micro ATX Mobo with Integrated Wifi

[SedaliaSteve]

and as much else as possible. When my tax refund arrives I'd like to have a music server that will sit next to my old analog stereo and have all my CD's ripped to it, probably in FLAC. The micro-ATX form factor looks right for a small system. Since it doesn't have that many slots in that size I'm looking for a motherboard that has an integral Wifi that won't eat a PCI slot.

I'm planning a SATA RAID 1 with big drives. I probably will move into video at some point.

I know there's an ASUS P5B-MX which does this. I've also seen reports of Ubuntu ported successfully to it. I just wondered of any other options.

Also, how is the sound of the motherboard on this model? Is it good quality.

Steve

[grimdestripador]

Depends, if your an audiophile when listening using onboard audio you'd notice:

• GPU noise (move a mouse = screeching/clicks, move a window = click/clunks)
  Higher CPU usage, as CPU is now doing audio-crunching
  Crappy sound with unbalanced eq curves

Although:

• Mothboard Audio has probably a better SnR (signal/noise measured in decibel watts) than 99% mp3 players, 90% CD home component CD players.
  You probably won't notice unless you have over 150 watt power ammps (per channel) with eq ballanced speakers/monitor

This is compared to the industries top audio cards from creative or maudio.

Conclusion: If you listen to the radio, and you don't mind the horrible quality, then you'd won't notice anything by upgrading your sound card. Most high end sound cards are for EAX gaming anyway; which isn't used when listening to music.

[grimdestripador]

I'm more sold on the gigabit port. If you want big drives or videos in the future, Wifi isn't your friend.