War of the Mobo's

[Austin]

Originally posted by Lexeus
the Abit has what anybody ?

Poor layout, irritating NB fan and no game port! But on the plus side it is one of the very few mobos to support/understand the 5th FID bit which allows multipliers over 12.5x and can adjust CPUs with high default multipliers too. It also is known to be the best SktA o/c'ing mobo and Abit are reknowned for very high build quality and reliability. MSI used to be known for great value, low prices, very good quality and great customer service but I think that's changed over the last few years, still a great mobo though despite that.

[Galant]

Okay, so can we simplify this? I'm still a newbie learning as fast as I can.

Will I notice any significant differences in performance or user friendliness between these three boards if I'm using it for the usual desktop stuff, possibly some video editing, RTS and FPS gaming, and some LAN gaming now and then?? (Or can I let the cheapest price rule the day?)

Other components, WD 80GB 7200 8MB, Corsair 2x256 PC3200, Radeon 9600Pro, Antec SX630II, Volcano 9 or 11, Athlon XP 2500+, etc.

[Russ]

look, no board, is gonna beat the nf7 atm unless u want onboard gfx, then i wud recomend the epox 8rga, but the nf7 is sexual

[Austin]

The best onboard desktop gfx are totally dire for 3D perf, def get a seperate gfx card plus you shoudl get 400FSB+ by avoiding IGP.

Asus A7N8X Deluxe and from what I hear the Epox equivilent are just as good as the Abit NF7-S so if you care little for tiny technical details all are very fine buys so you can just go for the cheapest one ... all 3 are excellent no doubt there. I would suggest you ensure it has MCP-T or Soundstorm for top notch onboard sound but other than that any nForce2 should be a good buy.

[TooNice]

I didn't know any motherboard had a built in game port...

Would've been nice, especially for those who do not have a sound card.
Sure there is USB, but I still have a SideWinder that uses the 15pin port..

[Anddos]

abit all the way , interesting results

[Zaphan58]

Get the abit you wont be dissapointed, the MSI may or may not be a good board I dont know but I can tell you it wont hit as high an FSB as the Abit will, and the Abit comes with the onboard soundstorm audio witch is excellent and actually comparable in sound quality to the SoundBlaster Audigy series of sound cards.

[Galant]

Erm... *cough*....what's a game port? *cough*

[mightynimrod]

Defo the Abit....or the Asus...Leadtek too.....all much better than the MSI which incidently i've used.....

[Austin]

mightynimrod what was it you didn't like about the MSI?