Video Mess

By James Gaskin, NetworkWorld.com, 11/10/04

One reason I bought the pieces to make this new PC was to test the nVidia video board Keith Shaw, reviews editor, sent me. The board came with no documentation, and I didn't investigate fully enough. I saw the little latch at the back and assumed the board fit into an AGP slot, so I made sure and got a motherboard with 8x AGP support.

Oops.

Turns out the board was really meant for PCI Express 16x, a much higher throughput, and therefore more expensive, motherboard. PCI Express motherboards are more expensive that standard PCI, but not that much. Unfortunately, PCI Express 16x motherboards are much more expensive than normal.

Of course, by the time I discovered my mistake, the motherboard installation was past the turning back point. CPU and memory chips were installed, and the board was bolted down to the case. So even if I could find an affordable PCI Express 16x motherboard, I couldn't in good conscience return the motherboard I had. Back to Keith went the nVidia board. Sigh.

Suddenly I needed a video board, because the motherboard had no monitor support at all. Ordering online would take too long, and I was excited to start up the system. So I went to the closest CompUSA.

I wound up with a Mad Dog Predator MX 4000 Plus video board because it included 128MB of RAM and the nVidia chipset. I felt bad about losing the other nVidia board, so I felt drawn to the nVidia GeForce MX4000 video processor on the board.

Cost: $70 plus tax. Did I pay full retail? Yeah. Is this a good board? Quite good, and I'm happy. Of course, a much higher-rated board for free as a review project would be better, but that's the way the board bounces (away from me).

Back to Small Business Tech Notes

Comments