MB Recommendation/Guidance

[mah56j]

I must replace my recently deceased ASUS P5GC-MX-1333 MB. It met my needs just fine.

This is a home office setting, using Office 2007 apps, Firefox, several specialty software app's--stock charts and such. No video feeds, photoshopping or gaming.

I'd prefer to re-use my Pentium dual-core 2.0 CPU and 2G DDR2 RAM stick.

Right now I'm on XP Pro but will upgrade to Windows 7x64 in the next 6 months or so.

I find a bewildering array of ASUS Socket 775 boards on ebay ranging from $40 to $250. (I'm not wed to ASUS by the way; this board is only 2 yrs old.)

Two main questions:
How much should I spend?
Which manufacturer is generally most reliable?

Thank you for any insights.

 

[r_manic]

If you're going to spend more than $200, I would suggest simply saving for an entirely new setup. The December 2009 system builder's marathon for instance, featured a pretty versatile $700 build.

As for your second question, from what I've seen here people have been satisfied for Asus, Gigabyte, and EVGA. Sorry for the non-specifics, but hopefully this helps you out!

 

[mah56j]

Thanks, rmanic.
Based on other input and looking around I did buy a $65 Asus MB similar to the dead one. that will get me going again. agree that down the road a bit its time to upgrade.