND even though they (Dell and others) COULD build what I want and
> sell it to me for less than I could build it, they don't.

That's the point. They don't. If is things become as easy as I
mentioned, I don't that they will change to adapt.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

[Ext User(~misfit~)]

kony wrote:
> Keeping the details you accumulate in mind, you can just build it any
> way you want, integrated or non. For the most part building systems
> is TOO easy, you'll get overconfident and overlook something obvious
> while getting wrapped up in the finer details... it helps to be fully
> awake, no after-midnight builds.

LOL. I attempted to build a machine after midnite last night, decided I
wanted a Win98SE machine to play some of my older games and to put a SCSI
card in so I can use my old SCSI scanner (no XP/2k drivers available for
it). Just used a cheapo desktop case I had lying around that has good
ventilation, not many older desktops that have places for two 90mm fans (I
get sick of towers everywhere). It's based on a Gigabyte/Via mobo that I
know worked last time I used it, with a Celly Tualatin 1.3GHz CPU. Well,
after gashing myself twice on sharp edges on the case (but making sure no
blood got on any components) I just couldn't get it to work. Fans spin up as
soon as I plug the PSU in, monitor indicator light flicks on, then nothing,
nada, dead. If I unplug the PSU for 30 secs and plug it back in it does the
same thing. Tried less RAM, different RAM, different PSU, different AGP
card, PCI graphics card, unplugging the HDD, CDROM and floppy, different CPU
(Celly 600 coppermine, the board supports them) removed the NIC, checked for
mobo shorts. No luck at all. I cleared CMOS, you name it, I tried it. I went
to bed annoyed and didn't sleep for ages. I'm gonna frisbee the board. I
wasn't using it as it's a dog, it's this board that put me off Via, it's had
all of 100 hours use. I stopped using it as, with the 1.3GHz tui, it only
benchmarked 10% better than a Celly coppermine 900MHz (with half the L2
cache) on a BX board. I just wish I had another board that could run the
tui, I haven't got one and I like tuis, I hate having the CPU on the shelf.

Looks like my 98SE machine will be a Celly 600 instead, the problem is, the
board I have for that has integrated graphics and no AGP slot. Oh well, the
games I have that won't run on XP (mainly Dungeon Keeper 2) aren't all that
demanding of graphics. The problem is, the integrated board I have only
allocates 2MB RAM for graphics and I can't find a setting in BIOS to change
it, and I've looked hard.

If it didn't mean re-formatting my main machine and starting from scratch
I'd just set it up to dual-boot. It took me weeks to get my XP installation
and apps just how I like them. I wish now I'd put 98SE on it first on a 5 -
10GB partition then installed XP on the rest of the drive.

I don't think this was a case of lack of attention due to the hour though,
I'm an insomniac and do my best work at night usually. A few hours after the
sun goes down my brain wakes up. Bloody annoying if I have to get up early.
--
~misfit~

[Ext User(Darren Harris)]

kony <spam@spam.com> wrote in message news:<247d40p5ggk2qc2nruc1hki2kqvm75lhe7@4ax.com>. ..
> On 3 Mar 2004 15:32:51 -0800, Searcher7@mail.con2.com (Darren Harris)
> wrote:
>
>
> >Yeah, but after I spend all that time swapping between slots and it
> >still doesn't work...(I've had a lot of bad luck).
>
> Apparently you have had a lot of bad luck. For the most part you could
> just throw the cards in without a care in the world and they'd work,
> though in some cases there were issues like sound or video cards hogging
> the bus or chipsets with flaky/slow PCI bus (Via 686 southbridge in
> particular). Of course there are other possibilities, but for the most
> part you are taking a gamble either way, moreso if you don't do the
> researching of parts first, but most people do set up (both, integrated or
> non-integrated) without significant problems.

Most people.

> >I have RAID hardware, but it appears to be a pain in the butt. My
> >overiding goal is to be able to manually copy my entire "C" drive to
> >an equal sized drive/partition. And use siad drive in place of the "C"
> >if something goes wrong. That sounds simple, but in six years I've yet
> >to find an *easy* way to do this.
>
> Huh? The software that comes with the retail packaged drives should do
> so. You don't mention your RAID config though. Popular cloning programs
> like DriveImage or Ghost are also widely used.

Yeah, I had a non-working copy of Drive Image installed on that
systema also. I finally took it off because all it was doing was
increasing the already too long booting-up time.

