Mobo advice?

[jade1001]

Fellow Geeks,

I'm looking for a mobo that can meet the following specs.

1. Dual 2.20+ Xeon capable
2. AGP slot v2.0 compliant (4x)
3. Intel chipset (possibly 860)
4. DDR memory or Rambus
5. SCSI and/or IDE

Cost is not an issue, however compatibility is. Does anyone have any advice as to where I should look or what I should try? I've looked at the more popular places and haven't found much. I'm hoping someone out there knows just the place to look.

Thanks in advanced,
jade >:O>

 

[KarveR]

Not sure about the agp but this has gotta be a starter for 6 ...

http://networking.gigabyte.com.tw/Products/Products_ServerBoard_Spec.asp?ProductID=39

***************************************
Party on, dudes!

 

[dakota81]

Check out:

http://www.supermicro.com/

They make high-end intel motherboards for all situations and all case styles, you're bound to find the one you need.

 

[jade1001]

KarveR-

Thanks for the URL.

I will definitely scope out Gigabyte.


dakota81,

That URL was the first place I checked out. In fact I was scoping out:

http://www.supermicro.com/product/motherboards/860/p4dc6+.htm

But I noticed the AGP slot description has 1.5v. I'm not sure what that means. I'm thinking if I can't find a board that can't meet the above specs then I might settle with this board or go with a Gigabyte board and build a 3rd box that can hack a high end video card but with less muscle.

Its kind of cool how we both found the same URL


More Details on what I'm trying to build:
This box I'm trying to build will serve as a render box but it will also be used to do 3D Studio Max projects and Maya projects so it also needs a high end video card. I plan to do alot of modeling and animation. I currently have a dual 1 GHz machine that takes 7 to 8 hours to render out a 241 frame project. While its rendering, you can't do anything else on it. Its like the machine is frozen. It will take literally 20 minutes to minimize a window.

I already have a GeForce3 Itanium card just sitting around my living room waiting to be used. Its been floating around there for almost a year. So I'm thinking why not stick it in this box. I already have two Intel Pentium Xeon 2.20 GHz processors. So I think I have half a machine ... sort of... I just need a mobo that can handle the load I'm going to put on it.

In the past, I have had problems with getting my video card to cooperate with the viachipset. I have two GeForce3 cards and 1 GeForce2 card. The GeForce2 card works fine in everything. However, the GeForce3 card is very picky about where it wants to run. Updating drivers would not help me. I would get prepeated hard freezes and sometimes just no video at all. Just black space. So this time I want to go Intel and see if there is a difference.



Thanks you both for your advise. If anyone out there feels my pain in this issue please do give advice as to where or what I should go with, let me know and I'll scope it out.

Thanks,
jade>:O>

 

[paparazi]

A high end Radeon maybe better suited to the task?
ATI cards have always been stronger in this area.
Martin Just trying to help, sometimes falling short, I am only human after all.

 

[dakota81]

AGP 3.3V = AGP 1.0
AGP 1.5V = AGP 2.0

 

[jade1001]

paparazi,

I have a friend/collegue who has an ATI Radeon 8500. He says all its good for is gaming. He struggles alot with it when it comes to modeling and rendering.

Since I already have a video card, I think I'm just going to concentrate on mobo. But that doesn't mean I will not take your advice under strong consideration. I have another friend who is going to upgrade his video card. I may advise him to get an ATI Radeon just to see how it performs.



dakota81,

Thanks alot dakota81, I'm glad I came here for advice. I didn't know that 1.5v was an AGP 2.0. I learn alot coming here.


Thanks everyone for all the great tips,
jade>:O>

 

[KarveR]

Ok a board that meets you requirement (not sure how well it will perform), do you really need dual xeon .. after all you'd only be rendering using one processor anyway.

http://www.aopen.com/products/server/dx2gplus.htm

CPU: Dual Intel Pentium II/III Xeon 450/500/550Mhz(512KB/1M/2M) or above - guess from the looks of this its a multiplier of 4 x 550mhz for you ***************************************
Party on, dudes!

 

[jade1001]

KarveR,

I went ahead and got the SuperMicro P4DC6+ board. I already have a dual 1 GHz box. When it renders, it uses both processors. I put it next to a single processor box and had both render out the same project. Both boards same specs just one had a missing processor. The dual board was able to complete the job almost twice as fast. Neither used that much memory but alot of processor muscle.

I'm waiting for the SuperMicro to get in the mail I'm excited.

Thanks,
jade >:O>