[K12OSN] Motherboard Manufacturer Recommendations?

[Rob Owens]

I had a problem with Abit boards once.  I bought two at the same time, 
and the onboard NIC on both boards had the same MAC address.  It really 
caused problems for DHCP.  To Abit's credit, they sent me new bios chips 
immediately and didn't give me a bunch of BS about how having the same 
MAC address is impossible.  (Actually, I suspect they may have had that 
problem before because the guy on the phone didn't even flinch when I 
told him my problem).

Besides that, though, I don't have any complaints about the boards. 
They're in use in 2 of my BackupPC servers.

-Rob

James P. Kinney III wrote:
> The top board maker by far is Tyan. They are not the least expensive nor
> the most expensive. Their boards are typically designed for heavy server
> use. 
> 
> The second place in most respects is Asus. They have a larger variety of
> boards than Tyan and that is tailored more toward the desktop. Many of
> their models are quite solid and some are really server-duty hardware.
> 
> SuperMicro is my third choice maker. I only put it after Tyan because I
> have had a SuperMicro board fail (once) and non of my Tyans have failed
> (yet). As I have a strong preference for LTSP servers using AMD cpus, I
> do not use many SM boards as their line is geared more toward Intel.
> 
> Last and certainly not least of what I will use is Abit. They have a
> large lineup of quite stable boards that are a good value for the money.
> I don't expect them to take the constant abuse of a Tyan, and they
> won't. But when a working Abit board can be bought and replaced twice
> for the cost of a Tyan board running the same cpu, it boils down to
> allowable down time. If a failure is OK, I use Abit. If the system MUST
> WORK and/or parts replacement is impossible because of remoteness, Tyan.
> 
> Right now a solid system using Athlon X2/Phenom is a very good starter
> point for a new small server. Go look at the Asus Crosshair II Formula
> AM@/AM2+ board :
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131292
> 
> On Thu, 2008-07-03 at 11:41 -0400, Henry Hartley wrote:
>> These days we have such a huge variety of options that we really
>> shouldn't complain.  In the "old days" we had to decide what speed
>> Pentium we should get.  Before that, there were even fewer choices.  So,
>> I want to build a small server.  It will be for testing purposes and
>> will probably go to run a handful of thin clients in my home when I'm
>> done.  Since I'm paying for it out of my own pocket, price matters.
>> Still, I'm not completely broke yet.  So, I think I want to use a
>> dual-core AMD processor but one should be adequate.  I know I want room
>> for lots of RAM, although again, this won't be running 20 or 30
>> stations, just three to five.  Since it's for testing, and since the
>> final product WILL be a larger lab, I want to take a step into the
>> 64-bit world.  That narrows things down a little but there are still a
>> lot of options.
>>
>> So, a very specific question.  Given the above, any motherboard
>> manufacturers you would recommend, either to get or to avoid?  If you
>> have a specific model you want to recommend, that would be welcome, of
>> course.  The reasoning behind any of your thoughts would be most
>> appreciated, too, of course.
>>
>> -- 
>> Henry Hartley
>>
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>>
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