First Time Build

[EricM]

Ok I understand this now. So should I stick with just regular SATA then? I also have a question about DFI's motherboards. What is the difference between the LANPARTY series and the LANPARTY UT series? Is there much difference between the [font=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]LANParty NF4 SLI, the [/font][font=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif] LANParty UT NF4 SLI-DR and the [/font][font=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]LANParty UT NF4 SLI-DR Expert?[/font]

 

[TRDCorolla1]

I would still get the best one offered and that is the SATA II. The DFI motherboards all use the same chipset with some supporting SLi depending if you want to go that route. They look all the same to me, just different names. I notice storage support is a bit different as some support SATA II while the other model supports SATA I. Onboard sound differes with Realtek and AC97 Codec. Some have more USB support and more integrated Ethernet port than others. It comes down to matter of preference of what you want. The more expensive the motherboard are, the more features it supports generally. Do you want SLi support? If so, this is a good one:

DFI LANPARTY nF4 SLI-DR Socket 939 NVIDIA nForce4 SLI ATX AMD Motherboard - Retai
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813136151#DetailSpecs

It's got an extra RAID controller, and support for all kinds of hard drives. This motherboard is totally loaded with stuff.

 

[EricM]

Sorry I should have mentioned I want an SLI board. I have it narrowed down to those 3. And would the SLI-DR be out of the box compatable with an AMD Athlon X2? I was leaning towards the UT SLI-DR expert but the SLI-DR is loaded with lots of stuff. Do they all have the same BIOS? And do u know how the UT series is different from just the LANPARTY series? And the SLI-DR expert has more room inbetween the PCI slots I think, but it also has the CPU in a weird spot.

 

[abowlofrice]

Since TDRcorolla already answered ur question im jus here to say good luck

 

[TRDCorolla1]

Do you have a link to that DFI Expert board? I can't seem to find it.

 

[EricM]

Ill give u links for all of them. I am going to be ordering off ncix.com since its Canadian.

Heres the expert - http://www.dfi.com.tw/Product/xx_product_spec_details_r_us.jsp?PAGE_TYPE=US&PRODUCT_ID=3872&SITE=US

SLI-DR http://www.dfi.com.tw/Product/xx_pr....jsp?PRODUCT_ID=3449&CATEGORY_TYPE=LP&SITE=US

http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=13826&vpn=LP-NF4-SLI-DR&manufacture=DFI

And the UT SLI-DR I think has been replaced by the expert version but here it is anyways... http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=14300&vpn=LP-UT-NF4-SLI-DR&manufacture=DFI

 

[TRDCorolla1]

I've narrowed it down to the two I like. The Expert one looks really good, but the board hereL: http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=13826&vpn=LP-NF4-SLI-DR&manufacture=DFI looks like it can OCed like a mother. So much you can do to that board. The Expert one has 3 PCI slots while the LANPARTY nF4 SLI-DR only has 2 PCI slots so I'm going to take the one with 3 PCI slots simply because I have a lot of PCI devices. It's your call though. They both look very, very good.

 

[EricM]

Will the positioning of the CPU socket on the expert cause any problems with oversized heat sinks? I will probably be using 2 PCI-E slots for my video cards and one pci slot for a fan that I am going to put under the video cards and the another PCI maybe for more usb ports.. but it is always good to have an extra pci slot. The SLI-DR looks extremely good but I dont know anything about OCing yet. Both look like good boards. My next question is on CPUs ... I am going to get an X2... possibly the 4400. My question is... how big of a difference is there between the 4200 and the 4400. The 4200 has 512mb of cache and the 4400 has 1mb for each core. From what I have read the 4200 is better for OCing because it uses the Manchester core and runs cooler and uses less power??? And the 4400 uses the Toledo which runs a bit hotter and is good for stock but not for OCing.

 

[TRDCorolla1]

If it does run a bit hotter, probably due to the extra cache, it is still by far one of the coolest CPU around. Ocing either core will result in hotter temps, naturally. I would still consider the 4400+ Toledo core because of that extra cache enabled. It's like $100 more for it. I figure if Opterons have a big cache, then it's got to be good for an X2 to have the 1MB cache instead of the 512MB.

 

[EricM]

Ok I was just posting a really long post when I got an error and it didnt post so I am going to try to remember everything I just typed. So going b ack to the mobos... Is there a huge diff between sata and sata 2? I would like to get the expert since it has an extra PCI slot and more space but the sli-dr has the sata2. As for video cards.. I was going to get the EVGA E-Geforce 7800gtx but I think i am going ot get BFG GeForce 7800gtx oc - http://www.ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=15488&vpn=BFGR78256GTXOC&manufacture=BFG%20Technologies

As for ram I was going to get the [font=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]OCZ EL Platinum PC3200 2GB 2X1GB DDR400 but I read it isnt good for OCing and the [/font][font=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]OCZ Platinum EB PC4000 2GB but the max most mobos support for AMD cpus is ddr400 correct?[/font]