Suggestions for a 754 PCI-E ATX Motherboard

quadnad

Supreme [H]ardness
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Alright guys, I'm looking for an ATX socket 754 PCI-E motherboard to breathe some new life into my system. I'm going to be ditching my 6800GT AGP card and picking up a 7900GT, so that means PCI-E is in my future!

So, I've looked at quite possibly every motherboard under the sun, but none of them have really gotten me excited. Here is the list I've been sorting through, and I haven't been able to make a choice. The processor I'm using is a clawhammer core 3700+, so overclocking prowess isn't exactly top choice, so what I'd like is a fast and stable board that won't put up a fight. The MSI is one of my top ideas, as well as this ABIT, but this DFI which was my original top contender is supposedly riddled with little issues.

Suggest away!
 
Do you require a full atx board? If not, the Biostar TForce is also an excellent choice.
 
Nuc_E said:
Do you require a full atx board? If not, the Biostar TForce is also an excellent choice.

Yeah, sorry I really don't want to get a mATX board because of the lesser number of....well all the features.
 
If you are interested in SLI at all, you should give the Epox 754 board a look. It a decent overclocker and cheap to boot.
 
no contest.epox 754 nf4 sli board.o/clocks well.use sli or not.only board out there like it.it sells for about 90.00 bucks.it would be my choise without a doubt....
 
wesleys_dad said:
no contest.epox 754 nf4 sli board.o/clocks well.use sli or not.only board out there like it.it sells for about 90.00 bucks.it would be my choise without a doubt....
Zoogle said:
If you are interested in SLI at all, you should give the Epox 754 board a look. It a decent overclocker and cheap to boot.

really? although I'm not particularily interested in SLI (I'd have to buy another PSU, and the entire reason I'm just buying a new mobo+vid card is because I don't want to shell out any more money for AM2 or 939), I'll take a look at it. How is Epox quality?
This is the Epox you're both talking about, but if I'd like more PCI/PCI-E slots and no SLI how is this board? It's less expensive...
 
quadnad said:
really? although I'm not particularily interested in SLI (I'd have to buy another PSU, and the entire reason I'm just buying a new mobo+vid card is because I don't want to shell out any more money for AM2 or 939), I'll take a look at it. How is Epox quality?
This is the Epox you're both talking about, but if I'd like more PCI/PCI-E slots and no SLI how is this board? It's less expensive...
Yes, thats the board EPox we were talking about. I can vouch for it being an awsome board, I'm running one right now.

With that other one you gain one standard PCI slot, and lose the ability to go SLI later...are you realy going to need 3 PCI slots?

About your PSU issue. Make sure your current PSU actualy has a 24pin power connector, and a square 4pin power connector. If you dont, you might need a new PSU anyway, or at the very least some adaptors to make your current one work.
 
Unknown-One said:
Yes, thats the board EPox we were talking about. I can vouch for it being an awsome board, I'm running one right now.

With that other one you gain one standard PCI slot, and lose the ability to go SLI later...are you realy going to need 3 PCI slots?

About your PSU issue. Make sure your current PSU actualy has a 24pin power connector, and a square 4pin power connector. If you dont, you might need a new PSU anyway, or at the very least some adaptors to make your current one work.

Although I'm sure the SLI motherboard is a great one, I'm not going to be going SLI on this system. The entire purpose of my 754 upgrade is to make an inexpensive move to PCI-E, and making it a dual 7900GT system wouldn't make sense in terms of budget. My PSU is up to the task for the new motherboard, and that'd have to be another $85 to pick up a decent SLI PSU. If I were thinking about going that far, I'm not sure sticking with 754 would even make sense. So yeah, I'd much prefer to go for a non-sli motherboard for this.


As of now, I'm leaning towards the ABIT NV8 because of both it's feature set, and standard size (I'd like a reassurance that my Ninja will have no problem clearing capacitors, and ABIT tech support already told me the measurements). Why are a lot of these motherboards smaller?

Any reasons I shouldn't go for the NV8? If that SLI Epox board is worth it even without SLI in the picture, perhaps I'll go with it because of it's great reviews. Will a ninja fit on that board?
 
I've had good luck with Gigabyte boards. Here's their solution:

http://www.giga-byte.com/Products/M...rview.aspx?ProductID=1958&ProductName=GA-K8NE

I think a lot of people run into problems when their memory timings aren't properly matched up to their boards. Some boards don't properly recognize the settings programmed into the SPD in some memory modules. If you can get up and running and then use A64 Tweaker to display your timings then it's easy to see if something is out to lunch.

