Good board in a pinch

The funny thing about how expensive technology is, is that as soon as you buy something that costs $300, it’s automatically obsolete and is worth roughly 1/3 of the original price.  Actually, it was pretty much obsolete the moment you bought it.  The world of the PC DIYer is a fantastic world, but the price bracket sucks the biggest set of hairy boys possible.  That’s why when I had to replace my motherboard on my tight budget, I went for one that wouldn’t break the bank.  Because let’s face it.  There are going to be a couple dozen introduced next week that will render your new i7 compatible board as ancient technology.  I think I’ll stick with my Athlon Dual Core until the price range comes down.

The motherboard I chose to replace the junker with the fried PCI-E slot is the GeForce 6100PM-M2.  Yeah, it has an Nvidia chipset.  And while Nvidia may not make the best chipset  on earth, they make one of the cheapest when you are on a budget.  And since it supports my Athlon 64 X2, along with 16GB of DDR2 RAM, I am more than happy to give it a shot.  So here are the specs on the board itself:

ECS Geforce6100PM-M2 V2.0 motherboard features the NVIDIA Geforce6100/nForce430 integrated chipset, which combine multiple graphics solutions and deliver the outstanding graphics performance. It supports the latest AMD socket AM2+ processors and dual-channel DDR2 memory up to DDR2 800. Geforce6100PM-M2 motherboard is the optimum choice for AMD platform.

Features

Certified For Windows Vista The latest generation Microsoft O.S., delivers better personal productivity and digital entertainment on your PC through its improved reliability, security, and performance.	Dual core Outperforms single-core processors on most multithreaded applications while running at lower clock speeds and consuming less power.
HT 2000 AMD64 technology provides simultaneous support for 32-bit and 64-bit computing with 2000MT/s system bus HyperTransport technology.	Dual Channel DDR2 800 Doubles the bandwidth of your system memory up to 12.8GB/s and pumps up the system performance.
Serial-ATA II Doubles the transfer speed of SATA, running at speed up to 3.0Gb/s, and fully compatible with the soon-to-be-released SATA HDD, CD-ROM and other cutting-edge devices with NCQ function support.	10/100 LAN Provides 10/100 Mbps solution to your network or broadhand connection without having to buy an extra LAN card.
USB 2.0 The latest connectivity standard which delivers transfer speeds up to 480Mb/s for easy connectivity and ultra-fast data transfers.	6 Channel High Definition Audio Integrated 6-channel HD Audio CODEC delivering advanced multi-channel audio and bringing you the experience of home theater-quality sound.
Graphics Embedded Graphics Embedded	NVRAID Uniquely allows users to assign an extra disk to any RAID volume so that should a disk failure occur NVIDIA RAID will automatically remote the failed disk and replace it with the spare.
MediaShield Protects and secures your digital media assets with RAID 5,SATA 3Gb/s,and PATA drives.Suite of features include the MediaShield user interface, flexible RAID configurations (RAID5,0,1,0+1),NVIDIA Disk Alert System, decicated spare disk protection, fast media transfers.	PCI EXPRCESS x16 Delivers up to a 4x increase in graphics and 2x I/O bandwidth for smooth multimedia performance
ROHS Choose an environment-friendly, fully RoHS-compliant ECS product as the foundation for keeping harmful substances out of our ecosystem.

Specifications

CPU	AMD Phenom processor (Socket AM2+) AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core / Athlon 64 / Sempron processor High-performance Hyper Transport CPU interface Support transfer rate of 2000/1600/1200/800/400 mega-transfers per second Note: This board supports CPU up to 95W TDP only
Chipset	NVIDIA GeForce 6100/nForce 430 NVIDIA MCP61P Single Chipset
Graphics	Share Memory: Maximum up to 256MB On Chip (NVIDIA GeForce 6100/P-based, 2D/3D graphic engine) Integrated DirectX 9 graphics processor
Memory	2 x 240-pin DDR2 DIMM socket support up to 16 GB (4GB realistic) Dual-channel DDR2 memory architecture Support DDR2 800/667/533/400 DDR2 SDRAM
Expansion Slot	1 x PCI Express x16 slot 1 x PCI Express x1 slot 2 x PCI slots
Storage	Support by NVIDIA GeForce 6100P 2x Ultra DMA133/100/66 devices 4x Serial ATAII 3.0Gb/s devices RAID0, RAID1, RAID0+1, RAID5 configuration
Audio	Realtek ALC662 6-channel audio Compliant with HD audio specification
LAN	Broadcom AC13 10/100 LAN
Rear Panel I/O	1 x PS/2 keyboard and PS/2 mouse connectors 1 x Serial port (COM 1) 1 x VGA port 1 x RJ45 LAN connector 4 x USB ports 1 x Parallel port (LPT1) (optional) 1 x Audio port (line-in, line-out, mic in)
Internal I/O Connectors and Headers	1 x 24-pin ATX Power Supply connector 1 x 4-pin ATX 12V connector 1 x FDD connector 1 x IDE connector 4 x Serial ATA connectors 1 x Speaker header 1 x SPDIF out header 1 x IrDA for SIR header (optional) 3 x USB 2.0 headers support additional 6 USB ports 1 x Front panel switch/LED header 1 x Front panel audio header 1 x CD in header CPUFAN/SYSFAN connectors
System Bios	Award BIOS with 8MB Flash ROM Supports Plug and Play, STR/STD, Hardware monitor, Multi Boot, DMI Supports ACPI revision 1.0 specification
Form Factor	Micro-ATX Size, 244mm*214mm

• 64 Bit  -  Allows platform to access more memory and larger files.  Large memory intensive programs can see dramatic performance increases.
• PCI Express X16  -  Delivers greater bandwith over the traditional AGP 8X interface and supporting the latest high-performance graphics cards.
• USB 2.0 High-Speed  -  USB 2.0 is the latest connectivity standard which delivers transfer speed up to 480Mb/s for easy connectivity and ultra-fast data transfers.
• Serial ATA  -  Serial ATA is a revolutionary replacement of ATA technology that provides superior performance.  With up to 150MB/s or 300MB/s data transfer rate, Serial ATA is faster than Parallel ATA, while providing 100% software compatibility.
• Audio Integrated  -  Onboard high-quality audio CODEC supports uncompromising audio quality, bringing a more vivid sound experience and great audio without having to buy advance sound cards.
• Ethernet  -  Provides onboard Ethernet solution to your network or broadband connection without having to buy an extra LAN card.
• Video Integrated  -  Provides 128MB of onboard video RAM, with Pixel Shader 3.0 support as well as top graphics options for today’s high-detail gaming enviornments.

<< Back to the Reviews

Page 1 of 4 1 : Good board in a pinch 2 : Motherboard Layout 3 : Performance Testing 4 : Conclusion

Motherboard Layout >>