Socket 939 Motherboard

[Comas]

So I am just wondering what would be a great motherboard for s939 based system. There certainly are lots of options, but what would fit the best for my needs.
Well first question is that does every motherboard nowadays support Dual-Core technology. Does it basically mean that you can use dual core processor in one motherboard if it uses Socket 939?

Second one is the importance of Sata Raid 2: Are there any real benefits from Sata150 to Sata300. What I have heard is that SATA300 is the way to go when you are using many HDs. I also want to remind that I am only going to go with 1 HD so if there isn't any advantage from it then I don't want it I might be wrong though so....
Basically I am also thinking if I take a motherboard which supports Sata2, I propably should take a SATA2 HD then too...Hope you can help me out of this too.

I don't want to use SLI technology, because Im not buying 2 cards at the same time so it feels kinda useless...Nvidia is the chipmaker Im going to go with though.

Of course I want some overclockability too, but Im not any kind of Hard core OC'er. DFI feels like a great OC board, but like I said, it isn't the most important thing for me. And DFI seems to be quite a task to use anyway, so that isn't what Im looking for either.

I have been looking for MSI, Asus maybe even ABIT..
Hope you can give me some tips what to do

 

[RichPLS]

No SLI, the Asus A8R-MVP works with nVidia ...and has SATA2 features...
at least you should check it out for info of this mainstream rocket...

 

[jrnyfan]

be wary of nforce3 boards if you are using a 6800 series card...read up in the nvidia forums for more info. i bought an msi k8n-neo2 and i love msi to death but nvidia really messed things up with the nforce3 chipset...the drivers are terrible and the new 5.11 series dont fix much. hell, the description on nvidia.com of the differences is just 'fixes for the 5.10' nforce3 drivers from a year ago. go with an asus k8v deluxe or something like that, using the via k8t800 chipset, seems to be more stable. of course, with everything, someone has to get the bad batch but there are a lot of us out there with the nforce3 chipset that are miffed at nvidia for doing this

 

[Comas]

Im going with Nforce4. Don't want to mess with via :lol:

 

[jrnyfan]

nforce4 is a solid choice, i always like MSI boards just because of the overclocking ability. all socket 939 boards support dual-core chips, i know cause i run one right now!

AMD X2 4200+
MSI K8N-Neo2
evga 6800gt
2gb (4x512mb crucial ballistix)

 

[Comas]

Ok, thanks, that's what I really wanted to hear.
Now I have only this Sata-Sata2 problem.

There are 2 MSI boards, which are very similar:
K8N Neo4-F (It is under Nforce 4)
and
K8N Neo4-FI (It is under Nforce 4 ULTRA)

Then there is this Asus board which seems to be high quality product too!

Asus A8N-E

Well, I know Ultra means just few, not always so useful, features.
Basic difference between these boards is that FI has SATA 2 and Firewire.
And If I take FI,which has SATA 2, I still can use SATA HD?

 

[Rugger]

Check out the Epox 9NPA+ Ultra and the Abit AN8 Ultra. Don't worry about SATA vs SATA II. Current HDD can't even saturate SATA, so the extra bandwidth of SATA II is useless.

 

[jrnyfan]

im going to have to agree about the SATA v. SATA II, it really wont make much difference and by the time it will, you will upgrade anyway and something new will be out there beyond SATA II. its similar to AGP 8X and 4X...8X came out and i dont know that they ever finally used all the bandwidth up before they switched to PCI-e but they touted it as faster...which is nice but a trickle of water flows through a 4 inch pipe the same as a 4 foot pipe, you just spend more building the extra pipe.

I would stick with the known names in mobo's, MSI ASUS ABIT etc. and go with whatever features you need...i dont think firewire is all that special so that's why i didnt go with the Platinum version of my MSI K8N-Neo2 as that was basically the only difference and i saved myself 40$ and still got almost all the bells and whistles...minus the 2nd gig lan i guess

 

[Comas]

Yea, Well Im pretty much between MSI and Asus right now:
Asus A8N-E and MSI K8N-Neo4-FI

Basically both have pretty much same features and both cost about the same so I will just have pick the one which is easier/better to overclock with. It's just dang hard to say which one is the ONE
I have to check some tests or something about it I guess...
Thanks for everyone who has posted already. It has helped me alot

 

[jrnyfan]

i know there was a reveiw here on tom's that talked about overclocking...dont remember which one exactly though. having dealt with both boards, i know that MSI is good for overclocking on all their boards while the ASUS boards seem to be only able to overclock on the higher-end versions...on the A8V for example, the deluxe is the version you want if you want to overclock.

at any rate, good luck

 

[Comas]

Yea, but isn't that VIA, not Nforce 4! 8O

 

[jrnyfan]

some ASUS boards run on the nforce4 chipset...but i dont know which ones cause i only use MSI...i was in pcclub the other day and i know i saw some there...but i can't remember the model numbers cause honestly, i didnt care enough to remember lol. had i only known...

 

[Comas]

Yea, Asus A8N-E is with Nforce 4 chipset.