> >I've spent over 100 hours already "researching". So I don't think I'm
> >rushing. :-) This is why Dell, Compaq, ect. make so much money. People
> >just don't want to be, or can't be bothered with the perils of
> >building their own systems. The day that everything is *really* easy
> >to install, and "plug and play" is the norm, is the day companies like
> >Dell go out of business.
>
> Not necessarily, some people don't want to do it themselves... two kinds
> of people in the world: hands-on and, not.

Well, I believe that if putting a PC together was as easy as I said,
that proportion would swing greatly in the direction
"do-it-your-selfers".

> There are a lot of other reasons to pick homebuild or OEM besides
> configuration "issues". Price, part selection, features, expandability,
> customization, out-of-warranty repair costs, no need for OEM-bundled
> software (added cost of it), desire to overclock, the overall feeling that
> OEMs build systems out of polished mid-grade parts for the most part, not
> really GOOD parts except with very limited selection and at a price
> premium.

Basically, it comes down to if what I'm looking for is available, and
so far it doesn't seem so.

> >> If you use common, fairly modern hardware from the larger manufacturers
> >> there's a lower chance of configuration or compatibility problems, and the
> >> better motherboard manufacturers will issue an appropriate number of BIOS
> >> revisions to combat any bugs, sometimes even issues with particular
> >> popular hardware that isn't really a motherboard problem per se.
> >
> >Yeah, there's that compatability thing again.
>
> Let me put it like this-
>
> I have drawers full of hardware, and enough systems that I lost count long
> ago. For the most part I can just throw any combination of parts together
> and expect it to work, it's unusual for any problems to arise, and even
> more unusual to have problems that aren't well-known issues with the
> particular hardware (where the research comes into play beforehand).

If I had that may parts, perhaps I could say the same thing.

> >> Keeping the details you accumulate in mind, you can just build it any way
> >> you want, integrated or non. For the most part building systems is TOO
> >> easy, you'll get overconfident and overlook something obvious while
> >> getting wrapped up in the finer details... it helps to be fully awake, no
> >> after-midnight builds.
> >
> >I don't think building systems is "too easy". Questions like mine on
> >the newsgroups prove that.
>
> But you're not really asking a specific question regarding a problem,
> you're expecting a problem with no specific reason to yet (jumping into
> the great black hole of "what if" abyss).

Actually the reason was specific. Integrated options to fall back on
until I get relatively high-end cards, or if I have configuration
problems.

> >Nevertheless, I'm basically looking for a mobo that will support The
> >Pentium Extreme Edition, which I plan to get when the price comes
> >down. :-)
>
> Why? It'll always be disproportionately priced, horrible value, and given
> your apprehension of the whole build-a-system process, you'll probably
> wait too long before upgrading again so you'd be paying premium price for
> just a moment's worth of great performance instead of upgrading again on a
> regular interval.

You're assuming too much. I never said I have an apprehension of the
whole "build-a-system process". If anything I have an apprehension of
big name manufactured systems. And the idea is to make this the last
32 bit system I build, before 64 bit takes over. So obviously I'll
want to have a minimum ceiling as for a processor when the time comes
to squeeze as much as I can out of the system.

> >But in the meantime I want to use a cheaper CPU on the board. This is
> >just me attempting to be a little "future-proof". I don't want to
> >spend a lot initially, but don't want to have to upgrade the
> >motherboard anytime soon.
>
>
> But this doesn't really have much to do with whether you get a board with
> a lot of integrated features. Any decent board will allow disabling any
> integrated features if you don't want to use them. Just don't lock
> yourself into a system with limited expansion capability (too few PCI
> slots and/or no AGP slot) unless reducing the size of the system case is
> the most important factor.

That is what this is all about. I was searching for an integrated mobo
that has all the features I need. But it may not exist.

> >I'm looking at getting and cannabalizing a barebones system for
> >this(See below). But the chipset may cause problems, because I don't
> >think Dual Chanel ram is supported.:
> >
> >DOF PCPC-533V Intel Celeron (400FSB/DDR/32V/S/L/USB2.0) Tested Value
> >Barebone Systems
> >? Boxed Intel Celeron Socket 478 2.4GHz (400FSB) CPU w/128K L2 Cache
> >? U8668D P4 Socket 478 P4M266A/8235 (400FSB/ATA133/USB2.0) uATX
> >Motherboard
> >? Integrated S3 SavagePro Graphics upto 32MB Video
> >? In-Win V500 Mini Tower Micro ATX Case w/250Watts Power Supply P4 &
> >USB2.0
> >? Integrated AC 97 6Ch Digital Audio
> >? Integrated 10/100BaseT Network Lan
>
>
> It looks cheap. Biostar.
>
> Did your last system have these low-end parts? If so, no wonder you had
> problems. Testing and followup support, bios upgrades, etc, cost the
> manufacturer $, and so the buyer as well.

