Which socket 939 board to go with?

This is mine and I love it.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E1681...

I got the ASUS A8N32SLI X16 because
1 its one of the best boards going
2 its got total freedom in the bios settings
3 great air cooler
4 I wanted a good board for SLI
5 I like the onboard digital sound AC97 (some peeps say it sucks... :? I have had NOT had any problems with it.
6 I't's paird to work with one of the best DDR ram sticks on the market Corsair 3500 LL pro 2 gigs at 2 3 2 6 1T @ 237 Mhz real fast for ram of that size
7 Stable OCer
8 easy to hook up

I could prolly think of more but what else you want to know?

Oh yeah......the copper heat pipes that connect the north n south bridge look pretty sweeet :wink: and they work too.  

RIG specs
Antec P180 PerformanceSeries Mid-Tower Case
SeaSonic S12 600 watt power supply
Asus A8N32 SLI mobo AMD N-Force 4 SLIX16 (bios 1103 V02.58)
RealTek 97 onboard digital 5.1 Surround
AMD Athlon 64 X2 4800+ Toledo Core, 2 X 1mb L2 cache (AMD driver 1.3.1.0 w/MS hotfix & AMD Dual Core Optimizer)
2 gigs of Corsair TwinX3500LL Pro @ 437Mhz 2-3-2-6-1T
2- BFG 7900 GT OC 256mb in SLI (nvidia driver 91.31)
Western Digital RAPTOR 74.3 gig 10-K rpm HDD for XP & Apps
Maxtor SATA II 250 G HDD for gaming, movies, MP3's
Maxtor SATA II 250 G HDD for document backup (unplugged)
Sony CDrom 52X
Plextor 708-A DVD/CD rom
Logitech Z-5500 Digital 5.1 THX 500watts

DFI Expert.

Why?
It is the best board for OC and has only high end caps/parts on it and all the voltage regulators have heatsinks.
I got tierd of the caps on my Asus boards dieing around 2-3 years after building. Haveing used a DFI MB I will never go back to Asus.

The "onboard" sound is a seperate unit so both it and the MB both work better than the "normal" onboard sound. No need for a SB card.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E1681...


Here is my board. Full speed AGP and PCI express so you can use your old agp card and upgrade to PCI express later. Who cares about SLI anyone on a budget is not going to spend that much on two cards. You even can buy a card to upgrade to new AM2 chip and faster DDR2 memory. The upgrade card is about 30 bucks.

DFI Expert.

Why?
It is the best board for OC and has only high end caps/parts on it and all the voltage regulators have heatsinks.
I got tierd of the caps on my Asus boards dieing around 2-3 years after building. Haveing used a DFI MB I will never go back to Asus.

The "onboard" sound is a seperate unit so both it and the MB both work better than the "normal" onboard sound. No need for a SB card.

the DFI expert was a blinding board. it like some one loaded a shot gun full of bios tweeks and fired them at the screen. its so comprehensive in everything u can do with it. dream board.

its everything a OCers board should be. it makes me warm inside to think about them.

What features do you need and what will your use be? OCer?

I mostly just want something of high quality that will give me hassle free operation. I may get into some minor OC'ing.

I was considering the Asus A8n sli premium, but I am now leaning more towards the higher end DFI board. I've heard nothing but good things about DFI.

this is mine
i love it its great! i have had it for a month or so now and its works great.
Albatron

YO ole dude, ya gotta link for your mobo. I'm curious to have a look at it. I have never owned a DFI. Have you always used em?

It depends on the rest of the components aslo. I woult recomend ABIT AT8 32X http://www2.abit.com.tw/page/uk/motherboard/motherboard...
or Abit AN8 32X http://www2.abit.com.tw/page/uk/motherboard/motherboard...
I use the earlier model of the later and I am Completely satisfied. Very stable and quiet ( the heat pipes are a great thing   ). But which one you will use depends on many things ( do you want to OC, do you want a quiet one, do you want the best money/performance ratio....etc.). Think it through since this is easily the most important part of your pc :wink:

I'm with Paybax on this one. A8N32-SLI Deluxe. Has some easy OC options. Got 3200+ from 2 to 2.5GHz without even thinking. Got to 2.75GHz with a bit of tweaking. Need more cooling for stable though, especially in summer.

