Which elite mobo should I pick, Asus, DFI or Abit?

What motherboard?

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Tony Williams

Weaksauce
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Aug 11, 2005
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Okay, I need a nice mobo, needs SLi and some nice features, planning on water cooling later I just need help picking it.

I get confused by people, one person says get DFI aweson O/cloker and Abit, nice features and O/clcker and same with Asus.

** In the POLL ...
 
DFI

That is if Ure prepared to readup, spend money getting quality component and finally work to get it up and running.
 
ASUS all the way, one of the easiest builds ever.
I had the ABIT AN8 Ultra and I was tearing my hair out with it, exchanged it for the ASUS and was playing within 2 hours.
 
forget the asus and DFI-- get the e-vga combo deal.

i think the egg is running it for $400 with a $40 some odd dollar MIR --so for about $360 you get a 7800gt videocard and a sli MB.

you can't beat that.

from what ive seen most NF4 mb can do 300fsb which is about all your going to be able to do with a a64 anyway..

as for the overclocking YMMV--but it is that way with asus and DFI as well.


yea i have a asus and a dfi ultra d-- if i wasn't asus and DFi poor i would get this combo instead. :cool:
 
The Abit board is pissing me off. I can't get it to run DDR500 2GB RAM kits at their rated speed. I like the AN8-SLI Fatal11ttyy (or whatever the hell it's called) but this RAM issue is killing me. I've got 512X2 DDR550 sticks that will do DDR500 in this board,but 2GB is no joy.

I've ordered a DFI, despite my better judgement.
 
i've built alot of DFI's --when there right--there wonderful--but when their a problem--a real pain in the rears problem.

but when you get one without the power regulation problem--there really good overall.

don't know much about the abits as i haven't built any of them:eek:

the asus -- i have built a number of the older a8n-sli-deluxe there good MB's if you run the latest bios i think it's 1013-02beta or somehtng like that.

i still have a revision one (Rev 1.0) --still runs well and overclocks about as high as my dfi-ultra d. i haven't had a problem with the nb fan's yet-- the new MB has heatpipes and soft-settings for the sli --so if i was looking to asus-- i would likely get the new mb --although either of the asus'es are a bit pricey still. :eek:
 
DFI only if you know what your doing. the asus has 2 big selling points, jumperless SLI and passive cooling on the chipset. Unless your looking for big overclocking numbers, the asus would serve well.
 
I was looking at water cooling in the future ... so DFI

One thing someone said jumperles Asus? ... can you extend on that please, I'd like to hear.
 
The ASUS a8n-SLI premium MB has software to enable SLI rather than a hardware device that is manually switched to enable dual videocard SLI. The northbridge is cooled by a passive radiator. ASUS makes very stable boards, but not in the same OC company as DFI, but DFI can be a challenge if you are not into OC. I have two ASUS A8N-SLI deluxe boards and love 'em. I use bios revision 11. The deluxe uses a hardware switch for SLI, very easy to use. The new NB fan runs slower,quieter and doesnt fail like its predecessor. :D
 
None of them. Except maybe the DFI... :D


Go with the EPoX EP-9NPA+ SLI board if it's available in the UK. If it is, then it should be quite a bit cheaper than the others you listed. Stable, oc's like the big boys, and has a great feature set.

Don't get me wrong. All the boards you listed are excellent boards, but for features and price I recommend the EPoX.
 
Tony Williams said:
One thing someone said jumperles Asus? ... can you extend on that please, I'd like to hear.
Click to expand...

Automatic SLI switching is a gimmick.

Usually once you get SLI you don't go back. I have moved my jumpers once.
 
Tony Williams said:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/acatalog/EPOX_Socket_939.html

HERE they are ... what is the difference with the TOP and SECOND?
Click to expand...
Good find. The EP-9NPA+ has an integrated Sil3132 PCIe controller for 2 additional SATA/300 ports. There are also additional onboard headers for Firewire. Those are the only difference I believe (although there might be something else I'm not aware of).


EP-9NPA+ SLI picture

EP-9NPAJ SLI picture
 
J-Mag said:
Automatic SLI switching is a gimmick.

Usually once you get SLI you don't go back. I have moved my jumpers once.
Click to expand...
Same for me. Besides, you can disable/enable SLI whenever you want to within the nVidia control panel anyway.... ;)
 
Tony Williams said:
Right I am getting the DFI!!

Next what one?

UT or none UT?

What difference does it make?
Click to expand...

just the bundle. if you dont want the front panel thing get the ut and save some $. the boards are the same
 
I had the ASUS Premium, But I had a problem with it wouldnt fully restart no matter what I did. I moved hard drives, moved CD rom drives, Moved Cards, Exchanged Memory etc etc.. so I bought the DFI and havnt looked back since :)
 
DO NOT get the ABIT fatwanker AN8

I got one, actually i'm on my second since I had to RMA the first one due to a defective LAN connenctor, they were nice enough to replace my brand new defective board with a USED (power on hours was 1168) defective board which still doesn't work correctly.

