Stable but cheap

Rafjr00 · Jul 17, 2002

I am building a comp for this kid that is about to start college. He knows nothing about computers. (surprise suprise suprise) his dad is paying for the comp. he wants good fast components but does not want to pay a premium. i was thinking of useing a shuttle AK31A motherboard and a duron 1 ghz. that way later if he wanted it better and faster i could drop in an xp. I was wondering if that board is good and stable. i don't want to have to go play with it ever other weekend because the kid did something stupid. thanks

attack · Jul 17, 2002

really good board, I built a 1 gig duron for a kid and used the AK31A and it worked beutiful, awesome board for what is it like 59 bucks?

Da Whip · Jul 17, 2002

That is a very stable board. For $30 more you should get an XP1500+. It is a much better chip.

Rafjr00 · Jul 17, 2002

I wanted to put the 1500+ but the dad only wants his son needs plus alittle room to grow and he wants it cheap. so i built up the system on paper with prices and with out my charge the whole thing comes to about $580. he said great under $600. so no xp. but room to grow.

lonewolf1983 · Jul 18, 2002

yep they look like a stable board
and that little package should go quite nicely

Maxvla · Jul 18, 2002

another recommendation for shuttle ak31a... i'm kinda partial

Oni · Jul 18, 2002

You might wanna look at the ECS motherboard, too (I can't remember the model number, unfortunately) A buddy of mine runs it, and it runs really stable. It uses the SiS 745 chipset, which supports SD and DDR RAM, and is very stable.

lonewolf1983 · Jul 18, 2002

yep its the ECS k7s5a board based on the sis735 chipset
used one in my last rig
certainly a fast and stable board

james.miller · Jul 18, 2002

yeah i love my k7s5a. no good for overclocking,but stable as helll with my xp1800

ZeroAquaduct · Jul 18, 2002

I'm not sure how the MSI KT3 Ultra board compared to the Shuttle in terms of price, but I'm using the KT3 and it's a very good budget board. It's probably one of the most stable boards out there.

The only concern I have with Shuttle is the tech support. I heard that once you have a Shuttle, you're pretty much on your own (unless you come here for advice of course, LOL).

james.miller · Jul 19, 2002

lol. this honestly is the best place to go for any advice pc related.

Rafjr00 · Jul 19, 2002

can't argue with that

what about the ECS K7SEM. It has an agp port to upgread the onboard video. plus it is micro atx thus a smaller case. and trust me with this kid smaller is better he will trip over a mid or bigger because he won't beable to put it away.if it small he can stick it under the dest or on it

Rafjr00 · Jul 19, 2002

I know the KT266 is not that great, but this guy is not doing any overclocking and unless i get pay some big money i am not going to spend my time doing it for him. so is the shuttle Ak32L an ok board and no i am not I have never used a shuttle board

It is the less expensive that supports DDR

james.miller · Jul 19, 2002

is it less the the k7s5a?

Rafjr00 · Jul 19, 2002

ya but only by a few bucks

james.miller · Jul 19, 2002

what other features does it have?

Maxvla · Jul 19, 2002

Rafjr00 said:
I know the KT266 is not that great, but this guy is not doing any overclocking and unless i get pay some big money i am not going to spend my time doing it for him. so is the shuttle Ak32L an ok board and no i am not I have never used a shuttle board It is the less expensive that supports DDR

the kt266 was a bit buggy but the revision kt266a gets stellar performance. i'd highly suggest a kt266a based board for someone trying to save a few bucks.

BigDawg69 · Jul 19, 2002

ECS k7VTA3 is what my most recent build was and I've had no calls from my computer illiterat mother since I delivered it two months ago! I figure that's got to be a good sign!

I built her:

ECS K7VTA3 mobo
AMD Duron 1.3ghz
Ge Force 2 GTS (I upgraded to a Ge Force 3 recently and gave her my old card. I know it's a bunch more card than she'll need!)
256mb PC2100 RAM
Maxtor 7200RPM 40gig HD
Philips CDRW Drive (She asked for it)
Windows XP

HaywirE · Jul 20, 2002

ECS K7S5A - 50, 1600 XP 66, 80GB 7200 RPM IBM HD 89?

shill82 · Jul 20, 2002

I would buy a refurbed Epox board from Newegg you can get an 8k3a+ for 66 free shipping I believe. The shuttle is a nice board but it died on me after 8 months of use without overclocking it at all. Well the CPU was OC'd but not the board ran it @133 full time. Or you can get the shuttle refurbed for 40 I think. The board I'm using is a refurb and although it has its quirks I don't think it was due to the fact that it is refurb or it might not be the board at all. Nevermind looks like they ran out of the Epoxs and the Ak31 refurbs might go AK35 for 49 though. I think it has a small performance increase over Ak31.

Shawn

Stable but cheap

Member

Member

Senior Member

Member

Member

Senior Member

Oni-ni-Kanab;, Ninja Hippo eater Moderator

Member

Member

Member

Member

Member

Member

Member

Member

Member

Senior Member

New Member

Disabled

Member

Similar threads