Sign in with
Sign up | Sign in

Reply to this thread

Solved Forum question

Started by Dutchoperative | | 9 answers
Need some help finding an affordable motherboard AM3+ that is crossfire compatible. Any suggestions?
I am planning on building a budget gaming pc using an AMD FX 6300 CPU, 8GB of RAM (would like to have a motherboard that allowed for upgrades), and a Raedon R9 2____ graphics card. I ideally would like to have my motherboard crossfire compatible to allow for the use of an additional graphics card. Any suggestions?
  • By posting on this site, I confirm I am over 13 years of age and agree to abide by the site’s rules.

a b V Motherboard
a b U Graphics card
September 9, 2014 9:32:30 PM

Dutchoperative said:
Okay, gotcha. I have been racking my brain for a while trying to determine the best course of action. I really appreciate the advice. You've made this overwhelming process exponentially easier.


Well if you ever need any more assistance you either message me or post some more forum questions. Good luck.
September 9, 2014 9:27:34 PM

Okay, gotcha. I have been racking my brain for a while trying to determine the best course of action. I really appreciate the advice. You've made this overwhelming process exponentially easier.
a b V Motherboard
a b U Graphics card
September 9, 2014 9:13:51 PM

People will debate back and forth between using two mid range cards in SLI/Crossfire vs a single more powerful GPU by itself. It really depends on your particular situation. If you are going with AMD GPUs, then you need to understand that they typically use more power and run hotter than similar Nvidia ones. So you will need a pretty beefy power supply and good cooling for running Crossfire. Also, while there are many games that do use Crossfire, not all do, and even if a game does the optimization may not be as good as it should be.

If you get a single more powerful GPU you can always add another one later on...while if you go for two GPUs in Crossfire, even if you could add a third GPU there would not really be a point to it.
September 9, 2014 9:07:25 PM

Thanks, it has been overwhelming trying to find a motherboard that covers all the bases. By the way do you have any experience with the R9 2___ series? I'm aware that they are far from being the best GPU option out there but from what I have ascertained they seem to be the most bang for your buck under $200. Also, how does using two cheaper graphics cards (ex. 2 X r9 270x's) through Crossfire compare to using a high end card? I'm am transitioning from console gaming to PC gaming and have no real experience with graphics cards. Thanks in advanced.
a b V Motherboard
a b U Graphics card
September 9, 2014 8:39:23 PM

The Biostar TA970 only has x4 on the second PCI-E slot. It'll Crossfire, but is not as a good choice compared to a 970 board that can do x16/x8 (I actually own one - its fine otherwise).

Best solution chosen by Dutchoperative

a b V Motherboard
a b U Graphics card
September 9, 2014 8:04:14 PM

Yes the Extreme 4 would be worth it if you want to use NVidia GPUs in the future in SLI. The board also has more SATA III ports (one more i think). Regarding Biostar, I don't know much about them, it just seems like one of those random cheaper alternative motherboards from what I have seen.
September 9, 2014 7:54:59 PM

So is it worth going for the ASRock 970 EXTREME4 over the ASRock 970 EXTREME3? From what I could tell the primary difference is that the EXTREME4 allows for multiple Nvidia GPU's. Is that correct? Also is BIOSTAR a comparable brand? Thanks for the help by the way.
a b V Motherboard
a b U Graphics card
September 9, 2014 7:12:04 PM

Depending on what GPUs you decide to buy, this is a great PCIe x16,x16 SLI/CF compatible mobo, that also is really good for CPU OC'ing. If you're just getting lower-end R9 cards like the 270 or 270x, x8,x8 CF should be enough for the card's bandwidth.
Here's the higher end Gigabyte one:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...
and lower end ones:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E168...

See all answers