New Abit Motherboard - No Extras On Board?

Damaeus · Jul 12, 2003

I want an Abit motherboard with no sound and no video included on the board. I absolutely abhor boards like that, but it seems that all the latest Abit motherboards have sound and video built in. :-(

Am I wrong about this? I want to be able to upgrade sound and video, and yeah, I know I can upgrade even when it's onboard, but it's messy...at least that's been my experience.

Thanks,
Damaeus

TomG · Jul 12, 2003

well, all I can say about that is that all of the onboard devices can be disabled. not all of their new boards have video, in fact, all of the new boards I have used did NOT have onboard video but onboard sound and LAN are the norm. like I said, both can be disabled.

Tom (26) · Jul 12, 2003

Damaeus wrote:

Am I wrong about this? I want to be able to upgrade sound and video,

You're not alone with that kind of thinking

That's why I got me a plain NF7. No '-S' or '-M' model!!

I know I can upgrade even when it's onboard, but it's
messy...at least that's been my experience.

Not really that messy - just go into the BIOS and turn off what you don't want.

But, why should I pay for something I don't need or want.
Like: I really don't think I'll need the Firewire for a long time to come. Serial ATA - same thing! I'm not going to replace a recently purchased 160Gig HD this quick. Besides, SATA needs to mature a bit more, I think. Most current SATA drives are just converted IDE drives.

And by the time it want these upgrades it's probably time for another mobo upgrade also.

--=tom=-

Morgan (archive) · Jul 12, 2003

But, why should I pay for something I don't need or want......

I could feel the same way about the five empty PCI slots that I have now got. At one time I used to struggle for slots, now I doubt as though I will ever need them for the life of this NF7-S. There is no big deal about disabling onboard stuff though - can't remember when I last used either the 2 COM ports or the Parallel port. As for firewire well I remember not too long ago paying almost as much for a firewire card as I did for the motherboard that now has it onboard....!!!

Doug G. · Jul 12, 2003

In article , no-
says...

I want an Abit motherboard with no sound and no video included on the board. I absolutely abhor boards like that, but it seems that all the latest Abit motherboards have sound and video built in. :-(

Am I wrong about this? I want to be able to upgrade sound and video, and yeah, I know I can upgrade even when it's onboard, but it's messy...at least that's been my experience.

Very few Abit boards have onboard Video. As far as sound and LAN go, just disable them in the BIOS. There is nothing 'messy' about it at all.

Doug

GTD · Jul 12, 2003

On Sat, 12 Jul 2003 16:54:14 +0100, "Morgan" wrote:

But, why should I pay for something I don't need or want......

I could feel the same way about the five empty PCI slots that I have now got. At one time I used to struggle for slots, now I doubt as though I will ever need them for the life of this NF7-S. There is no big deal about disabling onboard stuff though - can't remember when I last used either the 2 COM ports or the Parallel port. As for firewire well I remember not too long ago paying almost as much for a firewire card as I did for the motherboard that now has it onboard....!!!

I agree, but a PCI clot came in handy when ABIT was straightening out the SATA problems (I used an adaptec card, raid 0, then used ghost to copy it to a single drive, then bach to a newly formed sata raid0 array once it was fixed. Of course that is only possible if you have access to an extra drive that can handle that kind of move). I'v always had jobs where it was noisy (Military, machinist, now I manage a wood shop), so my hearing isn't good enough to tell the difference between the onboard sound on the nf7-s and my old SBLive. I agree it's frustrating when an onboard component fails and you have to replace the entire board, but the cost savings just can't be beat.

John Lewis · Jul 12, 2003

On Sat, 12 Jul 2003 11:42:12 GMT, Damaeus
wrote:

I want an Abit motherboard with no sound and no video included on the board. I absolutely abhor boards like that, but it seems that all the latest Abit motherboards have sound and video built in. :-(

Am I wrong about this? I want to be able to upgrade sound and video, and yeah, I know I can upgrade even when it's onboard, but it's messy...at least that's been my experience.

Some things in life today are near-free.........especially with large-scale silicon integration.

Get a IS7-E and turn off ALL unwanted functions in
BIOS.............absolutely painless............ And you may find them very useful in the future............... BTW, Abit does not include integrated video at all on any of their latest MB offerings.

Stellar performance, Dual DDR 400 etc
IS7-E @ $99 from Newegg.com.
(IS 7 -- Firewire and RAID @ $109 )

Free Fedex Super-saver shipping to the US (2-3 days
delivery )

John Lewis

Thanks,
Damaeus

Tom (26) · Jul 12, 2003

"Morgan" wrote:

But, why should I pay for something I don't need or want......

I could feel the same way about the five empty PCI slots that I have now got.

Apples & Oranges - add'l PCI connectors are wired almost in parallel and the only expense is the connector itself .

Firewire, SATA and whatever else require add'l chips and components. Not to speak of software logic to support them.

-=tom=-

Phil Weldon · Jul 12, 2003

My I suggest a hardware video encoder/decoder PCI board and a uh, let me see ... well a wireless LAN PCI board, and uh ... well, better to have too many than too few.

Phil Weldon,

"Morgan" wrote:

But, why should I pay for something I don't need or want......

I could feel the same way about the five empty PCI slots that I have now

got.

At one time I used to struggle for slots, now I doubt as though I will ever need them for the life of this NF7-S.
There is no big deal about disabling onboard stuff though - can't remember

when

I last used either the 2 COM ports or the Parallel port. As for firewire well I remember not too long ago paying almost as much for a firewire card as I did for the motherboard that now has it onboard....!!!

