Best Motherboards

[martyjs]

I"ve read plenty of reviews on Motherboards and sometimes wonder about the results. Not short term but long term, I,ve used Heaps of Gigabyte boards. some Asus, Albatron and of course PCCHIPS.
Speaking long term can people give me a general idea on how long and what brand they have used?
I am trying to increase my general knowledge on Motherboards. The shop were I work we mainly use Gigabyte and Asus, to a leasser degree Albatron. I have worked there for close to 5 years.
8)
Also opions on the main chipsets
Thanks

 

[ikjadoon]

I used to use Albatron for a bit, until I had got a really bad motherboard...Now, I'll use pretty much everyone else.

On Chipsets, it depends on whose processor you are buying. If you are getting an AMD processor, you have nVidia, ATI, and VIA. Those are in the order of best to worst, IMHO.

If you are getting an Intel processor you have Intel themselves, nVidia, ATI, and VIA. (Those are in no particular order) There is SiS and a few others, but they are not that large in the retail market.

I prefer nVidia right now, mainly because of the success of the 500 series, but ATI may have something up its sleeve for Core 2 Duo. VIA is more of a budget company. A while back they tried the gaming market, didn't really work out too well. SiS is more OEM and office-oriented.

Motherboard-wise, it really depends on what the computer is used for. Most manuf. have different models for different price ranges and uses. They also have mATX-models, as well. I like ASUS, MSI, Gigabyte, Abit, DFI, Biostar,Foxconn. ASUS has always been a premier-line gaming motherboard producer. MSI is gaming and office-type. Gigabyte is an innovating maker, gaming inclined. Abit is gaming, DFI is overclocking, Biostar is budget mobo, Foxconn hasn't made much news before they premiered their extreme gaming 590 SLi motherboard.

hth

~Ibrahim~

 

[martyjs]

Thanks for your reply, I have a pretty good knowledge of most Motherboards, I'm more interested in peoples long term experience.
I noticed in some cases when a new Motherboard comes out from so called cheap brands, they will sometimes get very good reviews. What I want to know, is after 1,2 or more years what happens to these different brands and does a chipset make it worse or better.
Example I can give is I had a batch of Abit socket 370 Motherboards(whoops I think they were AOPEN boards, not ABIT) come in where the same of Capacitors had all leaked, causing the System to die.
Another Example about 6 months ago I Had a batch of Gigabyte M/B's, from memory 8IPE775 were the southbridge chip kept melting when a customer would plug in a USB camera.
I hope to find out other boards quirks, helps with fault finding and product knowledge.
Thanks
For me PC's don't end with a release of a new model, in my job I still get the ocasonal Win 95 machine and even once in a blue moon running dos with Win 3.1.

 

[ZOldDude]

I"ve read plenty of reviews on Motherboards and sometimes wonder about the results. Not short term but long term, I,ve used Heaps of Gigabyte boards. some Asus, Albatron and of course PCCHIPS.
Speaking long term can people give me a general idea on how long and what brand they have used?
I am trying to increase my general knowledge on Motherboards. The shop were I work we mainly use Gigabyte and Asus, to a leasser degree Albatron. I have worked there for close to 5 years.
8)
Also opions on the main chipsets
Thanks

For the past seven years or so I have use almost only Asus (some Abit)....but now only DFI.

After DFI I will never go back to Asus.

Every Asus board I ever built with worked fine for about 3 years then died on me (caps). I also find that DFI lets me fine tune (OC) alot better.

Some Ausus boards died under the 3 years and they did replace withen 10 working days,but I have yet to have a DFI die on me.

 

[martyjs]

DFI boards are one board I,ve had nothing to do with, they are not widlly used in Australia. As far as I can tell there only seems to be 1 or 2 outlets.
Thanks for that will look in to them.

Whoops could be wrong just did a Google search and got stacks of hits.
Must be the living in the county syndrome.

 

[martyjs]

No help to me, I can't go around overclocking customer brand new systems, I'll have alsorts of problems with cranky customers and Warranties being voided.

 

[martyjs]

I understand what your saying and in theory I agree with you, but what I am tring to find out is real world experiences. As I work in a small business in town of only 8000 people my exposure to motherboards and high end systems is limited. I love were I live but am keen to learn more than my job will allow me to.
I read lots of reviews, but often wonder how the cheap brand M/Bx and Graphic cards do in 1,2 or more years.
Surely I'm not the only one to think this.
Toms and the Magazines I read test all the latest gear, the best the fastest.
What happens latter? As people who read the forumz would notice, a lot of us have been around for a long time and don't always run the latest machines.
Thats the information I'm after, all that long term experiences, can not only help me but others in how good all Motherboard makers are now and then.

