If you like the rainbow GB, you've ever seen DFI lanParty boards under UV? I always thought that the only appropriate garment with equipment like that would be a messed neon green top
If you like the rainbow GB, you've ever seen DFI lanParty boards under UV? I always thought that the only appropriate garment with equipment like that would be a messed neon green top
The Asus board in my profile (P5QPro) has been going 24/7 for almost 7 years now, except for an hour or so downtime to upgrade from a core2duo to a core2quad. I bought it initially as it was recommended as an OC monster, and I wasn't concerned with SLI. Never used the OC capabilities, but it has been rock solid since day 1.
Doesn't mean that the board I might buy new tomorrow will be anywhere near as good, but it does mean Asus will get the first look.
I've had 2 Foxconn branded boards in the past, and they both died horrible deaths - the smell of popping caps is not a good thing. Won't go in that direction again, for any number of reasons. Other than that, it's been a couple of Gigabyte boards, which were acceptable, in that they worked, but weren't anything special.
Providing support for various products inc mobo/GPU/LCD etc did give me a great insight into people's belief in one or two experiences being predictive across an entire company portfolio.
For the record, I'd strongly advise looking carefully at the warranty experiences (note, not terms) and let that lead you.
For instance, it's ridiculously easy to damage pins on Intel boards (especially the LGA 2011). I've been through a stock room before to get a board, and found 3 in a row all with pin damage. At ASUS, I saw several customers have theirs fixed FOC, even though they had damaged them.
Similarly, when my Corsair AX PSU broke, despite the repair centre being in the Netherlands, they agreed to pay all my postage costs which means I'd go back to them again.
My last 2 PCs were built with Asus boards; this current PC is 8 years old this month and is still OK.
A PC that I built with an Asrock board in 2008 is still going - surprising really, as that chap's house would clog up filters etc. in a year at most.
Gone off Asus now as the warranty is only 12 months; it was 36 months when I last used one.
PeterC
Political lubricant:
Rocket WMD45
I have an Abit one in an old PC (still used every day) which is about 10 years old now. I stuck a SATA3 card in it and an SSD. Still going strong
But these days I always go with Gigabyte for my gaming system.
They generally make server grade boards, I believe they are much loved by people running stuff like FreeNAS. I think I have one in the garage somewhere, but you wouldn't want to use it in a gaming rig, the integrated lights out stuff, POST that takes forever, all good in an enterprise server are pretty annoying.
Stumbled across this thread while researching for a new Skylake build, and saw this :
An updated report says ASUS now has the lower RMA rate, but we're talking numbers between 2.5-3% for the 4 manufacturers listed, so not much variation:
http://www.hardware.fr/articles/934-2/cartes-meres.html (suggest using Google Translate unless you're French is much better than mine!)
I'll stick with ASUS this time, but it's probably more brand loyalty than a belief in these stats.
Asus seem pretty solid; I remember getting fairly clueless support from Gigabyte on an early dual Opteron board, but that was a while ago, I got the impression they were generally better than that.
From my experience I would say Gigabyte over MSI.
My Gigabyte Z68 has long outlasted my MSI Z87 which died last week..
My vote would be Asus.
My Q6600 / P5K has been OC'd practically since day 1 and still going strong after 7-8yrs IIRC. It's clocked up so many hrs of use/stress testing that's it's amazed. Over the years it's had bits like RAM/GPU/storage upgrades and never had any bios/driver/hardware compatibility issues with it.
Latest rig is also Asus just due to a) how much I liked the P5K b) had features / layout I wanted
I have owned Abit, DFI, Gigabyte and Supermicro (IIRC) also over the years with other CPUs and the Asus P5K has been the best over those IMO.
Built PCs for friends & family and used above mentioned manufacturers plus Asrock, Biostar & MSI. Never had a DOA on any of them, can't ever recall RMA'ing any either.
SO generally speaking I'd say mobo QA seems good from most manufacturers from what I experienced.
i5 4690K @ 4.9GHz CPU@1.255v 4.4GHz Cache@1.10v - Archon SB-E X2 - Asus Maximus VII Ranger
Kingston HyperX Savage 16GB@2400MHz 1T - Sapphire R9 Fury X (1145/545 Custom ROM, ~17.7K 3DM FS)
Samsung 840 Evo 250GB - Cooler Master V850
R7 1700@3.8GHz - Archon IB-E X2 - Asus Crosshair VI Hero - G.Skill Trident Z 3200MHz C14 - Sapphire Fury X (1145/545 Custom ROM, ~17.2K 3DM FS)
Samsung 840 Evo 250GB - Cooler Master V850
Unless the quality bof Asus motherboards has deteriorated rapidly, I'd say that they'd be my best bet, as I even had one somehow survive the PSU it was attached to 'exploding' with no noticeable damage at all, by comparison I also had a friend who had an Asrock have a similar thing happen and theirs was completely fried along with their CPU D:
I'd have to echo the Asus vote. Their BIOS software is very intuitive, and it makes overclocking a breeze even for the novices.
gigabyte, dual bios is good, for when your heating breaks and the PCB reaches -20c, nearly all flash drives will be wiped clean
I've had failures with a number of manufacturers over the years but it doesn't put me off the brand, I would still consider them reliable overall. I think in general a lot of people are quick to say, "oh I've had 1 failure I'll never buy from them again" but that mentality is not restricted to computing. There are a lot of reliable motherboard brands today that the buying focus can be on features over reliability. The days of bad caps and melting coils are largely over.
My top 3 today in no particular order are Gigabyte, ASUS, ASRock, I would then consider MSI and EVGA especially if I felt the others were not able to provide the features required.
I'd second that top three - although in my case I'd order them as Asus, Gigabyte and ASRock. MSI would be fourth, but only because I've not much experience of their motherboards.
I guess, like most things these days, you pretty much get what you pay for - e.g. Cat persuaded me to upgrade from an AM3 "Deluxe" Asus board to the equivalent Sabretooth and he was 100% correct - that Sabre is pretty darn good.
There are currently 1 users browsing this thread. (0 members and 1 guests)