mATX G35 or 7150/630i

Ramshackles · 1 Jan 2008 at 13:37

Need help deciding which mATX motherboard chipset is best for HTPC.

Reliability and vendor support means a lot to me, coming from a shuttle with VERY poor support and a nagging problem with Sleep S3 not working.

Basically it's down to the latest G35 intel chipset or the Nvidia Geforce 7150 / nForce 630i chipset.

Which would be the best solution?
Asus P5E-VM HDMI Intel G35 or Gigabyte GA-73UM-S2H

I've previously had both Asus and Gigabyte and both seem to have good support and regular bios updates etc. I think I still prefer the Asus myself, it's just that I trust the intel chipset more than the nvidia really.

Opinions?

PS. Will use the integrated video ofcourse, going for a near-silent htpc.

WJA96 · 1 Jan 2008 at 14:34

I'm just playing with the Gigabyte GA-73PVM-S2H now and it's not a 630i/7150 board - it's a 630i/7100 board. For the full 630i/7150 you'll need to look at the EVGA 630OC which I also have running here, and if you can afford it - it's the one to go for as the BIOS has all the options turned on, whereas the Gigabyte BIOS is slightly crippled by the fact it has no memory or Northbridge voltage adjustment.

Other than that the Gigabyte is phenomenal value for money. I'm just going to set it up in maximal cheapo mode (E2180 with Corsair Value RAM) and see how far I can overclock it.

Ramshackles · 1 Jan 2008 at 14:54

You must be thinking about the Gigabyte GA-73PVM-S2H they have here at ocUK, the one I listed is a 7150.

Still leaning towards the Asus product though, only seems to be a slight letdown with the audio chip but that's not a big issue. The 7150 boards "only" have a single channel ddr2, whereas asus has dual channel.

My concern is reallly only about the mGPUs or IGP, which is the better of the 2

WJA96 · 1 Jan 2008 at 15:05

Ramshackles said:
You must be thinking about the Gigabyte GA-73PVM-S2H they have here at ocUK, the one I listed is a 7150.

Still leaning towards the Asus product though, only seems to be a slight letdown with the audio chip but that's not a big issue. The 7150 boards "only" have a single channel ddr2, whereas asus has dual channel.

My concern is reallly only about the mGPUs or IGP, which is the better of the 2

I beg your pardon - you are correct.

Tute · 1 Jan 2008 at 15:09

Hey WJA96, the only issue i'd have with the nVidia boards is if they support the new 45nm Core 2 processors or not.

I was under the impression there was still a question mark over 600 series chipsets?

CaDLoN · 1 Jan 2008 at 17:07

I have to say i've been impressed with my Asus P5E-VM HDMI so far, does suffer from a bit fo VDroop, but... nothing that cant be cure with a pencil

Loads of BIOS OCing options, slightly old skool realtek audio, but does wack out 7.1 channel 24 bit LPCM audio at up to 96kHz out it's HDMI 1.2... aparently, i've never plugged anything into it :eek:

It does clock nicely, had my Q6600 up to 3.8GHz, but in an HTPC thats not realy ideal.
I have however come up with a solution to quell my penchant for overclocking & HTPC needs... Clocked my Q6600 G0 to 3GHz & set it to the lowest voltage setting in *** BIOS 1.1V rock solid stable & reasonable temps in my V300