Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)You may need a couple of extra cables and such to build a machine with this board but once you get your computer up and running you will most likely be impressed by what you put together for under 200 bucks. I think I actually built a machine for about 210.00 including a used case and PSU w/o monitor.
My setup has 2 GB of Ram (the max amount), 60 GB SATA Hard Disk. Also, I used a 20 pin PSU to 24 pin Motherboard converter cable as the pins did not match up when trying to plug the stock 20 pin connector into the motherboard--the instructions say this is possible. I use it mainly as a media server and for watching movies through s-video output to my TV set.
Here are a few really nice bits I found out about the D945GCLF2 board after I got it home:
It has a vga and s-video output (no DVI) which can be used in dual display configuration. If you have a TV with an s-video input this can come in handy.
Each of the Atom 330's cores have hyperthreading which amounts to 4 logical processors detected by your operating system--the atom 330
along with it's 945 GPU make the computer run snappy.
Unlike some of the reviews of this board state, it can be used for more than just web browsing. No, you can't play Call of Duty but many 3d games that are a couple of years old run very well. I tried Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness and Oni (which is way old) and they both ran flawlessly.
Ubuntu with Compiz looks stunning.
I put the good stuff first because I really don't have any problems with my computer but here are some glitches I had to work around:
The s-video output has a vertical scrolling issue when the computer
first turns on but clears up when your OS loads. I still can't read the grub boot menu from my TV set. The VGA output has no issues, however. This s-video flicker problem could be solved by a bios update from intel (if we ever get one) in the future.
The board comes with a driver disk for windows so installing 2000/xp/vista is easy. Installing Ubuntu proved to be less than stupidly easy
(it often is stupidly easy these days). The main problem I had was with getting the dual display working with s-video and getting the OS to recognize the two Hyper Threading cores in the atom 330. I solved the
multi core problem by installing Ubuntu 64 bit. Ask a Linux wizard why the 64 bit distro is different in that regard, all I know is that it now recognizes 4 logical processors and I am satisfied with the result.
All and all This machine is pure It's cheap, its small, and it works
better than it should.
Click Here to see more reviews about: Intel D945GCLF2 Essential Series Mini-ITX DDR2 667 Intel Graphics Integrated Atom Processor Desktop Board - Retail
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