If you tweak these settings and play around with DDR voltage, etc. you should be able to get things 100% stable. Whatever board you choose, read as many reviews as you can about what memory works with that board.
 
Seeing as you are currently using a Gigabyte K8NS Pro w/ an nForce3 chipset, any of the nForce4 boards would be a nice improvement. I suggested the SLI board originally because you might be able to extend the life of your system later on w/ a simple addition of another 7900gt. As an example, you can easily find some people selling their once toppish end 7800gt's pretty cheaply on ebay. I can vouch for Epox's stability as I used to own their 8RDA board for socket A's. Just sayin that you prolly weren't gonna use the 3 pci slots anyway (sound card, tv tuner card). Use a USB wireless adapter if needed.

EDIT: to answer your question about the clearance. It would seem from the pictures that the area around the cpu is pretty clear. Ninja should fit fine.
 
Zoogle said:
Seeing as you are currently using a Gigabyte K8NS Pro w/ an nForce3 chipset, any of the nForce4 boards would be a nice improvement. I suggested the SLI board originally because you might be able to extend the life of your system later on w/ a simple addition of another 7900gt. As an example, you can easily find some people selling their once toppish end 7800gt's pretty cheaply on ebay. I can vouch for Epox's stability as I used to own their 8RDA board for socket A's. Just sayin that you prolly weren't gonna use the 3 pci slots anyway (sound card, tv tuner card). Use a USB wireless adapter if needed.

EDIT: to answer your question about the clearance. It would seem from the pictures that the area around the cpu is pretty clear. Ninja should fit fine.

Yeah, I understand what you mean, but I doubt this system will be worth slapping another 7900GT into, as it'll require another $85 or so pushed into the PSU. My plan is really to use this system with the 7900GT until I'm out of college (next year), get settled with a job, and then sell this and build a new system. Beyond this upgrade, I'm basically looking at a new rig entirely. It's good to know that they've got good stability, as that standard 1xPCI-e Epox is looking pretty good. TBH, I'm torn between that and the NV8. I've pm'd some people about their experiences with that NV8, but I don't seem to know anyone who has that Epox board.

@unclewebb: The DFI was originally on my list of motherboards to consider, but because of their renowned pickyness with just about everything from memory to PSUs, as well as many having faulty thermal diodes, I scratched it off my list. The Gigabyte motherboard was another possibility, but I laughed when I read that quite a few people were having issues using two sticks of RAM. My current GA-K8NS Pro has those spastic issues...

Also, I just want to mention that I truly appreciate people taking the time to give me your input. Thanks so much, and keep it coming!
 
quadnad said:
Yeah, sorry I really don't want to get a mATX board because of the lesser number of....well all the features.

That's crap i'm afraid. mATX boards are now extremely well featured packed and the new GeForce 6100 based boards generally have atleast 2 SATA300 ports, 1 PCI-E 16x, 1 PCI-E 1x and 2 PCI plus 5.1 audio and mostly 100MB network. They overclock extremely well and imo are just as good as their full sized cousins.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813186056

Foxconn make great boards and would be in my shortlist.
 
Firelord said:
That's crap i'm afraid. mATX boards are now extremely well featured packed and the new GeForce 6100 based boards generally have atleast 2 SATA300 ports, 1 PCI-E 16x, 1 PCI-E 1x and 2 PCI plus 5.1 audio and mostly 100MB network. They overclock extremely well and imo are just as good as their full sized cousins.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813186056

Foxconn make great boards and would be in my shortlist.

So it's got room for two SATA HDs (which I'll have filled), 1 fewer PCI slot, and two fewer USB ports. That means I'll have to switch (behind my computer mind you) between my printer, wheel, game controller, ipod charger/connector, mouse, and mic. I'll also have already filled both PCI slots and SATA ports. mATX boards with onboard vid are fantastic if you're building SFF, don't need the extra features, or are looking for great bang v buck for a budget build.

I on the other hand do need these kinds of features.
 
That board I pointed to is a ATX board and does have the required USB etc but still don't get your argument about USB ports cos the backplane of my mATX board has the same number of USB ports as a ATX board and capacity for 4 front mounted USB ports plus firewire AND audio.... So really your arguments don't add up i'm afraid.

Whilst i'm not pushing you too go mATX as thats not my place too, i'm just fed up of people assuming that mATX means less features. The mATX boards I have used have the same features as nearly every ATX board I have used. Geez you can even get a SLi mATX board! If you need more USB ports stick a hub in! Lets be honest how many people use all the expansion slots?
 
