Need Motherboard w/integrated audio & video suggestions. (1 Viewer)

[AllenD]

I've only built a few PCs around HTPC hardware using Wayne's (AKA xcel) "Best in Class" guide so I'm not at all familiar with other hardware. Can you suggest a MOBO so I can build a pc for my daughter? I can choose the rest of the hardware on my own. It will be used for children's software mostly and maybe an internet connection. Thank you very much in advance.

 

[Masood Ali]

By far, the best integrated motherboards are based on Nvidia's NForce chipset.
The sound is SoundBlaster Live! quality, and the video is good enough to play some games at decent speeds (it has an integrated Geforce2 MX chip).
Here is a good one. It sells for around $150 shipped.

 

[Richard_s]

Masood
That is one nice board for the money.
Good place to buy is www.newegg.com they have the board for $149 shipped. They also have good prices on cases, CPU's etc. They ship promply and are very good to deal with. Read theri return policy to make sure you ar happy with it. I buy almost all my computer stuff from them never had an issue.
I generally buy my memory from www.crucial.com even though newegg sells crucial memory. No matter where you buy you crucial memory, crucial will back the product and are very quick to replace. I had a bad stick I gave them a Charge card number to allow them to send immediately and I shiped the bad stick back. I got the replacement stick the next day.
I always buy Maxtor drives they are very quiet and reliable. Maxtor is great to deal with if you do have a problem. They don't care where you buy it they will back their product.
I love the ENLIGHT MEDIUM ATX TOWER CASE MODEL # EN-72370X3C4 - OEM with 300Watts Power Supply - Pentium 4 Ready & AMD Approved. 4 5.25" Bays, and cost $46 +18 S&H from newegg I have 3 AMD systems using this case.
Good luck..

 

[Kelley_B]

If you need video and audio then go for the nForce 420-D boards from either MSI or Asus, they Asus is considered the better of the two, but they are both great boards.

 

[AllenD]

Thanks for the suggestions! The MSI K7N420 PRO at $150 is a bit out of my budget. Thanks anyways. I should've mentioned that my budget is limited.
What do you think about this COLORCASES 305 case? Are Colorcases regarded a reliable product?
You should get a chuckle out of this one: My wife picked out this 1104-Pink case for my daughter. It makes the hunt a tad bit more difficult considering it's size for a novice like me. Leave it to a woman to make your life slightly more difficult.

 

[Masood Ali]

ECS K7SEM B SiS730S - $68 shipped.

 

[Kimmo Jaskari]

Just keep in mind that there really are no other integrated motherboards out there that can do 3D in a useful way, aside from the nForce boards. That means that you may well be looking at a graphics card purchase fairly immediately when you try to run games, which means you may reach or exceed that $150 mark in pieces rather than all at once.

 

[Kelley_B]

Allen...that case is hideous, just leave it to a woman to pick that out.