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From best to worst - BX boards

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First post, by Arctic

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Can you guys help me figure out which of these boards are the best in some kind of order (also considering revisions)?

-Asus P2B-B Rev. 1.12
-Asus P2B-S Rev. 1.03
-Asus P2B-DS Rev. 1.06
-Asus P3B-F
-Gigabyte BX2000
-MSI 6120 1.1 BX3
-MSI 6156 1.0 BX7

Reply 1 of 47, by blank001

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I didn't think it got any better than a P3B-F on BX (except maybe a cubx?)

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Reply 2 of 47, by petro89

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Yep. Unless there's something going on with one of those other boards that I don't know about, the P3B-F is definately the cream of the crop.

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Reply 3 of 47, by brontozaur

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Out of those listed, P3B-F. However, if you want the best BX of all times - it is def ABIT, BF-6 or BX-133. They let you go by 1 MHz and are stable as hell. Used to be the top choice among connoisseurs

Reply 4 of 47, by tayyare

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I don't know much about the others (used only BX2000 in the past for a short time) but your Asus list is actually have four different purpose cards:

-Asus P2B-B Rev. 1.12 - AT form factor
-Asus P2B-S Rev. 1.03 - on board SCSI and ethernet
-Asus P2B-DS Rev. 1.06 - multi CPU
-Asus P3B-F - normal version.

I would get the P3B-F anyday.

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Reply 5 of 47, by Scali

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tayyare wrote:

-Asus P2B-S Rev. 1.03 - on board SCSI and Ethernet

The one with Ethernet is the P2B-LS, which I have.
L stands for LAN I suppose, and S stands for SCSI.
So P2B-S is only SCSI, no LAN.
There is also a P2B-L, which only has Ethernet, no SCSI.

Whichever P2B you choose doesn't really matter, just depends on whether you want to use SCSI and/or LAN.

The P2B is aimed at Pentium II, where the P3B is an updated version for Pentium III, so I would go for a P3B if possible. Slot-1 Pentium III CPUs do work on the P2B though, but they were not officially supported, because the board predates PIII.

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Reply 6 of 47, by GeorgeMan

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Scali wrote:
The one with Ethernet is the P2B-LS, which I have. L stands for LAN I suppose, and S stands for SCSI. So P2B-S is only SCSI, no […]
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tayyare wrote:

-Asus P2B-S Rev. 1.03 - on board SCSI and Ethernet

The one with Ethernet is the P2B-LS, which I have.
L stands for LAN I suppose, and S stands for SCSI.
So P2B-S is only SCSI, no LAN.
There is also a P2B-L, which only has Ethernet, no SCSI.

Whichever P2B you choose doesn't really matter, just depends on whether you want to use SCSI and/or LAN.

The P2B is aimed at Pentium II, where the P3B is an updated version for Pentium III, so I would go for a P3B if possible. Slot-1 Pentium III CPUs do work on the P2B though, but they were not officially supported, because the board predates PIII.

Unless you connect a Tualatin Celeron (100MHz FSB, no overclocks there 😉 ), combined with a powerleap adapter to an old ASUS P2B board, which operates just fine. 😀

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Reply 7 of 47, by stamasd

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brontozaur wrote:

Out of those listed, P3B-F. However, if you want the best BX of all times - it is def ABIT, BF-6 or BX-133. They let you go by 1 MHz and are stable as hell. Used to be the top choice among connoisseurs

I had/still have a Abit BH-6. Used it with my Celeron300A overclocked to 450, well into the PIII era. Wish current motherboards were as brilliant as that one. Actually, wish Abit still made motherboards. They were the best manufacturer. Asus were decent back then, but have gone down the drain recently.

I/O, I/O,
It's off to disk I go,
With a bit and a byte
And a read and a write,
I/O, I/O

Reply 8 of 47, by Maraakate

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I'm interested in getting a P3B-F board. Do they support P3 800mhz slot 1 processors that are 100mhz clocks?

My only gripe with all of it would be the one ISA slot. Are there other BX440 (or i815 doesn't really matter to me) boards that have 2 ISA slots and an AGP slot? I intended to be able to have a GUS and an SB16 in the same computer. But, if I have to swap my ViperMax card into it so be it.