I would go with either a Biostar T-force or Biostar regular S754 ATX PCB (red). Biostar is very reliable and easy to set up and tweakable.
 
Firelord said:
That board I pointed to is a ATX board and does have the required USB etc but still don't get your argument about USB ports cos the backplane of my mATX board has the same number of USB ports as a ATX board and capacity for 4 front mounted USB ports plus firewire AND audio.... So really your arguments don't add up i'm afraid.

Whilst i'm not pushing you too go mATX as thats not my place too, i'm just fed up of people assuming that mATX means less features. The mATX boards I have used have the same features as nearly every ATX board I have used. Geez you can even get a SLi mATX board! If you need more USB ports stick a hub in! Lets be honest how many people use all the expansion slots?

I wasn't referring to the Foxconn board.

Alright, I'm not really sure why you're getting so worked about about mATX boards and why I'm not interested, but according to the specs on the newegg site, it's got a total of 4 usb ports. Maybe thats incorrect, but if it is correct why should I either deal with buying a USB 2.0 hub or switch my components around when I can just have them all plugged in at once? Why should I deal with having no HD expandibility unless I buy either IDE or a PCI SATA controller? Oh, and I wouldn't be able to use the SATA controller because I'd have no spare PCI slots! Who needs the expansion slots? I do.

and yes, I know about mATX SLI motherboards, and I'm not saying that all mATX boards are lacking in features, but the ones that meet the criteria of 754/PCI-E are lacking.
 
zone_86 said:
I would go with either a Biostar T-force or Biostar regular S754 ATX PCB (red). Biostar is very reliable and easy to set up and tweakable.

I'm going to have a look at that Biostar ATX motherboard. I used to have a Biostar back in the T-Bird days...didn't fail on me ever!

EDIT: Is this the board you were referring to? I'm not sure how I missed it the first run through. I think I'll do some googling for some reviews.

EDIT EDIT: I can never seem to find many worthwhile reviews of these boards... :(
 
I'd avoid the GA-K8NE. Mine went kablooey after only a few months, and it wasn't very good of an overclocker. I wasn't able to reach as high of a FSB with it as I was with my Epox NF3 board.

Stick with the DFI, Epox, or MSI offerings.
 
In the end I've decided to go with that NV8 because of it's features and reviews. Thanks again to all that helped.
 
quadnad said:
I'm going to have a look at that Biostar ATX motherboard. I used to have a Biostar back in the T-Bird days...didn't fail on me ever!
EDIT: Is this the board you were referring to? I'm not sure how I missed it the first run through. I think I'll do some googling for some reviews.EDIT EDIT: I can never seem to find many worthwhile reviews of these boards... :(

Yeah that's the one, but good lcuk with your VIA solution i'm sure you'll be fine.
 
zone_86 said:
Yeah that's the one, but good lcuk with your VIA solution i'm sure you'll be fine.

VIA? It's using the Nforce 4 chipset...
 
I probably would have gone with the Abit NV8 myself. I've had mixed success with Epox.
 
kirbyrj said:
I probably would have gone with the Abit NV8 myself. I've had mixed success with Epox.

Yeah, after looking at all my options the Abit made the most sense. Glad to hear someone agrees with me :D
 
quadnad said:
VIA? It's using the Nforce 4 chipset...



lmao you're right i just checked it at newegg. They already has the NF8 (abit) on the AGP variant - you would think the NFV monkier would be for a VIA board.
 
Good god...I just took a look at the NV8, why on earth do you need 3 PCIe 1X slots??? Considering that there are so few cards out that actually use the interface, this isn't much better than a mATX board in terms of the number of PCI slots. Oh well...be happy :). hehe
 
Zoogle said:
Good god...I just took a look at the NV8, why on earth do you need 3 PCIe 1X slots??? Considering that there are so few cards out that actually use the interface, this isn't much better than a mATX board in terms of the number of PCI slots. Oh well...be happy :). hehe

Considering the piece of mind I have going with a big name like Abit and the positive reviews I could find, I feel like it was the right choice on all accounts. After having installed it and been using it for the past few days, I can confirm that this is an excellent board.

Although I agree with you about the PCI-E 1x slots, I don't think that it makes sense to switch to a mATX board that I'll have filled both the PCI and SATA slots/ports on the day I get it. Where's the expandibility?

All in all, I'd wholeheartedly recommend the Abit motherboard to anyone who needs a 754 pci-e motherboard.
 
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