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I'm having a VERY hard time choosing a MOBO!!

Forum Homebuilt Systems : General Homebuilt - I'm having a VERY hard time choosing a MOBO!!

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Hey guys,

I'm having an extremely hard time finding the perfect motherboard. I intend to use this system for gaming and multimedia.

- LGA 775: Planning to put in a Q6600 (I already have it)
- P45 NB (I prolly wont have crossfire but leaving that option open for a 22" widescreen) (x48 is TOO expensive for me)
- Looking for 8 pin CPU power source, 24 pin MOBO power source (not too sure but I think utilizing all pins will help in the OC?) (PSU I already have supports it)

Need to spend less than $200 on it which really limits me!

I plan to OC (good passive cooling/pipes for NB/SB) so I need an unlocked BIOS with good customer support.

With that said, I've been looking on newegg and I haven't found one that is substantially better. I don't really care about brand of MOBO, but rest assured that a good mobo with the listed specs will not be manufactured from lets say ECS or Foxconn (nothing I have against these brands)..

I would GREATLY appreciate your help. Looking to buy from newegg (I receive items in 1 day!!!)

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My recommendations (all are very good OCing boards):

P45-DS3L (for a low budget, should work well with the Q6600 as the board won't limit the Q6600):
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813128345
$80

P45-DS3R (for RAID and possibele CrossFire) **Note: doing CrossFire on P45 will bottle neck 4850s++
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813128344
$110

ASUS P5Q (solid all around motherboard, good Ocing)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813131295
$130

For the higher end (<$250, I realize budget is $200 but you could spend the extra and get a good X48 that will do CrossFire without bottle necking)

ASUS P5E Deluxe
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813131317
$220

GIGABYTE X48-DS4
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813128336
$225

The very best (imo):
ASUS RAMPAGE FORMULA X48
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] 6813131284
$290

Message edited by Shadow703793 on 09-17-2008 at 01:49:18 AM

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http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3553/3818083596_1a772f7162_o.gif

Reply to Shadow703793

ASUS P5Q is a great board at a low price.... go go go

Message quoted 1 times

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Patriot Dual Channel 2GB DDR400: Raid0 640GB 2pc WD3200AAJS
Powercolor ATI Radeon HD3870 PCS 512MB DDR4

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Reply to goonting

goonting wrote :

ASUS P5Q is a great board at a low price.... go go go

However, the regular p5q doesnt have a second pci-e 2.0 slot for crossfire.

I'm running a 22" 1680x1050 monitor so running dual x8 2.0 pci-e slots shouldnt pose as a bottleneck correct?

Reply to aberchonbie

^See:
http://www.tweaktown.com/articles/ [...] index.html

Message quoted 1 times
Message edited by Shadow703793 on 09-17-2008 at 01:56:33 AM

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Reply to Shadow703793

Shadow703793 wrote :

^See:
http://www.tweaktown.com/articles/ [...] index.html

I see that there was marginal difference in the p45 and x48 at resolutions close to 1680x1050.

However, putting up AA and AF, the margin became larger.

Now this complicates things EVEN MORE!

any good x48/x38 boards that will run me less than $200 w/ good OC'ing capability?

Reply to aberchonbie

On the x48 chipset, looks like the DFI DK X48 is lowest at 220 w/ 10 shipping + tax (has better ratings and greater savings than the MSI)
On the x38 chipset, looks like the DFI DK x38 T2RB is lowest at 175 w/ 10 shipping + tax (not a fan of DDR2/DDR3 supported MOBO's)

Compared with Asus P5Q-E at 160 w/ FREE shipping + tax (but running p45 chipset)

What do you guys think?

Reply to aberchonbie

If your into maximum overclocking then look at DFI motherboards.

------------------------------ *While we crash and burn, small, low tech, agrarian societies such as the Hmong in the mountains of Laos will continue on without so much as blinking an eye.*
Reply to ZOldDude

I can help out here. Compare the P5Q Pro with the P5Q -E. Look at the pics closely. Note the areas around the CPU especially. This is why you get better voltage options and a beefier BIOS in the -E and higher boards.

The -E is the more serious OC board, and has a few other features as well. It's about the best choice in your price range... but there is also a Gigabyte board that is just slightly more, with some nice features.

I had my P5Q -E up to 533 FSB, and I think it might have been stable there if it had not been for the bad RAM... that was on air too.

Reply to Proximon

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