GA-7ZXE Recommedations

[Dourden]

Checked out the board on Gigabytes website. www.giga-byte.com and I did notice one small problem or could be a problem anyway. The bios is totally attached to the board not in a socket. This being the case you can't ever replace the bios with another chip if that ones goes out or needs to be physically updated. Other than that it looks like a good board. The last giga-byte board I order just a couple of months ago was the same way. I haven't seen a non socketed bios since 386 days. Strange that Giga-byte would be going back to that.

When was the last time you had to change your BIOS chip?

[Scott Tiger]

I think they're doing that because they have 2 BIOS on the board. If your BIOS install goes South then you can just revert back to the older one.

I think it's a great idea but I don't know how well it works in practice. Honestly, I hope I never find out..

Still, I've only had one BIOS upgrade bad on me and the cost of the replacement chip was more than the mobo was worth. Given that the board I bought was $125 shipped with a 1600+ I don't think it'll be cost effective to try and replace the chip on this board either even if the backup BIOS doesn't work if thing do indeed go south.

My only real question now (besided longevity and reliablity) is will the new mobo combination (512 megs CAS2 pc133 and a 1.4 ghz XP processor)perform about the same as the my old one - a 1.2ghz T-Bird with 512 megs of DDR. I'm just wondering if the 200mhz difference will make up for the slower memory. I'll be using identical drives in both computers. Still, I suppose it's a moot point - I was running Slack on a 1.0 ghz celeron with 384 megs of ram and was blown away by it's performance. Something tells me I won't notice the difference. :-)

Edit: I also hope the onboard sound sounds good too..

[Dourden]

Originally posted by EvilRick
When was the last time you had to change your BIOS chip?

Actually I have had to do it more times that you would think. See sometimes customers like to flash their own bios and botch it. Like I said it is only a small problem though. Not a show stopper.

[Scott Tiger]

For those that might be considering this board it's really nice. I've been really pleased with this system so far. It's been stable, it was easy to configure, and Gigabyte has released BIOS updates for this board to take a 2800+ if you're so inclined. I imagine that the performance would suffer quite a bit because it's running PC133 with a chip like that but it's nice to know if you bought this board right now you get a gig a Crucial CAS2, the board and a 1800+ right now for ~ $250 and upgrade to really fast proc a year down the road when they get cheap.

The thing that really stands out about this board is how good the documentation is. Gigabyte went above and beyond in that department. All jumpers and BIOS settings are well covered in the manual. Unless you're looking for a really state of the art screamer you just can't go wrong with this guy..

[MegalosSkylaki]

Huh? How'd you find such an excellent--I hope--Mobo, anyhow

MO D G BO

[Scott Tiger]

Thanks again Dog - this board's been really good to me so far! Now I need to get a good vid card for it. Currently running a MX400 in it. Maybe the GF3's will drop in price around Christmas time!