On Wednesday, January 12, 2000 6:29 AM, "Conor McNessa"
<[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> May I introduce myself - I'm just starting to build a PC with a couple of
> friends in other countries. Can anyone recommend a good motherboard, with
> *excellent tech support*, international availability, a reasonable price,
> easy to build to? I'm thinking about the Abit BE6-II. What experience have
> people had?
First, welcome to the list <g>. The second half of your question is most
difficult because a lot will depend on how you will use this computer
system.
Abit continues its trend of creating the best boards for overclocking.
Since the original LX6 and the inclusion of the CPU Softmenu, Abit has
been the choice for overclockers everywhere. The new BE6 brings along its
heritage and adds enough new features to make it a worthy purchase for
anyone into overclocking. OTOH, Asus' P3B-F, is a genetic mutant that's
related to the P2B and the P2B-F, two boards that received mostly stellar
reviews around the 'net. I'm not friendly to "just" any motherboards--I
expect alot from them. IMHO, they're the most important component of a
machine; their purpose is to please their silicon driving master. It
stands to reason, then, that like many of you, I expect top-notch
performance from a motherboard. But in "geek" speak, what exactly is
top-notch performance? Personally, I don't care if a motherboard
sports Quad Celeron support and a liquid cooling option that allows you to
run a Celeron 300A (oh, how we love those CPUs) up to a Gigahertz. What I
want from a board is stability, speed, and if possible, ease of setup.
Lately many overclockers have been jumping for boards with more nifty
features, more voltage settings, and more bus speeds, sometimes compromising
that very stability we should all be striving for. A motherboard
isn't the sum of a few BIOS settings and benchmark-tests. The mobo's
performance has to be considered in a wide-spectrum of use, and stability
has to be considered.
The ASUS P3B-F is a unique moniker in the mobo world. To the best of my
knowledge, it's the first motherboard "model" to (confusingly) house
multiple slot configurations and actually ships in a few different
varieties! There's a 5 PCI/2 ISA/1 AGP version, a 6PCI/1 ISA/1 AGP version,
and a 6 PCI/1 AGP version (no ISA for you!). What does this mean you may
ask? It means that when you're looking to buy one, be darn sure to check
which configuration a vendor is selling. I know a few people are
getting bit by this as you read these words. Odd decision on the part of
ASUS, if you ask me. The myriad configurations have an upside, pf course,
and that is choice. You can shelter all your PCI components without the
annoyance of unused ISA slots taking up space in your case. All that you
have to do is purchase the mobo config that you want, and you're set (if you
can find that config, of course). For me, the 5/2/1 board, a
configuration Abit users have grown quite affectionate with, was beckoning
me. For the overclocker in you <lol>, you'll be happy to know that ASUS has
stuck with the 83781D/WINBOND combination for hardware monitoring.
One of the most interesting features of this motherboard is that it can
utilize both dipswitches and a SoftMenu-style configuration tool (they call
it JumperFree™). Their answer to Abit's SoftMenu is,
well...interesting. The term that I can best use to describe it is
"kludge". Being neither as intuitive nor as user-friendly as Abit's,
JumperFree clearly reveals it's frosh status. The interface just isn't
that great. Then again, chances are, once you get everything set the way
you like it, you won't be messing with it too much. Interestingly, use
of JumperFree requires that a dipswitch on the motherboard be set
appropriately. Fortunately they're setting it to enabled by default -
an indication of things to come. Both company's have excellent tech
support, etc. Aside from the personal biases, there are a lot of great manu
facturers of mobo's and you will have to decide for yourself which one will
do what you want to accomplish. I apologize for the long post. HTH. :-)
Walter R. Worth
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