[SOORENA]

I was wondering which of these motherboards were the best. They all have the same price i just wanna see which one to get.

Mach Speed Matrix P4M800 Via Socket 478 MicroATX Motherboard
or
Asus P5VDC-MX Via Socket 775 MicroATX Motherboard
or
Asus P4V8X-MX Via Socket 478 MicroATX Motherboard
or
MSI PM8M-V Via Socket 478 MicroATX Motherboard

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I take it you are not planning to go with the newest fast graphics cards. PCI-E is twice as fast as AGP8x but the cards are more expensive.

Heres my take on these.

I like the machspeed but you will have to buy a AGP video card for it. By the way most mach speed motherboards are really built by jetaway.

the Asus P5VDC-MX is a socket 775 cpu Mb. I do not like the PCI express slot on it. I see no gain over the mach speed on this one.

On the Asus P4V8X i see no real advantage over the mach speed but i would consider it equal.

Then there is the MSI PM8M-V. I like the layout better on this board for the usb headers. It still is just equal to the mach speed.

My personal preference would be for a name brand like the MSI. I generally stay away from the asus boards simply because i have had some problems with a few of them. My other personal preference is to use intel chipsets with intel processors. I have the least amount of problems building puters this way. I am not saying that VIA chipsets are not as good. I build high end puters mostly and the intel boards are nearer to the cutting edge than VIA boards.

SRX660

[SRX660]

I take it you are not planning to go with the newest fast graphics cards. PCI-E is twice as fast as AGP8x but the cards are more expensive.

Heres my take on these.

I like the machspeed but you will have to buy a AGP video card for it. By the way most mach speed motherboards are really built by jetaway.

the Asus P5VDC-MX is a socket 775 cpu Mb. I do not like the PCI express slot on it. I see no gain over the mach speed on this one.

On the Asus P4V8X i see no real advantage over the mach speed but i would consider it equal.

Then there is the MSI PM8M-V. I like the layout better on this board for the usb headers. It still is just equal to the mach speed.

My personal preference would be for a name brand like the MSI. I generally stay away from the asus boards simply because i have had some problems with a few of them. My other personal preference is to use intel chipsets with intel processors. I have the least amount of problems building puters this way. I am not saying that VIA chipsets are not as good. I build high end puters mostly and the intel boards are nearer to the cutting edge than VIA boards.

SRX660

[Mr.Chow]

What do you use your computer for ?

This can make a diffrence in the type of options that you will want on it.

[The_Shadow_630]

I can personally vouch for the MSI board. I have one by MSI that is very similar to that one and it has worked fantastically for me. I friend recommended MSI to me a while back so that is the one I went with and I am very happy that I did. It was easy to install, simple drivers, simple hook-up and everything. My only complaint is the placement of the 3.5 floppy connection on the board, but they gave me a longer cable for it. It just makes it more difficult to work with is all. Other than that, MSI is a board that I will stand behind, unless, like many corporations, they decide to start cutting corners. They are not yet though.

[SOORENA]

What do you use your computer for ?

This can make a diffrence in the type of options that you will want on it.

Im trying to make a computer that can handle most games, but i don't want it to be the best i just want one that works with me.

[The_Shadow_630]

mine is presently handling Doom3 pretty smoothly at higher display settings. I did have to go get a video card. Low budget so I went for the nVidia GeForce FX 5500. It does well, I am happy with it. I do not know how advanced of games you are wanting to get into, but I know that this one performs well under the load of Doom 3.

[warriorscot]

I would get an AMD system then rather than an intel as AMD is cheaper and they are better at games.

Als SRX AGP cards at least here cost more than the PCI-E counterparts most of the time.

[SOORENA]

Is this any good?

Gigabyte K8NE NVIDIA Socket 754 ATX Motherboard and an AMD Athlon 64 3400+ 2.40GHz OEM Processor

[SRX660]

Warriorscot, the 775 PCI-E Asus motherboard had only a 1x PCI-E slot and no other's. I would prefer a 16X PCI-E slot if i needed to buy a motherboard. I also cannot recommend Asus motherboards because of having problems with them lately. All the other boards she mentioned were AGP motherboards so i assumed that was what she wanted. The PCI-E and AGP cards are equal in price here in the states. The nvidia 6800 PCI-E cards are slightly lower in price than agp cards. So far i can only find one 1x PCI-e card and its a $399 quadro.

As for Amd vs Intel i really dont have a choice here. Both are good and the intels do run cooler than the AMD's. I have not built a amd puter with the latest processors even tho i hear they are running cooler now. Again i took her message at face value thinking she prefered the intel processors since all of them were for intel processors. I also had a thought that she was just replacing the motherboard and processor and wanted to reuse the memory, HD, drives, etc from a computer she was upgrading.

With limited information on the type of computer she wants to build and what else she is using i can only try to give my advice on the info that is given.

Soorena, i have always liked Gigabyte boards. I have two of them here right now. The K8NE looks like a good gaming board with lots of options there. Tiger direct usually has some good prices on kits and MB combos. They have this combo for $219. Otherwise i prefer using newegg for parts when possible. You will have to buy a PCI-E card as there is no onboard video. You can add another $150 for a good video card for this motherboard. Sometimes it nice to have onboard hardware if you really can't afford all the good parts at one time.

SRX660

[The_Shadow_630]

ok, that is a little confusing, I was always told that the AMD processors run cooler than the Intel processors. I do not have experience with the AMD, but that is what I was told.

[warriorscot]

Yeah they are amuch much cooler, not sure what SRX is smokin or it was a really really long time ago he used an AMD cpu but they can be as much as 20 degrees cooler than the intel equivalent.

[The Colonel]

I agree with Warrior as well. I would typically go with MSI or ASUS if you need an Intel board, but if you are building a Small Form Factor PC you may want to go with AMD. They are cooler and the HSFs that come with them are usually better than the HSFs I have recieved with Intel CPUs. I would personally recommend MSI, as I have not had any problems with boards from them. Back to the Intel/AMD argument, AMD is usually much cheaper than the Intel equivalent.

[SOORENA]

Warriorscot, the 775 PCI-E Asus motherboard had only a 1x PCI-E slot and no other's. I would prefer a 16X PCI-E slot if i needed to buy a motherboard. I also cannot recommend Asus motherboards because of having problems with them lately. All the other boards "she" mentioned

srry but im not a girl cause its not really pronounced as its written

i found this on tiger direct heres a link tell me if its worth it:

tiger direct

heres the motherboard and cpu page

main page

if its not good please tell me which is worth getting because i have an intel and i can't upgrade the graphics card and its really bugging me.

Edited by SOORENA, 24 March 2006 - 05:46 PM.

[warriorscot]

You want a minimum set up like mine, a 939 nforce 4 with a athlon 64 venice core, thats the best budget setup for performance users, then you just add on the cpu speeds as you see how much cash you have.

[The_Shadow_630]

I am totally with colonel here. About the HSF, if you get an Intel processor, I would buy another HSF. The stock ones are not that great. If you get another one, you can get an Intel HSF, just get one that is rated higher than you really need for your processor. The other obvious option is to just get a good HSF.