Believe its not quite as good as DFI for OC options, correct me if I'm wrong of course. :wink:

P.S. and it does look sweet 8)

Why shouldn't he get a 939 CPU and mother board? If he is on a budget and wants to save money he could build a great system around a 939 cpu. Not everyone needs to run out and buy the next new thing on the market. Then in a year or so he could then build a great budget system around a Core2 chip when they drop way down because the next new cpu comes out. If you stay behind the technology curve you can still get a great system and save a lot of cash. Of course we don't know how much this guy wants to spend on his new system. That would also help if we knew that. If he wants to build a new system from the ground up and has a grand or so to blow I would say get skip 939 and get the newest thing from AMD the AM2 or go with the new intell Core2 chip and build around that. But build something that you will be happy with. If you are a mad gamer and want the best FPS and highest graphics settings spend big and aim high. My wifes system that has a socket A 2500+ Barton chip with a 6800 vanilla gpu and is still ok for her and it still plays most games at decent resolutions and the thing has been a rock solid system for almost 3 years. When I put that system together I payed very little for that cpu about 80 bucks the MSI mother board was less than 100.

I agree with caamsa's view completely. The 939 platform is established and more stable than the new AM2, and on top of that there is the added value. Cost comparison between an AM2 setup and 939 setup are not far off, but at this time the performance is very close as well. For the time being I can save some cash and have a fine gaming rig that will probably play all of the games well until the next generation platform is released.

My desired setup is mostly for gaming. I can spend around $800-$900 and from that I need a mobo, cpu, ram, and a vid card. I have a good case, power supply, and WD raptor already. I am pretty much sold on the Evga 7900GT 512mb vid card because the performance/$ is probably unbeatable. That leaves me with around $500-600 to get a cpu, mobo, and ram. Any suggestions on that are appreciated.

I'm with caam on that...Whats wrong with a 939 board anyway?? :?
I built mine 5 months ago around the A8N32 SLI and I love it. At the time it was almost the top of the market. As far as performace goes, it pretty much still is and would still give a conroe a run for it's money. Hell, Quad SLI would still beat me....... but by how much???....20- 30 FPS???
Can the naked eye even see that???
CAAM is right...If you always wait for this... or wait for that.....or beat yourself up for missing out on this or that.... YOU"LL NEVER GET A MACHINE!!!! 8O
Decide your budget, do youir research, shop aroudn for the best price, and go out an buy your rig bro...get your 939 and be happy with what you have...otherwise you can be miserable and never satisfied with what you have.
Sorry guys I bitched enough for one day,,..... had a hard day at work  

Now I've said what I wanted to say.....
RIG specs
Antec P180 PerformanceSeries Mid-Tower Case
SeaSonic S12 600 watt power supply
Asus A8N32 SLI mobo AMD N-Force 4 SLIX16 (bios 1103 V02.58)
RealTek 97 onboard digital 5.1 Surround
AMD Athlon 64 X2 4800+ Toledo Core, 2 X 1mb L2 cache (AMD driver 1.3.1.0 w/MS hotfix & AMD Dual Core Optimizer)
2 gigs of Corsair TwinX3500LL Pro @ 437Mhz 2-3-2-6-1T
2- BFG 7900 GT OC 256mb in SLI (nvidia driver 91.31)
Western Digital RAPTOR 74.3 gig 10-K rpm HDD for XP & Apps
Maxtor SATA II 250 G HDD for gaming, movies, MP3's
Maxtor SATA II 250 G HDD for document backup (unplugged)
Sony CDrom 52X
Plextor 708-A DVD/CD rom
Logitech Z-5500 Digital 5.1 THX 500watts