My last system was purchased in 1998 is a SCSI system considered to be
relatively high-end at the time. And it's actually lasted longer than
a lot of big name PCs, considering how much running time it's had.

> Don't buy junk. Don't buy a barebones assembled to be very cheap else
> you're asking for more problems. That's more likely to give you grief
> than whether things are integrated onto a board or not.
> Buy a decent foundation for a system. Intel or Asus motherboard, 300+W
> name-brand power supply, decent heatsink, memory, etc.

I've also been looking at the Asus P4P800* and P4C800*, but I'm told
that Intel mobos would be more reliable, and tend to have more
integrated features.

> Prosavage video is poor performance but IS ok if you don't need to do
> gaming or anything else demanding... would be fine for 4 year old games or
> DVD/video, median sized image editing, office/'net/email/etc.

Well if I get into gaming next year, I'd have to spring for a high-end
video card.

Thanks.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

[Ext User(Bob Adkins)]

On 1 Mar 2004 14:16:45 -0800, Searcher7@mail.con2.com (Darren Harris) wrote:

>Can anyone tell if if integrated options on a motherbaord, like video,
>audio, firewire, ect., a better idea than using add-on cards if the
>priority is to avoid configuration problems when building a system?

Of course this depends on your needs. Generally speaking, onboard LAN is OK,
onboard sound is fair, and onboard video is not so great.

Having said that, an integrated board is a cheap and a good way to build a
system on the cheap.

Always buy a board with an AGP slot, at least 5 additional PCI slots, and 3
RAM slots. You can always disable the onboard stuff and add better sound,
video, etc. later on if you feel you need it.

Bob

Remove "kins" from address to reply.

[Ext User(Darren Harris)]

Dick Sidbury <drjamessidbury@hotmail.com> wrote in message news:<c263e9$1p5hve$1@ID-109339.news.uni-berlin.de>...
> Darren Harris wrote:
> > I've spent over 100 hours already "researching". So I don't think I'm
> > rushing. :-) This is why Dell, Compaq, ect. make so much money. People
> > just don't want to be, or can't be bothered with the perils of
> > building their own systems. The day that everything is *really* easy
> > to install, and "plug and play" is the norm, is the day companies like
> > Dell go out of business.
> >
> I disagree. These companies will stay in business simply because they
> can build systems of equal quality to home built cheaper because they
> buy in such quantity that they get better prices.

Yeah, but we don't get those better prices. Their profit margin would
have to drop significantly in order for them to survive under the
conditions I mentioned.

> Now homebuilt systems will always be around because it's fun to build
> them AND even though they (Dell and others) COULD build what I want and
> sell it to me for less than I could build it, they don't.

That's the point. They don't. If is things become as easy as I
mentioned, I don't that they will change to adapt.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

[Ext User(Darren Harris)]

kony <spam@spam.com> wrote in message news:<247d40p5ggk2qc2nruc1hki2kqvm75lhe7@4ax.com>. ..
> On 3 Mar 2004 15:32:51 -0800, Searcher7@mail.con2.com (Darren Harris)
> wrote:
>
>
> >Yeah, but after I spend all that time swapping between slots and it
> >still doesn't work...(I've had a lot of bad luck).
>
> Apparently you have had a lot of bad luck. For the most part you could
> just throw the cards in without a care in the world and they'd work,
> though in some cases there were issues like sound or video cards hogging
> the bus or chipsets with flaky/slow PCI bus (Via 686 southbridge in
> particular). Of course there are other possibilities, but for the most
> part you are taking a gamble either way, moreso if you don't do the
> researching of parts first, but most people do set up (both, integrated or
> non-integrated) without significant problems.

Most people.

> >I have RAID hardware, but it appears to be a pain in the butt. My
> >overiding goal is to be able to manually copy my entire "C" drive to
> >an equal sized drive/partition. And use siad drive in place of the "C"
> >if something goes wrong. That sounds simple, but in six years I've yet
> >to find an *easy* way to do this.
>
> Huh? The software that comes with the retail packaged drives should do
> so. You don't mention your RAID config though. Popular cloning programs
> like DriveImage or Ghost are also widely used.

Yeah, I had a non-working copy of Drive Image installed on that
systema also. I finally took it off because all it was doing was
increasing the already too long booting-up time.