Odd thing is it seems fine in device mgr and win xp isn't giving me any error msgs but I can't get any data transfer through the lan or with a NIC card in either PCI slot.

It's not my cables or modem either because i'm using them to post this message :rolleyes:
 
Tony Williams said:
Right I am getting the DFI!!

Next what one?

UT or none UT?

What difference does it make?
Click to expand...
i believe the ONLY difference between the UT and non UT is that the non UT comes with more stuff, like UV sleeving kit and FrontX connector thingy.
 
Get the Asus for stright out of the box stable fun.
Get the DFI for the OC power
 
Majin said:
Get the Asus for stright out of the box stable fun.
Get the DFI for the OC power
Click to expand...
Or get the EPoX for both!
biggrin.gif


All in all, any of these boards would be fine.
 
I bought the MSI SLI board, haven't recieved it yet, but will let you know how good it is. I never used anything but Asus, or Abit.
 
my vote goes to the a8n sli. i have one coming tomarrow :)
I bought the MSI SLI board, haven't recieved it yet, but will let you know how good it is. I never used anything but Asus, or Abit.
Click to expand...
then why change? ALL of my MSI boards (3) have been NOTHING but problems - one is hanging, dead, on my wall, one is working currently, having been through 2 RMA's already, and 1 is on its second RMA. STAY AWAY FROM MSI!!!
 
hehehe, I ordered the MSI board too.

I used to buy all abit boards, but they can't seem to create a board with the feature set I want anymore. Every time I start shopping a new board, the abit offering is never the best choice.

Had a number of Asus boards, no fan of them either. I seem to have bad luck with their gear, every other board is flaky, or they decide to do something the asus way instead of the standard way and it ends up sucking.

This will be my 2nd MSI board(just normal upgrade processes, not because the first had issues), and I was perfectly happy with the first.

Never used DFI. The issues with getting their SLI board running smoothly seem to only payoff in terms of overclocking---which I don't bother with anymore.
 
lithium726 said:
my vote goes to the a8n sli. i have one coming tomarrow :)
then why change? ALL of my MSI boards (3) have been NOTHING but problems - one is hanging, dead, on my wall, one is working currently, having been through 2 RMA's already, and 1 is on its second RMA. STAY AWAY FROM MSI!!!
Click to expand...

Well first off I wanted something different :)

And second I don't have to mess with BIOS, since they have live updates. Knowing me i'de screw it up.

And I've heard good things about the board.
 
Im torn between the gigabyte board with sli and the epox... I think either will be a good choice although the epox I think will over clock better
 
i just got my a8n sli in. so far, its pwning the MSI board in stability, speed, AND overclocking. i love this board.

not to mention it doenst have that shitty little fan on the chipset, and the power circutry doesnt whine like a little bitch with the X2 installed.
 
lithium726 said:
my vote goes to the a8n sli. i have one coming tomarrow :)
then why change? ALL of my MSI boards (3) have been NOTHING but problems - one is hanging, dead, on my wall, one is working currently, having been through 2 RMA's already, and 1 is on its second RMA. STAY AWAY FROM MSI!!!
Click to expand...

QFT! And msi imo has terrible cust. service and horribly slow RMA's.
Took almost a month to recieve my mobo from RMA, and its still screwed up.
 
Roliath said:
QFT! And msi imo has terrible cust. service and horribly slow RMA's.
Took almost a month to recieve my mobo from RMA, and its still screwed up.
Click to expand...
the only positive thing i can say about MSI's RMA is that they approve pretty much everything, lol. they just take forever to fix it.
 
I just bought the Asus A8N-SLI Premium and a friend of mine just purchased the Abit Fatal1ty so I guess I'll see first hand if he has any of the problems commonly associated with that board. How is the customer support with Asus anyway should I need to deal with them?
 
go with jetway 939gt4-sli. those other boards all have great overclocking, or great performance, or a little of both, but not both great. the jetway has both great. believe it.
 
DejaWiz said:
None of them. EPoX EP-9NPA+ SLI[/url] board if it's available in the UK. If it is, then it should be quite a bit cheaper than the others you listed. Stable, oc's like the big boys, and has a great feature set.

Don't get me wrong. All the boards you listed are excellent boards, but for features and price I recommend the EPoX.
Click to expand...

I have the dfi I'de say go with the Epox
 
Well, my DFI NF4 SLI-DR came today and I have to say that so far I am really, really impressed with it.
 
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