Look, we know you've got choices, and when it comes to
motherboards, you've got options galore. If you've been eying a new Core i5 or Core i7 rig to replace that aging
Pentium 4 486 system of yours, but aren't quite feeling the pre-fabricated thing, a whole slew of mobo makers have pushed through new boards to support Intel's
P55 Express chipset. The gurus over at
Hot Hardware -- gluttons for pain no like other, it seems -- rounded up mainboards from ASUS, EVGA, Gigabyte, Intel and MSI in order to see which ruled the roost, and more importantly, which was right for you. Options ranging from $140 to $340 were taken into account, and while the top-end EVGA P55 Classified obviously performed well under pressure, just about every single contender had a little something special to offer. There's no cut and dry "winner" when it comes to something like this, only detailed explanations as to which board suits what kind of buyer. Tired of paging through Froogle without actually knowing what you're looking for? Tap that source link and get some enlightenment.
posted April 3rd 2010 4:11AM
Good article. I've been using Asus for the past 6-8 years but am getting tired of thier subpar driver distribution/website access. I also don't think their new boards seem to be as well built as they used to be. I was thinking of trying Gigabyte next but maybe EVGA is worth a try as well. I did run a MSI/Microstar board at one time and would use them again... Though it wasn't the best made, it never failed me. Looks like they are moving up in the world. This makes me want to build a new computer!
@RastaD
BTW, If anyone is wanting to try building a PC, Toms Hardware, Anandtech and Sharky Extreme (for build sugestions at least) are some decent places to gather some info. It's easier than you might think.