Please help me choose a motherboard?

Out of the two I'd go with the ASUS Z97-A however have you looked at the; http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128709 ?

See http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-intel-amd-motherboard,3902.html - the ASRock.

This should make it easy:



This should seal the deal:

$120 - MSI Gaming 5 - 10% negative (1 egg) reviews
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130770

$109 - Gigabyte Gaming 5 - 10% negative (1 egg) reviews
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128709

$140 - Asus Z97-A97-A - 23% negative (1 egg) reviews
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813132118

$145 - ASRock Z97 Extreme6 - 23% negative (1 egg) reviews
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157500

misread for asrock extreme 4. apologies. ^1+

The Extreme 4 is better value per http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/mainstream-gaming-z97-motherboard,3824-27.html

and recommended in the link above.

Though the extreme 4 has some features over the z97-A, Iv'e read it has had some problems and Iv'e always preferred ASUS quality wise.

See -
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1822238
http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1822238
http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-2170281/asus-z97-motherboard-problems-booting.html

They all have problems reported. Most caused by the user. But they can all be RMAd - warranty return - if there's a real problem.

Let me make it simple for you. Since you're looking for a "good gaming/overclocking" motherboard, I would suggest this one, which has great price to performance ratio:

PCPartPicker part list / Price breakdown by merchant

Motherboard: ASRock Fatal1ty Z97 Killer ATX LGA1150 Motherboard ($106.98 @ Newegg)
Total: $106.98
Prices include shipping, taxes, and discounts when available
Generated by PCPartPicker 2015-05-02 23:11 EDT-0400

Cheers!

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-intel-amd-motherboard,3902.html - Best motherboards April 2015 -

Extreme 4, 6 and 9


Z97 mobo by tier - http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/id-2383187/motherboard-tier-list-z97-chipset.html

Tier 1a - Extreme 9, 1b - Extreme 6, 2 - Extreme 3 and 4 & Z97-A

Its like playing ping pong. Your turn Jack.

We have had this tier list discussion before.... I find these tier lists useless ...way too many inconsistencies and over generalizations.... look it has this VRM and these features so it must be Tier 1.... the fact that a $300 board gets its tail kicked by a $135 one is not factored in ? The fact that a $135 board has the same feature set, equal or better componentry and performs significantly better than a $215 board is not factored in ? The fact that several sizes in a PSU model line are great puts the whole line in tier 1 while the bigger size units are poorly reviewed. How does a PSU w/ better stability and lower ripple wind up in a tier below the one it beats ?

And as for THG reviews, I find it discomforting for example that each month they juggle all the price categories around so as to get a good mix of winners and losers. Best card under $350 one month manages to exclude a $355 card that kicks tail on everything else in the category if it was < $360. So what happens then the price of the $355 card drops to $335 ? The < $350 category is now the $325 category. How is it that the 290x and 970 "tie" and yet in just 7 months the 970 (2.81%) has more market share than all R7 (0.89%) and R9 (0.92%) cards over 18 months combined and by a substantial margin (1.55 times) ? For every two cards that AMD sells from $50 to $300, nVidia is selling three $340 970s. To my eyes that "ranking" is obviously not "in line" with what consumers are thinking.

The fact that someone decides that so and so card / board deserves say a "value" or "approved" rating doesn't impress, especially when it is oft not supported by the very data within the article as with the link above where performance went MSI > Giga > Asrock > Asus. I'm oft left wondering what other outside influences go into these designations. Don't user experiences, failure rate and "overclocking performance" factor in at all ? What about customer satisfaction ?

Asrock Extreme 9 - 31% of users gave it 1 egg
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157527

Asrock Extreme 6 - 23% of users gave it 1 egg
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157500

Asrock Extreme 4 - 18% of users gave it 1 egg
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157293

That's an average of 24% negative reviews for these "award winning" Motherboards. The two Gaming 5's were 10%

Going back to the tier list ...... the MSI Gaming 5, Gigabyte Gaming 5 and the Extreme 6 are on the Tier 1b list ....with this thread is about a gaming build

a) Doesn't the relative performance of the 3 boards factor in at all ?
b) Doesn't the failure rate for the 3 manufacturers factor in at all ?
c) Doesn't the fact that the Extreme 6 is the most expensive of the 3 factor in at all ?
d) Doesn't the % of dissatisfied users factor in at all (Asrock Extreme 6 has 230% of the dissatisfied users that MSI and Gigabyte Gaming 5 have )..

Those 4 things along with component quality are things I like to factor in when I make recommendations. Others may not care about some of those things .... "who cares if boards have high warranty return rate, they will send me a new one" you might say..... but it's me who has to rebuild a user's box or I lose a production box for 2 weeks (or 3 months on my Asus WS Board), that costs time and money.

I am not trying to convince you that my way of thinking is right and yours is wrong .... just explaining why I don't give weight to rankings that are not directly supported by data. To make tier 1b for example, board must have M.2 .... you may find this to be a great feature while I'm thinking "this is a gaming box, why would I wanna kill SLI ?"....

To me, tier lists an "value" rankings are meaningless in the face of other factors..... it's all about the numbers, I'll decide what the value is for my purposes on my own.

Using an analogy that's timely ..... Hopkins thought Manny won the fight tonight .... I respect Hopkins opinion but I look at the punch stat numbers and go huh ? It wasn't even close...... it's all about the numbers. How often ya hit and how hard ya hit. With MoBos, it's how often ya win and by how much ya win.

A lot of users are themselves responsible for the problems. So I would take the numbers with a grain of salt.