Why Full ATX instead of Micro ATX

mahidoes

Honorable
Jun 14, 2012
94
0
10,630
What is the advantage of using a Full ATX board when you don't have any much peripheral cards to be installed? there are lot of high end micro atx boards which support Muti GPU and all other high end feature but of course it doesn't have more pci/e slots. For my builds i only need the pci-e 16x graphic slot. So i'm always with micro ATX. It also allow more room in the casing. I like it that way. But yesterday i saw the Toms hard ware builds from the below link

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/pc-gaming-overclock-build-a-pc,3443.html

Why would they always use the Full ATX even for a build under 600$?
I know it is not a expensive motherboard but why Full ATX? By using micro ATX am i missing some thing? Or Full ATX good with cable management?
 

g-unit1111

Titan
Moderator
I have a couple of theories behind my logic to picking full ATX boards.

1. I keep saying this a lot but there's no accurate way to truly future proof a rig. The only way to do so is to not limit your expansion options. You want to plan so that way you're running the latest peripherals and the latest GPUs without adding more to what you already have. An mATX motherboard prohibits this because in order to conserve space the manufacturers will cut back on the RAM slots and SATA ports. This means that if you want to add more drives or anything else later on then you will be SOL if you use all your ports initially. The only way to ensure longevity is to not limit your PC in terms of what it can do now vs. planning for the future.

2. Space. If you want to run a single GPU now and then add one in later, on mATX boards that will be a really tight fit. On a full ATX board you won't have that space constraint.

3. B75. B75 is great for mATX and mITX builds. But on a full desktop build it will have outdated ports like parallel and serial that you will never use. Not to mention these ports are a major hassle to get working as they're not true plug and play like USB is.