msi mobo...

[parlee]

i have 754 mobo proc and want to upgrade to pci express while keeping my cpu since its a 3700... the mobo i found was a http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813130493 if u take the time to read the latest review it says that hes running a 9700pro agp card in it, is he just being a dick and saying that so people go out and buy it or does it really have an agp slot... the description says it doesnt, but if u look at the picture theres a slot thats covered by red tape, is that the pci express slot or an agp one?... does anyone know if this is a good board or not? i know its a good idea to go to pci express from an x700pro, provided my parents let me... which they prob wont... some sucker from my school is going to buy my x700 for 120 (and i bought it for 129 )

 

[Scout]

Interesting... this board actually has an AGP slot, or at least a slot that will support some AGP cards. I'm not sure exactly how it's set up since the nForce4 chipset doesn't support AGP normally. So the guy isn't lying... you really can use an AGP card.

I've seen some 915 boards in the past that hooked together two PCI slots into an "AGP Express" slot, but it didn't have the bandwidth of a true AGP slot. This may be something similar.

 

[parlee]

is it a guess and check or will there site show me a card compatability list? do u know if an x700pro is supported? i can live with a minimal decrease in performance for a while till i get the 7800gt(x)

 

[parlee]

ive found another mobo that deff supports all agp card.. its

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813153036

it seems decent enough for me, reviews say it sucks but some kid gave it a 2 for not having a manual.. i can live without 1 and still give it a 5 all i really want is a stable board that i can learn to overclock with... SATA ports are no problem as i have 1 hd and dotn plan on expanding, as with usb i have about 2 usb devices and may upgrade to a usb keyboard but not anytime soon... so my question is should i go for the MSI mobo and have a MAYBE non compatable video card or should i go with the jetway and have a pretty much guarenteed agp compatability? i know that msi is a bigger name than jetway and have nice overclocking software... so im leaning towards msi right now

 

[Newf]

MSI K8N Neo3-F
http://www.msicomputer.com/product/p_spec.asp?model=K8N_Neo3-F&class=mb
The "odd" slot this board has is an AGR slot. It works only with "compatible" AGP video cards...
A large number of older AGP cards are shown in the compatibility list, but the x700 is not among them. Sorry.

 

[parlee]

i looked at it and noticed the newest card supported was a 6600gt by msi, do u think that maybe they havnt updated the list? i dont get why older cards would be supported and not newer ones? usually isnt it the opposite, the AGR slot runs at 4x agp i believe, my card can run at 4x agp should i try it out? if it doesnt work ill prob just hold onto it until i can get a 7800gt... prices for this stuff is only going to go up since they stopped making them :-/... kinda like my 3700 was 229 with a mobo and now its 320 for just the chip... im guessing that it will support the x700pro and if not itll probably support it on an older driver... any1 agree?

 

[Newf]

Usually as old parts are discontinued prices do tend to go up.
But...
In another post (I can't remember where) WUSY said a couple of days ago that some OEM is coming out with an AGP based NVidia 7800GT board. I asked him for a reference so I could read more but haven't heard back yet.
I have no idea if your x700 might just work due to an "old" list.
Caveat Emptor...

 

[parlee]

if u can find any reviews other than newegg can u please direct me, i couldnt find any... the newegg ones seem like idiots saying that the agp slot is slower, they must have done somthing wrong because it probably wont be noticably slower

 

[Newf]

I'm not sure that's true.
Chipsets that have native support for PCI-E do not directly support AGP.
Usually the workaround is to run the AGP slot thru the regular PCI bus.
With older videocards this bottleneck is either minimal or completely transparent to the user.
The faster your AGP card is, the more likely you will not get the speed you paid for.
Newegg reviews are written by a wide sample of buyers. They can't be considered "reviews" in the same way as those done professionally. Sometimes you can weed through the chaff and get useful info from them though.

 

[Newf]

if u can find any reviews other than newegg can u please direct me, i couldnt find any...

Google the mobo name.

 

[parlee]

well thanks for the help, i googled the jetway mobo and found nothing. theres 5 reviews on newegg and none of them mean anything to me...

Easily the biggest feature of the MSI K8N Neo3-F is its support for 8xAGP videocards. The AGR slot, as MSI likes to call it, runs through the PCI Express bus although MSI does not state exactly how quickly data travels (I'd guess it's PCI express x2 - but don't quote me on that)

http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleid=1806&page=2

it runs though the pci express, but is noticably slower, so u were right.. it says it support 8x cards so i dont see why the list isnt a LOT bigger than it is, 60+ card supported seems like a lie i doubt itd been updated, or maybe its a driver issue, anyway if u look at the benchmarks its onpar with other boards there comparing with... they probably used a pci express card tho i havnt found anything on it supporting newer cards, although i havnt been looking very long, ill reply soon when i fidn out

 

[parlee]

i just thought it over and i may buy the motherboard, and a 7800gt... i was going to get this board and wait a while but it seems that there will be a pretty big performance loss its 10% on an mx440 or some card like that, so im guessing itll be much bigger with an x700 considering its at a 2x agp speed... i kinda wanna wait till 7900 launches so that 7800gt prices will drop more, but for the 270 its so worth it, i think ill go with a nice asus mobo with just pci express, sell the x700 to a friend from school for 100 bux (bought for 129 ) and lose 200 bux on a huge overhaul which will set me for a while