What kind of motherboard should I get

[Thanty]

I have decided to get the oem version of Vista for the new computer, so with the extra money saved I was suggested to buy a newer motherboard. I have trouble deciding which motherboard I should get, and which ones are new.

The one I had previously chosen was the
EVGA 122-CK-NF68-A1 LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 680i SLI ATX Intel Motherboard

[Jamie Nixx]

The motherboard you chose there is great.

In terms of newness (if thats a word) these are the chipsets to go for.

Nvidia
650i
680i
780i (not released until December)

Intel
P35
X38 (very expensive)

Both have their advantages and disadvantages, the Nvidia chipset boards support SLi and are great overclockers.

The Intel chipset boards support DDR3 and are newer chipsets, thus they are better but slighly more expensive.

The 680i and the P35 are not much different accept the P35 supports DDR3 memory and is generally a newer chipset and the 680i has more PCI lanes and supports SLi while being a better overclocker.

If you saved quite a bit of money going for the OEM Vista, get a P35 chipset mobo, Asus are a good brand to go with.

[gtrasi]

Iam also looking to buy a whole new computer post-holiday season...

Planning for a budget mainstream AMD 690G platform and i hav 2 choices to make..

Either Asus M2AVM HDMI or

Biostar T690G HDMI both are equally priced.
However Asus gives a riser card for its HDMi but Biostar HDMi is inbuilt.

Also Biostar boasts of "solid state capacitor design" and seems an ideal choice for gaming enthus.

Whts ur opinion jamie???

[Jamie Nixx]

Go for the Biostar...

[gtrasi]

now that i was planning to go for 690G chipset, all this talk of new chipsets such as 770/790 series from AMD and P35/X38 from intel hav caught my attention.

also Rob recommends nvidia sli chipsets from both intel & amd platform.

i hav ordered msi 8800GT OC video card that runs on pci express 2.0. however iam not going for x38 since 2.0 offers no visible performance advantage over 1.1.
And anyways iam not planning to use SLI...but that quality of asus sli boards look much better that 690G boards from any make.

Also I have seen that only BIOSTAR offers solid state cap in all its mobos while the rest only offer them in recent x38 or 770/790 series. Do solid state caps really make the difference?

So please tell mewhich platform to go for and then which chipset ofers me best perfm2price ratio ?

[The Wise Monkey]

The new nVidia 780i chipset is said to be very good, but will be very expensive as it has only just been released.

You are better off going for a P35 chipset at the moment, as they have come down in price a lot and are good performers as well. Afaik, all Gigabyte motherboards have solid state capacitors, but I'm not 100% on that.

[gtrasi]

The new nVidia 780i chipset is said to be very good, but will be very expensive as it has only just been released.

You are better off going for a P35 chipset at the moment, as they have come down in price a lot and are good performers as well. Afaik, all Gigabyte motherboards have solid state capacitors, but I'm not 100% on that.

I checked out the Gigabyte site and they offer "Ultra 2 Solid state caps" only in AMD 7series and X38 chipset mobos just like asus.

Also i hav ordered Corsair Twin 800MHz so no point goin for ddr3 based mobos.

So amd 7series and X38 are out of question.

[The Wise Monkey]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128067

Ultra 2 solid caps, P35 chipset mobo. :)

[gtrasi]

Thanks...tht was easy...!
However no such luck for AMD 690G mobos.

Anyways are these so called solid caps really tht imp ?

Whts ur opinion on gigabyte mobos compared to asus , biostar, abit & msi.

Rightnow iam awestruck with asus blitz and my goodness...its lik ownng a ferrari!!!

Awaiting reply.

[gtrasi]

BTW...Blitz has P35 which obviously not being made by nvidia isnt tru SLI but supports dualcard technology thru Crossfire.

So it means to use dualcard on this mobo i need ATi only videocards?

I plan to use 8800GT in single mode whch i hope shouldnt be a problem.
please calrify.

[The Wise Monkey]

I think that Gigabyte make very good motherboards and are serious competition to ASUS. They are slightly cheaper as well, and were one of the first to bring out the P35 chipset.

Single 8800GT will be fine, but no support for SLI with the P35 chipset unfortunately. If you want two cards, you need to use Crossfire.

[gtrasi]

Asus striker costs 300US so i cant imagine how much will Blitz cost!

I am settling for either of these:

Asus M2N32 SLI Dlx for AMD

or

Asus P5N32 E Sli 680i for Intel

which platform to go for?

If Amd, i will buy X2 Brisbane 1MB 5000+ as higher ones are only in Windsor.

IF intel , i will settle for E6650 2.33GHz 4Mb cache as that wht i can afford!

Yea i know thats a lots of cache memory in intel and thers hardly anyb diff in price.
however intel mobo is a bit expensive.

Whts ur opinion on asus 680i Sli board? IS xfx better ?

[The Wise Monkey]

That Intel C2D will totally outperform the AMD one you selected, so go for that one. ;)

[gtrasi]

Just browsing for mainboards...and Abit Ip35 pro has lots of nice reiews.
wht has caught my eye is that it also fetaures solid state japanese caps which non of asus mbs have except for X38 ones.

but asus mobo P5n32 sli 680i has 8phase design. whts the adv of 8phase design...it also has 8pin cpu pwr supply but my smps will only hav 4pins..so is it useful??

[The Wise Monkey]

Info on 8-phase:
http://event.asus.com/2005/mb/ailife_ge/02_1.htm

To be honest, it won't make a huge amount of difference in the long run unless you are going to be overclocking a lot.