> >I've spent over 100 hours already "researching". So I don't think I'm
> >rushing. :-) This is why Dell, Compaq, ect. make so much money. People
> >just don't want to be, or can't be bothered with the perils of
> >building their own systems. The day that everything is *really* easy
> >to install, and "plug and play" is the norm, is the day companies like
> >Dell go out of business.
>
> Not necessarily, some people don't want to do it themselves... two kinds
> of people in the world: hands-on and, not.

Well, I believe that if putting a PC together was as easy as I said,
that proportion would swing greatly in the direction
"do-it-your-selfers".

> There are a lot of other reasons to pick homebuild or OEM besides
> configuration "issues". Price, part selection, features, expandability,
> customization, out-of-warranty repair costs, no need for OEM-bundled
> software (added cost of it), desire to overclock, the overall feeling that
> OEMs build systems out of polished mid-grade parts for the most part, not
> really GOOD parts except with very limited selection and at a price
> premium.

Basically, it comes down to if what I'm looking for is available, and
so far it doesn't seem so.

> >> If you use common, fairly modern hardware from the larger manufacturers
> >> there's a lower chance of configuration or compatibility problems, and the
> >> better motherboard manufacturers will issue an appropriate number of BIOS
> >> revisions to combat any bugs, sometimes even issues with particular
> >> popular hardware that isn't really a motherboard problem per se.
> >
> >Yeah, there's that compatability thing again.
>
> Let me put it like this-
>
> I have drawers full of hardware, and enough systems that I lost count long
> ago. For the most part I can just throw any combination of parts together
> and expect it to work, it's unusual for any problems to arise, and even
> more unusual to have problems that aren't well-known issues with the
> particular hardware (where the research comes into play beforehand).

If I had that may parts, perhaps I could say the same thing.

> >> Keeping the details you accumulate in mind, you can just build it any way
> >> you want, integrated or non. For the most part building systems is TOO
> >> easy, you'll get overconfident and overlook something obvious while
> >> getting wrapped up in the finer details... it helps to be fully awake, no
> >> after-midnight builds.
> >
> >I don't think building systems is "too easy". Questions like mine on
> >the newsgroups prove that.
>
> But you're not really asking a specific question regarding a problem,
> you're expecting a problem with no specific reason to yet (jumping into
> the great black hole of "what if" abyss).

Actually the reason was specific. Integrated options to fall back on
until I get relatively high-end cards, or if I have configuration
problems.

> >Nevertheless, I'm basically looking for a mobo that will support The
> >Pentium Extreme Edition, which I plan to get when the price comes
> >down. :-)
>
> Why? It'll always be disproportionately priced, horrible value, and given
> your apprehension of the whole build-a-system process, you'll probably
> wait too long before upgrading again so you'd be paying premium price for
> just a moment's worth of great performance instead of upgrading again on a
> regular interval.

You're assuming too much. I never said I have an apprehension of the
whole "build-a-system process". If anything I have an apprehension of
big name manufactured systems. And the idea is to make this the last
32 bit system I build, before 64 bit takes over. So obviously I'll
want to have a minimum ceiling as for a processor when the time comes
to squeeze as much as I can out of the system.

> >But in the meantime I want to use a cheaper CPU on the board. This is
> >just me attempting to be a little "future-proof". I don't want to
> >spend a lot initially, but don't want to have to upgrade the
> >motherboard anytime soon.
>
>
> But this doesn't really have much to do with whether you get a board with
> a lot of integrated features. Any decent board will allow disabling any
> integrated features if you don't want to use them. Just don't lock
> yourself into a system with limited expansion capability (too few PCI
> slots and/or no AGP slot) unless reducing the size of the system case is
> the most important factor.

That is what this is all about. I was searching for an integrated mobo
that has all the features I need. But it may not exist.

> >I'm looking at getting and cannabalizing a barebones system for
> >this(See below). But the chipset may cause problems, because I don't
> >think Dual Chanel ram is supported.:
> >
> >DOF PCPC-533V Intel Celeron (400FSB/DDR/32V/S/L/USB2.0) Tested Value
> >Barebone Systems
> >? Boxed Intel Celeron Socket 478 2.4GHz (400FSB) CPU w/128K L2 Cache
> >? U8668D P4 Socket 478 P4M266A/8235 (400FSB/ATA133/USB2.0) uATX
> >Motherboard
> >? Integrated S3 SavagePro Graphics upto 32MB Video
> >? In-Win V500 Mini Tower Micro ATX Case w/250Watts Power Supply P4 &
> >USB2.0
> >? Integrated AC 97 6Ch Digital Audio
> >? Integrated 10/100BaseT Network Lan
>
>
> It looks cheap. Biostar.
>
> Did your last system have these low-end parts? If so, no wonder you had
> problems. Testing and followup support, bios upgrades, etc, cost the
> manufacturer $, and so the buyer as well.

