Looking For A Mini ITX Motherboard - Advice For Small Gaming Project?

[godbrother]

Hi,

I was at my fathers house, playing around with my brother in laws shinny new Ion PC. I was impressed that something like this was finally released on the market. But to cut the long story short, my father and I are interested in building an extremely small gaming PC using an Mini ITX board that supports PCI-e. Now, it would be the better if it supported PCI-e 2.0 since so SLI option is possible, and we would need every drip of juice out of the card we choose. I had in mind the 9800GT SFF (low profile - new egg has them.)

Can anyone here give us any advice on a decent board. It would the world if it supported OC'ing, but I highly doubt that, and I'm not interested anyway, as we will using an e8400. (or a E5200 if a decent OC'ing board is found.) I've found one that supported the E8400, but it had no PCI-e X16 or 2.0 port. Then I found another that supported X16, but only supported Nano CPU's. Any help is appreciated.

 

[o1die]

Go for the zotac GF 9300 G-E for $139.99 before $15 rebate at newegg. It has a pci-e slot, hdmi port, and 2 ddr2 slots. These boards aren't designed for overclocking, so don't even think about it. The e8400 is plenty fast at stock with a decent video card.

 

[godbrother]

Go for the zotac GF 9300 G-E for $139.99 before $15 rebate at newegg. It has a pci-e slot, hdmi port, and 2 ddr2 slots. These boards aren't designed for overclocking, so don't even think about it. The e8400 is plenty fast at stock with a decent video card.

Wow, look what I found:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813136073

Any ideas if this is any good? If it is, then we might go for a i5 after all. (good for OC'ing?)

 

[o1die]

DFI makes good boards; go with the corsair xms3 1600 ddr3 2x2gb for $95 at newegg. If you want to check the bios settings for overclocking, download the manual off DFI's website before ordering. Look for memory and cpu voltage, and memory ratios. I doubt you will find many overclocking settings, but if any brand has them, DFI is the best for bios options.

 

[godbrother]

DFI makes good boards; go with the corsair xms3 1600 ddr3 2x2gb for $95 at newegg. If you want to check the bios settings for overclocking, download the manual off DFI's website before ordering. Look for memory and cpu voltage, and memory ratios. I doubt you will find many overclocking settings, but if any brand has them, DFI is the best for bios options.

It is strange, becuase I've never heard of DFI. I thought seen as its so-so cheap for an i7 CPU board, that it would be simply better getting this... Instead of a LGA775 board.

Will this board support the 920? They seem to be the best sellers for i7.

 

[o1die]

No. The 920 is socket 1366 and runs at 130 watts. If you want to use one, go with a micro atx board and case. But the i5 is more than adequate for gaming. Whatever you use, you must have a good power supply for your video card. Anything faster than the 4670 chipset will require more than 300 watts. I found a beautiful htpc atx case for only $30 on craigslist. It's a glossy black finish and will fit in most cabinets, and takes any atx power supply. It also came with a 120mm fan. It would be a good choice for any core i7 just for the heat issue.