DFI and Aopen mATX Pentium M boards are at Newegg!!!

Geeky1 · Post by **Geeky1** » Wed Dec 08, 2004 11:44 pm

Wasn't sure where to put this, but... check these out:
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDe ... 057&depa=0
http://www.newegg.com/app/ViewProductDe ... 150&depa=0
*drools*

Oh, and they have the Pentium Ms to go with them too. The 1.6GHz model is only $205.

silverback · Post by **silverback** » Thu Dec 09, 2004 5:44 am

now you got to decide wich one =P. the dfi or the aopen with a standard p4 mount for heatsink.

all the prices for the pentium ms went up :/ the 1.6 is up 10, the 1.7 is up 5 and the 1.8 is up 5 from last week.

I have a 1.8 but no motherboard

to close to christmas now so will have to wait until after christmas to finish the system.

Check out epiacenters mini itx lineup. they have a couple of p4 m boards there also. Even smaller then the dfi and aopen (170mm,170mm). some boards like the commel LV-671 have onboard power so thats even less noise for you to worry about since there is no power supply.

http://www.epiacenter.com/modules.php?n ... age&pid=39

Geeky1 · Post by **Geeky1** » Thu Dec 09, 2004 3:31 pm

That's not PCI Express on the DFI, it's a 64-bit PCI slot

The commell is a nice board, but the lack of a desktop AGP slot keeps me from being interested in it.

Hazelrah · Post by **Hazelrah** » Fri Dec 10, 2004 4:50 am

I've never tried, but is it possible to pull a Pentium M CPU out of a laptop, or are they usually glued in or something?

Geeky1 · Post by **Geeky1** » Fri Dec 10, 2004 4:57 am

The Pentium M is available in a BGA package and a PGA package. 99% of laptops are going to have the PGA package, which is a socketed CPU just like the P4, Athlon, some P3s, etc.

The socket the Pentium M is in is locked and unlocked using a flathead screwdriver. There's a slot for the screwdriver at the top of the socket. Just turn that to unlock it and the CPU will lift right out.

slam · Post by **slam** » Sun Jan 02, 2005 10:24 am

the DFI board seems like the better bet right now. reviews have it overclockable to a 533 FSB, far better than the measely 400 FSB offered stock on PM cpus.

the aopen board was overclockable but not to anywhere near 533.

at 533 MHz FSB the DFI board was whooping P4 Extreme Edition's butt. well, ok, not whooping it, but either holding it's own or slightly exceded the performance of the high end P4EE in everything except video encoding.

on the other hand, aopen puts it in a SFF and that's cool. i went to fry's and actually fondled the antec aria case and the shuttle xpc case, and the xpc is really quiet smaller in subjective terms. the xc cases that aopen uses are roughly the same size as shuttle xpc. if you want a sff box that you can tuck under your arm, the antec aria really isn't it. it weighed a ton more too. and it gets really beat-up looking; the aluminum panels looked like crap at frys. so SFF is probably better that mATX, but the aopen sff is not as overclockable as the DFI mATX board and the aopen sff is only available in japan (although i have a friend stationed there and i might ask her to buy me one).

yours,
slam

Geeky1 · Post by **Geeky1** » Sun Jan 02, 2005 4:00 pm

But the DFI doesn't take standard heatsinks

slam · Post by **slam** » Sun Jan 02, 2005 4:17 pm

true, but it's a Pentium M. it's, what, 25W of power? so little heat, so little need for custom cooling. and with a little hacking you could still attach some custom fans to the stock heatsink.

this board might be a bad pick for a watercooling system, but it should run quiet just fine.

also, keep an eye on the cach size on those mid-speed pentium Ms. the 1 MB cache CPUs in 1.5, 1.6, and 1.7 GHz are the older Banias chips, while the 2 MB cache CPUs in the same speeds are the Dothan chips. the Dothans are far superior at the same clock speed. benchmarks show the Banias to be about equal to a P4 running at 1.5 times the PM speed, and the Dothans are about equal to a P4 running at twice the speed the PM.

~slam

Edward Ng · Post by **Edward Ng** » Sun Jan 02, 2005 5:24 pm

slam wrote:this board might be a bad pick for a watercooling system, but it should run quiet just fine.

Not at all; just use a chipset water block.

-Ed

daba · Post by **daba** » Fri Jan 07, 2005 12:41 am

Has anyone got one of these set up yet?

dualblade · Post by **dualblade** » Sat Jan 15, 2005 9:38 pm

slam wrote: ...holding it's own or slightly exceded the performance of the high end P4EE in everything except video encoding.

which, ironically, is one of the chief applications of a home theater pc

silverback · Post by **silverback** » Sun Jan 16, 2005 12:25 am

wouldnt a good tv card like the hauppage do all that in hardware on the card not the cpu anyway? I think you can get a hauppage card for 99 bucks. maybe Im wrong that certainly wouldnt be the first time.