Best S939 motherboards?

M

McDeth

Limp Gawd
Joined
Sep 26, 2002
Messages
414
I recently upgraded to a s939 4600 x2 processor, but kept my old motherboard and video card due to cost constraints. While I am enjoying the processing power booster over my old CPU, I understand that s939 may not survive it through to 2008. I do not plan on upgrading again for a while, maybe I will drop some cash on an AM3 when they come out, who knows.

What I do know is that my old motherboard (Asus AGP mobo) will not cut it for the future. The main reason being that I am going to have to upgrade to PCI-E at one point or another in the future. Now my thinking behind this is that PCI-E cards are going to be around for a long while, definitally longer than S939 will be. My plan is to drop some bucks on a nice motherboard now (or in the very near future) and then in a few months, get a really nice DX10 compatible PCI-E card once they come down in price a bit.

What I need to know is what is the best S939 SLI motherboard I can buy right now performance and feature wise. I'm not that heavy into overclocking anymore, but some overclockability is desireable. Dosn't really need wireless or built in audio, but I really don't care about it if it does have it.

However the one feature that confuses me the most overall is the difference between SLI and Crossfire. I assume that is just two different flavors for Nvidia and ATI cards to run in dual channel mode or w/e, but I could be wrong.

Set me straight please :D
 
I like the DFI Lanparty SLI series of motherboards this board is loaded for anything. http://www.dfi.com.tw/Product/xx_pr....jsp?PRODUCT_ID=3449&CATEGORY_TYPE=LP&SITE=US
Here is where you need to make a choice. If you want to run 2 videocards you need to decide on which manufacturer you like. Nvidia Video uses SLI and must be on an SLI board (Nvidia chipset). If you have a prefence to ATI video cards then you need to go with a crossfire (ATI) motherboard. If you are only going to run 1 video card then you can mix an ATI chipset and a Nvidia Video card or vice-versa.
 
I REALLY like the abit an8-32x. It has everything imaginable, great overclocking, heatpipe cooling, good bios, tons of fan headers, and the perfect layout.

crossfire = ati's dual gpu solution
sli = nvidia's dual gpu solution
 
I dunno. I am a really big fan of Asus/Abit. Something in me just despises the shit out of DFI motherboards, probably something to do with the 'XTR33333MEEE DFI L@NPARTY" with the glow in the dark bullshit on the board. Do they still make them like that?
 
MSI K8N Diamond Plus (if you can find it) was the best OC and feature rich board I've used. I tried the DFI and Asus boards...didn't like them but MSI boards are just a personal choice for me.
 
Asus A8N SLI Premium - great overclocker, very stable and you don't sandwhich a sound card inbetween your graphics cards

eVga mATX SLi- the only SLi capable mATX mobo in existence.



 
IMO best s939 SLI board = A8N32-SLI. there was a reason why it was the flagship model when s939 = king.
 
The DFI SLI-DR expert is the best 939 motherboard out, but it doesnt have 32 PCIe lanes for full 16x SLIX2 however the importance of that is debatable. DFIs are neon but they are the most stable boards ever and can OC the most. I know you dont want to OC alot but you always buy something that will do more than you want so you know it will not fail while performing at your level... ie stereo equipment can play louder than you listen to it so that when you listen to it at your desired level it sounds good and isnt distorted...
 
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