--
Regards

Morgan

How I fixed my noisy IBM drive
www.flyinglizard.freeserve.co.uk
3DMark 2001 with Ti 4200 = 15214
http://service.futuremark.com/compare?2k1=6420632

minus200 · Jul 12, 2003

i have been fooling with these computers for a long time and I absolutely abhor boards with on board IDE and floppy controllers. It seems like all the lastest boards have controllers built in. (if you have never seen a controller card - I will send you some - ISA and Vesa Local Bus

Does that make sense to you?

Buy a NF7 and disable the sound - dont buy the NF7-S that comes with sound that is good as all but a very few sound cards. And dont use on board LAN. Dont use a win modem either

The extra cost of the cheaper sound (NF7) is so low that MB mfgs would be silly not to include it.

Damaeus wrote:

I want an Abit motherboard with no sound and no video included on the board. I absolutely abhor boards like that, but it seems that all the latest Abit motherboards have sound and video built in. :-(

Am I wrong about this? I want to be able to upgrade sound and video, and yeah, I know I can upgrade even when it's onboard, but it's messy...at least that's been my experience.

Thanks,
Damaeus

Damaeus · Jul 12, 2003

In "TomG"
posted on Sat, 12 Jul 2003 08:22:08 -0400:

well, all I can say about that is that all of the onboard devices can be disabled. not all of their new boards have video, in fact, all of the new boards I have used did NOT have onboard video but onboard sound and LAN are the norm. like I said, both can be disabled.

I once had an old Packard Bell Multimedia E-154 computer. I think it had an Intel LX motherboard. Well, it had an on-board graphics chip. I disabled that and installed a Creative Labs Voodoo2 Banshee video card. But when I ran one of those system inspection tools, it always found the on-board chip, not my PCI graphics card. It was very irritating.

Damaeus

Damaeus · Jul 12, 2003

In Doug G.
posted on Sat, 12 Jul 2003 10:03:50 -0600:

Very few Abit boards have onboard Video. As far as sound and LAN go, just disable them in the BIOS. There is nothing 'messy' about it at all.

What about the Abit motherboards with the nVidia chipset. Is that a full graphics solution on the board, or does it just have chips geared toward better accomodation of a real nVidia AGP card?

Damaeus

John Lewis · Jul 13, 2003

On Sun, 13 Jul 2003 03:57:26 GMT, Damaeus
wrote:

In "TomG"
posted on Sat, 12 Jul 2003 08:22:08 -0400:

well, all I can say about that is that all of the onboard devices can be disabled. not all of their new boards have video, in fact, all of the new boards I have used did NOT have onboard video but onboard sound and LAN are the norm. like I said, both can be disabled.

I once had an old Packard Bell Multimedia E-154 computer. I think it had an Intel LX motherboard. Well, it had an on-board graphics chip. I disabled that and installed a Creative Labs Voodoo2 Banshee video card. But when I ran one of those system inspection tools, it always found the ...

Yes, we had vacuum-tube amps too at that time.............

Still have, for the retro-freaks.........

Hard-hat on..........

John Lewis

Doug G. · Jul 13, 2003

In article , no-
says...

In Doug G.
posted on Sat, 12 Jul 2003 10:03:50 -0600:

Very few Abit boards have onboard Video. As far as sound and LAN go,
just disable them in the BIOS. There is nothing 'messy' about it at all.

What about the Abit motherboards with the nVidia chipset. Is that a full graphics solution on the board, or does it just have chips geared toward better accomodation of a real nVidia AGP card?

Damaeus

The NF7 boards have nVidia north and south bridge chipsets. That is the motherboards chipset, not video.

Doug

Damaeus · Jul 13, 2003

In Doug G.
posted on Sat, 12 Jul 2003 23:09:47 -0600:

The NF7 boards have nVidia north and south bridge chipsets. That is the motherboards chipset, not video.

Ah, that might not be too bad. I've liked nVidia so far. Maybe they make good mobo chipsets, too. I know they have a sound chip on some boards, too.

Damaeus

Myron Johnson · Jul 14, 2003

minus200 wrote:

i have been fooling with these computers for a long time and I absolutely abhor boards with on board IDE and floppy controllers. It seems like all the lastest boards have controllers built in. (if you have never seen a controller card - I will send you some - ISA and Vesa Local Bus

Yikes!
Add-on drive controllers were a pain! Especially the IDE controllers circa 1990. I remember how some would work with some motherboards, but not with others. I was SO happy when I got my first board with built-in IDE and I/O ports.

BTW, I still have some MFM and RTL controller boards around, along with appropriate cables, just in case

If we get bombed back into the stone age, I'll be the only person who can build a computer with a Seagate ST-225 hard drive and 320KB 5 1/4-inch floppy drives!

GTD · Jul 14, 2003

BTW, I still have some MFM and RTL controller boards around, along with appropriate cables, just in case If we get bombed back into the stone age, I'll be the only person who can build a computer with a Seagate ST-225 hard drive and 320KB 5 1/4-inch floppy drives!

I always hang on to older, outdated equipment for a while, figuring SOMEBODY can use it or even needs it. Then when the pile becomes overwhelming, I take it all out to the range.... PULL!!!

A 7MM Remmington Magnum does awesome things to old harddrives!

Eric Meyers · Jul 18, 2003

"Damaeus" wrote:

I want an Abit motherboard with no sound and no video included on the board. I absolutely abhor boards like that, but it seems that all the latest Abit motherboards have sound and video built in. :-(

Am I wrong about this? I want to be able to upgrade sound and video, and yeah, I know I can upgrade even when it's onboard, but it's messy...at least that's been my experience.

Thanks,
Damaeus

My KD7-E has no sound, video, or LAN. Works great.

Eric