My last system was purchased in 1998 is a SCSI system considered to be
relatively high-end at the time. And it's actually lasted longer than
a lot of big name PCs, considering how much running time it's had.

> Don't buy junk. Don't buy a barebones assembled to be very cheap else
> you're asking for more problems. That's more likely to give you grief
> than whether things are integrated onto a board or not.
> Buy a decent foundation for a system. Intel or Asus motherboard, 300+W
> name-brand power supply, decent heatsink, memory, etc.

I've also been looking at the Asus P4P800* and P4C800*, but I'm told
that Intel mobos would be more reliable, and tend to have more
integrated features.

> Prosavage video is poor performance but IS ok if you don't need to do
> gaming or anything else demanding... would be fine for 4 year old games or
> DVD/video, median sized image editing, office/'net/email/etc.

Well if I get into gaming next year, I'd have to spring for a high-end
video card.

Thanks.

Darren Harris
Staten Island, New York.

[Ext User(kony)]

On 4 Mar 2004 09:11:30 -0800, Searcher7@mail.con2.com (Darren Harris)
wrote:

>> Apparently you have had a lot of bad luck. For the most part you could
>> just throw the cards in without a care in the world and they'd work,
>> though in some cases there were issues like sound or video cards hogging
>> the bus or chipsets with flaky/slow PCI bus (Via 686 southbridge in
>> particular). Of course there are other possibilities, but for the most
>> part you are taking a gamble either way, moreso if you don't do the
>> researching of parts first, but most people do set up (both, integrated or
>> non-integrated) without significant problems.
>
>Most people.

yeah, "most people" can expect to drive to work tomorrow without getting
in a traffic accident too, but some won't make it.

>Well, I believe that if putting a PC together was as easy as I said,
>that proportion would swing greatly in the direction
>"do-it-your-selfers".

Fair enough, the more you do it the easier it gets. Just do it. You won't
learn anything about fixing configuration issues if you never have any.

>Basically, it comes down to if what I'm looking for is available, and
>so far it doesn't seem so.

Dude, get a Dell.


>> I have drawers full of hardware, and enough systems that I lost count long
>> ago. For the most part I can just throw any combination of parts together
>> and expect it to work, it's unusual for any problems to arise, and even
>> more unusual to have problems that aren't well-known issues with the
>> particular hardware (where the research comes into play beforehand).
>
>If I had that may parts, perhaps I could say the same thing.

You're missing the point... it's not that I'd have to swap parts to get it
working, but rather just blindly reach in and grab "something" expecting
it to work.

>Actually the reason was specific. Integrated options to fall back on
>until I get relatively high-end cards, or if I have configuration
>problems.

Fair enough, but with the plan to get cards eventually you might consider
a non-mATX motherboard, and something a bit better than Biostar (which is
just about any name-brand).


>You're assuming too much. I never said I have an apprehension of the
>whole "build-a-system process".

Ummmm, this thread is evidence of that apprehension. In less time than it
took for you and I to write/reply to this thread, the parts could've been
ordered or assembled, you could be done right now.

>If anything I have an apprehension of
>big name manufactured systems. And the idea is to make this the last
>32 bit system I build, before 64 bit takes over. So obviously I'll
>want to have a minimum ceiling as for a processor when the time comes
>to squeeze as much as I can out of the system.

Fair enough, then get an Athlon board that supports DDR400 or P4 board
supporting QDR800, too often called 800 "MHz". Buy from a manufacturer
that offers timely bios updates... check their website for their track
record with current and aging boards, if they didn't support "squeezing as
much as I can" (which I assume to mean a CPU upgrade) out of their past
boards, you shouldn't expect them to do so with current boards.

Asus, Abit, MSI or Gigabyte would be better choices than Biostar.

>That is what this is all about. I was searching for an integrated mobo
>that has all the features I need. But it may not exist.

But you never mentiond what specific features, performance levels you
need... you're being unproductive.


>I've also been looking at the Asus P4P800* and P4C800*, but I'm told
>that Intel mobos would be more reliable, and tend to have more
>integrated features.

Then buy an Intel board.

>Well if I get into gaming next year, I'd have to spring for a high-end
>video card.

OK?