PC Help Needed - Motherboard Replacement

I've got an Alienware Area 51 7500 that is 2 months out of warranty and has started rebooting randomly. After much testing I narrowed it down to the mobo. MemTest showed tons of errors, and replacement RAM chips showed them too. Must be the mobo, right?

So I'd like to replace the mobo (Asus P5ND2-SLI) but keep all the other parts - ie; memory (2GB DDR2 PC4200 and 2GB DDR2 PC5300) and CPU (P4 D I think, but two 3.0 GHz cores for sure). But I can't find another Asus P5ND2-SLI for sale other than used ones.

I'm out of touch with current technology, and have a couple questions. I was looking at an Intel D975XBX2 which seems like it would be a possible replacement. ATX, socket 775, can handle P4 D dual-core chips and the memory I have. Can anyone confirm that this Intel mobo is a possible replacement that will allow me to keep my CPU and RAM?


Concerning Windows XP. Will I have any issues if I just plop this new mobo in and boot my existing hard drive with Windows XP?


And I'm thinking about adding another HDD, and re-installing XP onto that and make my current drive (with C: D: and E my second drive and forcing the new drive to C: and those old partitions to D: E: and F: respectively. But the last time I added a new drive (to a different system) it seemed that XP wanted to make the new drive D and keep C as the old one. Is there a way around this?


If I break down and get a new CPU and RAM, will Windows XP Pro handle a 4-core CPU, or is it limited to 2 CPUs?


Any recommendations welcome. Thanks in advance.

As long as new new board is ATX form any manufactures should work just fine. XP will install perfectly but will need to install the chipset and Lan drivers supplied with the new mobo.

Intel releases their new Penryn processors soon that will make the current ones obsolete. Very good reviews coming out about them.

Read this: http://cps7.00b.net …537/01.19.viewo​nline.html

Get new Corsair XMS memory as its gotten dirt cheap of late.

Did you check out newegg.com? They still have a few 775 mobos

Booting your existing HD with XP installed will not work if the hard drive controllers on the new board are not compatible with the currently installed driver.

Probably the easiest way to get it to work is to install the default, basic IDE controller drivers and remove your brand-specific ones. Then it *should* boot and let you install proper drivers. Doesn't always work.

If this seems complex, you should be able to boot from the XP CD and do a repair on the OS and it should boot right up after that.

OdiN1701 wrote in post #4746338
Booting your existing HD with XP installed will not work if the hard drive controllers on the new board are not compatible with the currently installed driver.

Probably the easiest way to get it to work is to install the default, basic IDE controller drivers and remove your brand-specific ones. Then it *should* boot and let you install proper drivers. Doesn't always work.

If this seems complex, you should be able to boot from the XP CD and do a repair on the OS and it should boot right up after that.

this only works if the XP Boot CD can see his hard drive. He may have to use the F6 and load a driver from floppy during XP CD Boot.

Easiest thing to do is just buy the used board and swap it out. machine will boot up just fine (if the used board works 100%).