Buying a new PC - what MOBO

I am looking at buying a Paladin XLC V3 from ibuypower. Planning on an i7 920 processor with dual ATI 5870 graphics cards and an Auzentech Prelude soundcard.

I know almost nothing about motherboards, so not sure what criteria I should be using to select one. Looking at the Asus P6X58D Premium, the MSI Eclipse SLI and the EVGA X58 SLI.

I would appreciate any advice people can offer!

The criteria used to asses which mobo you want depends on what you are actually looking for (solid overclocking, SLI, etc.) but it becomes less important at the premium level of x58 boards, as they usually include most of the goodies that would make one board preferable over another.

I actually have not heard of that specific ASUS board you listed.. but a quick glance at newegg shows that its okay. I'm personally not a fan of MSI's x58 mobos but that may just be me. EVGA's makes the best x58 boards in my opinion. You did not actually list a specific EVGA board, "EVGA X58 SLI" just tells me its EVGA branded, is for i7s, and can run multiple video cards :].

Which one were you specifically talking about?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Prod [...] LI&x=0&y=0


Just a side comment: I'm all for supporting online computer-building boutiques, but I'll simply state that you can save a lot by ordering the parts and making it yourself. The prep time on reading may be long but it's easier than it looks. I remember building my first comp... it was a pretty satisfying experience, plus you gain tons of knowledge regarding hardware and the likes. Just saying.

I was actually surprised how little the markup was vs. ordering the parts directly from tigerdirect. The full system came to just over $200 more than the sum of the parts, and it comes with a 3 year warranty which certainly has value.