Which mobo/vid card to go with...

Hey all,

So I'm getting ready to buy some new stuff from Newegg and I need help deciding between two possibilities. They have this mobo/video card combo - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813138051 - which I do like. However, I had already chosen the following mobo - http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16813130060 - and the following separate video card - http://www.newegg.com/product/produc...82E16814102041.

The combo mobo supports twice as much memory as the MSI mobo, twice as many PATA drives, but doesn't have better built-in sound. The nVidia card that comes with the combo looks good except that it has half the memory as the ATI card I have chosen.

What do you guys and gals think? Which of these two setups is better?

Radeon X1600PRO , nothing wrong there.
2GB of ram is more than plenty for XP.

Now, what do you expect to use this setup for?

Thanks for the thoughts. I plan to use it for basic or general use, school work, etc., and a little bit of gaming. I play mostly America's Army. I don't play anything newer than that and I don't play often (once a week maybe for a few hours).

I'd go with the MSI over a Biostar. And ditto the above.

AA is a good game, i especially like the price. ;):)


Liam

I like the price of AA, too. Once a week a few of us get online, use Team Speak and play AA for about 5 or 6 hours. Than once a month I have some guys over to the house and I host a LAN gaming party. I have a few friends and relatives come into it over the Internet, too. We rarely get more than 10 guys playing on that once a month gaming party, but it's a blast. :D

Then with that video card and MSI board, you are good to go then.

Biostar is a very mediocre mobo. :(

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Train

Biostar is a very mediocre mobo. :(

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That seems to be what everyone says about Biostar. I'm glad I asked.

Check this out:

BIOSTAR TFORCE 550 Socket AM2 NVIDIA nForce 550 MCP ATX AMD Motherboard - Retail
AMD Athlon 64 X2 3600+ Brisbane 1.9GHz 2 x 512KB L2 Cache Socket AM2 Processor - OEM

Original price: $183.99
Discount: -$20.00
Combo Price: $163.99

This is a combo and it looks pretty good. Would an AMD dual core setup like this be better overall? I'm mostly thinking about how it will perform in America's Army versus a straight P4 3.0 GHz processor single core. It seems like it will and it will be a little bit more future proof, perhaps.

I'd avoid the Biostar, even though the price is good you don't wanna have to replace it x many months down the line.

The 3600+ is new, a budget dual core chip...it would still do nicely though, great price for the CPU alone.


Liam

Check these mobo out for that cpu.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...SubCategory=22

Basically I have around $150 to spend on a mobo/cpu. I know nothing about dual core processors except that is where the technology is going. Since I know nothing about them I'm not sure how to compare them to P4's. I'm mostly thinking about how the dual core will play America's Army. Even though I only play that game maybe once a week I want it to play well when I do.

So do you like any of these MSI boards for that processor (IOW, any will work well), and is that processor okay? Again, I know nothing about dual core processors. I don't know about the Intel versus AMD, and how they compare on cost, too. I was always of the mindset that I should wait on the dual core since apps weren't ready for them and I really wanted speed for the one or two games I'd play. Now it seems that I've found out that dual core chips will play the games basically better than their single core counterparts that run as much as twice as fast in some cases. Hence my confusion...

We understand. But we are trying to say, it might be to your advantage now to spend more, than have to replace things later.

P4's run to hot for my liking.

I doubt it will make much difference, not a lot of games are optomised for dual-core processors, nor multi-threaded, AM2 will bring DDR2 support, along with that X1600 it should improve gameplay in AA, framerate will rise, and you'll probably be able to higher some settings, what resolution do you play at?


Liam