Motherboard suggestions sought

I need to build a Core i7 system for someone else. Nothing exotic,
single video only, etc. There is some desire for a "legacy rich"
system; a floppy drive, serial port and parallel port are viewed as
desirable. At least two PCI slots are also essential (the system will
have to host an Adaptec SCSI card and possibly an Audigy series PCI
sound card with Live Drive). IT WILL BE RUNNING XP FOR NOW, ANYWAY.

I've kind of narrowed this down to 5 cards:

-MSI X58 Pro
-Asus P6T SE
-Asus P6T
-Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD4P
-Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD5

But I'm open to other seemingly good suggestions.

Two particular questions, what are the essential differences between the
two Asus boards and, similarly, between the two Gigabyte boards.

Comments?

On Wed, 27 May 2009 22:12:56 -0400, Barry Watzman
wrote:


There is some desire for a "legacy rich"
system; a floppy drive, serial port and parallel port are viewed as
desirable.

Neither of these list a serial or parallel port in their specs?
(I also am looking for a board which includes these ports as standard)

-Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD4P
-Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD5

--
Geo

On Wed, 27 May 2009 22:12:56 -0400, Barry Watzman
wrote:

I need to build a Core i7 system for someone else. Nothing exotic,
single video only, etc. There is some desire for a "legacy rich"
system; a floppy drive, serial port and parallel port are viewed as
desirable. At least two PCI slots are also essential (the system will
have to host an Adaptec SCSI card and possibly an Audigy series PCI
sound card with Live Drive). IT WILL BE RUNNING XP FOR NOW, ANYWAY.

I've kind of narrowed this down to 5 cards:

-MSI X58 Pro
-Asus P6T SE
-Asus P6T
-Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD4P
-Gigabyte GA-EX58-UD5

But I'm open to other seemingly good suggestions.

Two particular questions, what are the essential differences between the
two Asus boards and, similarly, between the two Gigabyte boards.

http://www.gigabyte.us/Products/Moth...ctID=2985,2961
Asus has a Compare List function, but it won't create a direct URL to
the comparison.


Comments?

For serial/parallel, get a PCI or PCI-e card.
For floppy, get a USB floppy drive.

I'm not sure that a USB floppy drive will work. The owner needs to be
able to prepare Diskettes for a Yamaha Disklavier (spelling?) Grand
Piano (it's a $40,000 modern version of a "player piano" that uses
floppy diskettes instead of rolls of paper with holes in them).
Unfortunately, the diskettes are non-standard 720k 3.5" floppies. They
can be created on a PC with a "real" floppy drive, but I'm not sure it
can be done on a USB floppy.


Andy wrote:


For serial/parallel, get a PCI or PCI-e card.
For floppy, get a USB floppy drive.

The two Gigabyte motherboards actually still have floppy connectors on
them.

On Thu, 28 May 2009 23:53:23 -0400, Barry Watzman
wrote:

I'm not sure that a USB floppy drive will work. The owner needs to be
able to prepare Diskettes for a Yamaha Disklavier (spelling?) Grand
Piano (it's a $40,000 modern version of a "player piano" that uses
floppy diskettes instead of rolls of paper with holes in them).
Unfortunately, the diskettes are non-standard 720k 3.5" floppies. They
can be created on a PC with a "real" floppy drive, but I'm not sure it
can be done on a USB floppy.


Andy wrote:


For serial/parallel, get a PCI or PCI-e card.
For floppy, get a USB floppy drive.

On 5/28/2009 10:53 PM, Barry Watzman wrote:
I'm not sure that a USB floppy drive will work. The owner needs to be
able to prepare Diskettes for a Yamaha Disklavier (spelling?) Grand
Piano (it's a $40,000 modern version of a "player piano" that uses
floppy diskettes instead of rolls of paper with holes in them).
Unfortunately, the diskettes are non-standard 720k 3.5" floppies. They
can be created on a PC with a "real" floppy drive, but I'm not sure it
can be done on a USB floppy.

You can use HD 3.5" floppies and format them as DD on a USB disk
drive. You'll need to physically cover the HD hole in the corner of the
floppy, though.