What motherboard should I get?

[thecolorcute]

I plan on upgrading my motherboard to one that supports CFX. My current motherboard only has one PCI-E 2.0 x16 slot and one x4 slot and I've heard that putting a second card in the x4 slot would degrade its performance by a fair margin. I've narrowed in down to a few choice. They are:

MSI 790FX-GD70 - ~$168 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130223&Tpk=MSI%20790FX-GD70
Gigabyte GA-790FXTA-UD5 - ~$185 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128415
Asus M4A79XTD EVO - ~$120 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131402&cm_re=Asus_M4A79XTD_EVO-_-13-131-402-_-Product
DFI LANParty DK 790FXB-M3H5 - ~$140 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813136067

My current specs are:

My current specs are:
AMD Phenom II 965 BE
8GB G.SKILL DDR2 800 RAM
Intel X25M 80GB SSD
WD 650GB 7200RPM HDD
GIGABYTE GA-MA785G-UD3H
Corsair 750W PSU - (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817139006&cm_re=Corsair_750W_PSU-_-17-139-006-_-Product)
XFX ATI RADEON HD 5870 1GB (second one is coming in on Monday)
Windows 7 64-bit Home Premium
Cooler Master Cosmos 1000 Case

I would have to upgrade my RAM to DDR3 (I was thinking about a 8GB set of Corsair Dominator DDR3 1333).
Anyway, what would you recommend for the motherboard? They all have their strong points and they have all gotten good reviews. Has anybody ever used any of these motherboards before? If so, what was/is your experience with it/them?

Thanks in advance!

 

[p1n3apqlexpr3ss]

Looking at specs i would recommend the MSI board, has 4 pcie16 slots, has higher clocked ram support and some other less important things, the only real thing the gigabyte has going for it is questionably better quality/reliability and the fact it is a bit future proofed with sata3/usb3 ports

EDIT: the msi is a bit cheaper and it comes with lots more extra good stuff
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ImageGallery.aspx?CurImage=13-130-223-S04&ISList=13-130-223-S01,13-130-223-S02,13-130-223-S04,13-130-223-S03,13-130-223-S05&S7ImageFlag=1&Item=N82E16813130223&Depa=0&WaterMark=1&Description=MSI%20790FX-GD70%20AM3%20AMD%20790FX%20ATX%20AMD%20Motherboard
VS
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ImageGallery.aspx?CurImage=13-128-415-Z03&SpinSet=13-128-415-RS&ISList=13-128-415-Z01,13-128-415-Z02,13-128-415-Z03,13-128-415-Z04,13-128-415-Z05&S7ImageFlag=1&Item=N82E16813128415&Depa=0&WaterMark=1&Description=GIGABYTE%20GA-790FXTA-UD5%20AM3%20AMD%20790FX%20SATA%206Gb/s%20USB%203.0%20ATX%20AMD%20Motherboard

 

[chip monkey]

My colleague got the MSI and is very happy with it.
I've bought the DFI and am currently waiting for the fourth warranty replacement. 'nough said about that.

 

[thecolorcute]

I got the MSI (twice) and it caught fire on me (twice). That may have been my fault though. I think in both cases the corners near the RAM slots was touching the side of my case (it's a steel case) and the electrical current was conducted by the case and jumped back to the motherboard resulting in a fried module which prevented the CPU fan from spinning up. I returned both the MSIs and ordered the Gigabyte and just got it today. I'll install it later tonight probably.

 

[p1n3apqlexpr3ss]

Ok, sounds good, tell us how it goes

 

[thecolorcute]

It went perfectly. Well, the first time I booted up the mobo wasn't able to detect my OS. But once I restarted it booted fine. I'm guessing it's because my SSD hadn't been registered yet.

Anyway, I installed everything. For some reason the Intel SSD Optimizer won't work -- it may be because I have the SSD plugged into a SATA 3.0 port. But I don't know. I installed my second 5870 for Crossfire. The two cards are ridiculously close together. I hope they'll be OK.