Home > Consumer Reviews > Biostar P4M80-M4 - Motherboard - micro ATX - P4M800 - Socket 478 - UDMA133, SATA (RAID) - Ethernet - video - 6-channel audio

The processor that the previous reviewer recommends is incompatible with the motherboard. Running a Northwood on a system that will only take Prescott's will make you wonder if your motherboard is DOA. The max cpu that this board can take is 3.2 Ghz. Do not bother attempting to get SATA II support, your system bus is only 32bit at 33mhz, SATA II cards take 66mhz. On the topic of the prescott, yes it runs hot, but there are remedies that reduce the heat. I use the Silverstone NT-06 with the 120mm fan. With all my fans set at the lowest possible setting, my idle temperature is 32 Celsius, load is 38 Celsius. With my my CPU fan on full my temperature drops 2 degrees. With my other fan running I dip down into 28 Celsius for idle and 36 Celsius for load. Use Arctic Silver 5, it is some of the best thermal/heatsink stuff you can do to lower the temperature on your processor.

Using this board with a northwood pentium 4 (Prescott runs too hot) 3.0 ghz - overclocked to 3.2 ghz; memory clock at 430 - 860 MHZ FSB; stable as can be and is running Vista - have found all drivers needed - including recently updated realtek audio drivers, SATA, etc...

AGP 8X ATI-1300 $125 M-board $50 processor $80 - etc... very low cost high performance system - suggest ATA133 or SATA II drives - no SATA III or other Gig ethernet - but works great.

Don't expect any support for Vista - find it all yourself!

The motherboard is a great deal for an older board. Great for an internet computer.

got this board, installed it, DOA, had prescott processor,
no beep codes,althought the fans came on ,nothing else happened,wont buy another BIOSTAR product, Will spend a little more for a better board.
I hope this helps someone