However, if these boards have on-board audio and support SB compatibility under DOS (i.e. based off those Yamaha chipsets I saw in a lot of P2 laptops from the time) that would be acceptable too.

Reply 10 of 47, by Maraakate

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Hmm right now I have a QDI Brilliant IV which is a Dual P2 400 board. It says it can unofficially support P3 as long as the clock is 100mhz. I have an extra P3 550 on the way. Unsure if it would go up to 800mhz though.

Reply 12 of 47, by Maraakate

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Arctic wrote:

Thanks for all of your responses. I forgot to say that I own all of the boards on the list and I am trying to figure out which of these boards I should keep.

Is the BX2000 worth keeping?

I don't know the specs but if you at least got an ISA slot and can handle later generation P3 slot 1 stuff like the 800mhz I'd keep it around.

Reply 13 of 47, by ODwilly

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Arctic wrote:

Thanks for all of your responses. I forgot to say that I own all of the boards on the list and I am trying to figure out which of these boards I should keep.

Is the BX2000 worth keeping?

If it is anything like this: http://www.gigabyte.dk/products/page/mb/ga-686bx then it is a solid board. I accidentally plugged in a cheap ATX powersupply that was not keyed backwards, up until then it was a killer 98se machine. Dang board still works but is buggy as heck, still can not bear to throw it out as long as it boots to the bios at least 😊

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Reply 14 of 47, by Marquzz

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I like my BE6-II very much 😀 It's almost the same board as BF6, but BF6 has an extra PCI-slot and only ATA33 support, BE6-II has a Highpoint controller for ATA66 support.

Reply 15 of 47, by mockingbird

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brontozaur wrote:

Out of those listed, P3B-F. However, if you want the best BX of all times - it is def ABIT, BF-6 or BX-133. They let you go by 1 MHz and are stable as hell. Used to be the top choice among connoisseurs

Yes, the BF6 was fantastic, and felt much snappier even at stock than my BX6 2.0, but oh how Abit loved Teapo capacitors. These boards did not last anywhere nearly as long as Asus boards did.

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Reply 16 of 47, by stamasd

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mockingbird wrote:
brontozaur wrote:

Out of those listed, P3B-F. However, if you want the best BX of all times - it is def ABIT, BF-6 or BX-133. They let you go by 1 MHz and are stable as hell. Used to be the top choice among connoisseurs

Yes, the BF6 was fantastic, and felt much snappier even at stock than my BX6 2.0, but oh how Abit loved Teapo capacitors. These boards did not last anywhere nearly as long as Asus boards did.

My BH6 is still going strong after 17 years of use.

I/O, I/O,
It's off to disk I go,
With a bit and a byte
And a read and a write,
I/O, I/O

Reply 17 of 47, by chinny22

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Maraakate wrote:

Hmm right now I have a QDI Brilliant IV which is a Dual P2 400 board. It says it can unofficially support P3 as long as the clock is 100mhz. I have an extra P3 550 on the way. Unsure if it would go up to 800mhz though.

I've got 2 Duel Slot 1 boards. One in a Compaq Prolient 1600 and a P2B-DS (Rev 1.03 I think) Both cant handle anything beyond ‎Katmai due to the VRM's
Later P2B-D boards then mine are ok, just comes down to age of the board

Reply 18 of 47, by Maraakate

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chinny22 wrote:
Maraakate wrote:

Hmm right now I have a QDI Brilliant IV which is a Dual P2 400 board. It says it can unofficially support P3 as long as the clock is 100mhz. I have an extra P3 550 on the way. Unsure if it would go up to 800mhz though.

I've got 2 Duel Slot 1 boards. One in a Compaq Prolient 1600 and a P2B-DS (Rev 1.03 I think) Both cant handle anything beyond ‎Katmai due to the VRM's
Later P2B-D boards then mine are ok, just comes down to age of the board

That's a shame a lot of these boards are picky about revisions. I have some Intel board (Not sure which one it is will have to open the case) that is a Slot 1 and is picky between revisisions if it will accept anything higher than 550 😒.

There is a 2 slot P3B-F when I did more research but naturally everyone wants $200 for the damn thing.