 

[ikjadoon]

That is a fact that I don't like about almost all reviewer sites. They almost always review the top of the line, i.e. M2N32-SLi, or higher end mid-range, like the MSI K9N SLi Platinum. As you have mentioned, we need reviews on mid-range products or even low-end so that we know that either 1)They are priced that low for a reason or 2)This motherboard is great and a price to match.

You know, Wusy, I've never thought of it like that. A very good point. I'll have to consider DFI a bit more now, just wish they'd hurry with AM2.

~Ibrahim~

 

[jimw428]

I used to use Albatron for a bit, until I had got a really bad motherboard...Now, I'll use pretty much everyone else.

On Chipsets, it depends on whose processor you are buying. If you are getting an AMD processor, you have nVidia, ATI, and VIA. Those are in the order of best to worst, IMHO.

If you are getting an Intel processor you have Intel themselves, nVidia, ATI, and VIA. (Those are in no particular order) There is SiS and a few others, but they are not that large in the retail market.

I prefer nVidia right now, mainly because of the success of the 500 series, but ATI may have something up its sleeve for Core 2 Duo. VIA is more of a budget company. A while back they tried the gaming market, didn't really work out too well. SiS is more OEM and office-oriented.

Motherboard-wise, it really depends on what the computer is used for. Most manuf. have different models for different price ranges and uses. They also have mATX-models, as well. I like ASUS, MSI, Gigabyte, Abit, DFI, Biostar,Foxconn. ASUS has always been a premier-line gaming motherboard producer. MSI is gaming and office-type. Gigabyte is an innovating maker, gaming inclined. Abit is gaming, DFI is overclocking, Biostar is budget mobo, Foxconn hasn't made much news before they premiered their extreme gaming 590 SLi motherboard.

hth

~Ibrahim~

Insightful. 8)

 

[ikjadoon]

Haha, thanks for the heads up. I'm reading reviews even as I type.

~Ibrahim~

 

[INeedCache]

One thing that irks me with DFI is that one year warranty. If you're not overclocking, that's poor when compared to the several makers that give 2 and 3 year warranties. Most computer buyers don't overclock nor do they change boards every year. As a reseller, I'm big on warranties, and I'd like to see DFI up theirs to at least 2 years, but 3 would be better. Why would a non-overclocker on an Intel platform buy a DFI board over an Intel? Makes no sense as Intel boards are 3 years warranty and have a lower failure rate.

 

[ikjadoon]

Really? Just a year? Ouch...I, also, would like to see those 2-3 warranties, then. But they are, usually, marketed towards the overclockers, who do not have the word "warranty" in their vocabularly, :lol:

~Ibrahim~

 

[martyjs]

I,m not sure if people understand what I am asking. I don't want reviews form magz or web sites. I want the readers to share there experiences of system builds eg what boards they have used, which ones have failed. That sort of info.
ZOldDude is the only one wha has really provided us with real world experiences.
Thanks in advance
Whoops sorry and ikjadoon

 

[chunkymonster]

I,m not sure if people understand what I am asking. I don't want reviews form magz or web sites. I want the readers to share there experiences of system builds eg what boards they have used, which ones have failed. That sort of info.
ZOldDude is the only one wha has really provided us with real world experiences.
Thanks in advance
Whoops sorry and ikjadoon

For long term stability and reliability I've had great results from Tyan, Supermicro, Asus, and aBit....In addition, I've also had success with Epox and DFI...I've learned to stay away from PCChips, Albatron, MSI, SOYO, and ECS...I've built a few file server/workstations with Tyan boards and am currently using a Supermicro for my own dual opty workstation, had nothing but great luck with 4 builds using aBit boards...I think Epox is underrated and makes a great board...glad to see DFI get it together since the LANParty series...was excited about MSI and SOYO a few years ago until a few boards ginked out building a couple of AthlonXP machines for friends...PCChips, Albatron, and ECS are just cheap, you get what you pay for...

Hope this is more of what you were looking for. Good luck!

 

[martyjs]

You hit the nail right on the head, real world experiece is just as important as reviews.
bonza mate 8)

 

[_Cosmin_]

In past 10 years:
I used Gigabyte 1000MK PRO- work fine some problems with bios (now are fixed)
I used MSI - works flawlesly with graphic card from same manufacturer
I used Intel (Pearl and Breeze) - no problem whatsoever.
I used ASUS (mainly A7N8X Deluxe and now i have A8N32 SLI Deluxe) - only problem i had with them was compatibility with TV-tuners