DFI, Abit, ASUS, MSI??? which one?

M

Mr. Baz

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Aug 17, 2001
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I'm looking into building me up a new rig. I haven't really been paying attention lately to the articles on mobos.

Basically, I'm wanting a motherboard that supports the following:

AMD64 939
gigabit LAN (2 LAN ports would be nice, but not necessary nor a buying point)
PCI Express (I'm not going with an SLI setup anytime soon, but may want it for future expandability)
SATAII (is there really THAT much difference between SATA and SATAII?)
overclockability isn't really that great of an issue. If I do any overclocking, it will be very slight...nothing major.
 
Asus hands down, they make very stable mobo, i just build a new rig for a friend with a asus mobo, i was shocked how stable they were.
 
DFI = Overclocking/Features.
ASUS = Stability/Reputation.
Abit = Used to be good for overclocking, but now they're surpassed by DFI. They're still O.K. though, IMHO.
MSI = Crap. Don't get one. Trust me. ;)
 
MSI or DFI...

DFI if Ure real [H]ard MSI if U want it a little easier..
Abits chief BIOS wrighter (Oscar Wu) works for DFI nowdays and Rox da boat there but left a BIG hole at ABit so Avíod Abit. ASUS does just not measure up right now to the MSI nF4 and the DFI nF4 LP series.
 
[rant] man im in the same boat as you Mr. Baz... im just looking for a good Nforce 4 Ultra that i can OC... i remember back in the nforce 2 days the decision was easy.. get the Abit Nf7s and you will be happy.. i did get and i was happy.. now every company has thier goods with thier bads... I was leaning towards MSI but then they have a problem with overclocking the winchester core past 220 for some reason.. i was thinking DFI but then everyonet says they are a tweakers dream and a casual OCers nightmare they just have too many options to customize...i was about to just say forget this all and just get the chaintech for 80 bucks its almost half the price of these mobos... [/rant]
I just dont think ive ever been this confused even when i was first starting off building custom pcs a few years ago lol.. oh well..
Eddie
 
1c3d0g said:
MSI = Crap. Don't get one. Trust me. ;)
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really now? i'm not trusting you. i own an msi, and talk to other people with msi's and we have nothing but good things to say about them. maybe you can explain why you don't like them? :p

to the OP, if you're not oc'ing, at all, get either msi or asus.
slight oc'ing, msi
heavy oc'ing, dfi
 
I have to say DFI, they have great OCs and are not bad even when not OC, in fact im gonna be usin the DFI LANPARTY UT nF4 SLI-DR for next build, and gonna OC the crap out if it :D
 
They're all good brands, i shy away from Abit nowadays cause of the crappy little fans they put on their chipsets. I'd reccomend one that uses passive cooling for those ...
 
DiscoStu said:
They're all good brands, i shy away from Abit nowadays cause of the crappy little fans they put on their chipsets. I'd reccomend one that uses passive cooling for those ...
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agree...and to think for a while there i actually wanted to get the ABIT Fatal1ty AN8 :eek:
until, that is, i started to want the DFI LP UT nF4 SLI-DR :)
 
i am a happy new owner of a DFI nF4 UT SLI-DR and i love it. it has the dual gigabit lan, SLi, of course 939, but i dont think it has SATA2. i highly reccomend it though. :)
 
many people are saying good things about the DFI series, I would go with them, I do like abit however..asus is good but I hate the bios layout
 
Since you're not OCing that much (if at all according to the OP), I'd get the MSI. It has the best features of the bunch (at least the Platinum SLI does) and runs solid at stock speeds.
 
If your into moderate or light overclocking or running at stock speeds the Asus board is a solid choice. Stable as hell and feature packed. In addition it has the most clearance between the two video cards making it possible to use larger cooling solutions for your chipset and your video cards.
 
My DFI nF4 Ultra-D has SATA II...but it probably won't mean anything to you vs. SATA I. It has some extra features that may be useful to some people but not to most, and the 300 vs. 150 bit...both of them are in excess of what the drive needs anyway so it's, again, meaningless in most situations.
 
Overclocked or not, I'd give my vote to the DFI NF4 boards. I've been very impressed by the quality of the motherboard. You do need to be selective on what power supply and RAM you pair with it (forget anything that says Value in the name), but that's the biggest thing to watch out for. I haven't had my Ultra-D for that long (not even a month yet), but it's been a pretty smooth board to work with.
 
1c3d0g said:
DFI = Overclocking/Features.
ASUS = Stability/Reputation.
Abit = Used to be good for overclocking, but now they're surpassed by DFI. They're still O.K. though, IMHO.
MSI = Crap. Don't get one. Trust me. ;)
Click to expand...


This may be wisdom based on prior product, but in the current benchies for overclocking, etc, the current lineup goes like this:

DFI - fastest
MSI - very close to DFI and has onboard Creative 24-bit audio chipset.
ASUS
Gigabyte

Does Abit have an SLI rig at this point in time?
 
I'd say DFI or Asus in that order. I used to be a die hard Abit fan but now I think they suck.
 
Kolya said:
I'd say DFI or Asus in that order. I used to be a die hard Abit fan but now I think they suck.
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Yeah, they have their priorities all screwed up, they really should be working on the stability and overall features of their NF4 boards rather than focusing on Intel's dieing breed.
 
This is a very interesting discussion and you will hear from fan boys on all sides of this battle.

I have used 3 of the brands mentioned NForce 4 boards so hopefully my experience will show through in this post.

DFI Lan Party SLI-DR is a great board for overclocking. I was not too happy with its onboard sound, and at stock speeds it did not feel as fast as some of its competitors. Overclocks on air were very good, got my 3500+ 90nm to 2.65. The bios was pretty good, and I was stable without issue. Now I know this board comes in lots of flavors, so you will have to decide which you prefer.

MSI Neo 4 Platinum SLI is a great all-around board. Call it Mario and DFI is like Luigi. This board had the best sound of all of the boards I tried, and I was also able to get my overclock to 2.75, but only 2.7 prime stable. A bit tougher to overclock with this board, and I don't think it could handle as much as the DFI from an overclocked standpoint. The lack of PCI xpress x1 slots on the board was a bit disheartening, and the fact that it did not come with a D-bracket was not so cool. All in all though, this board was my favorite. It was fast at stock, overclocked, and very stable.

ASUS A8N-SLI was my least favorite. Onboard sound, thumbs down. It was stable though, however overclocking with this board was not happening with my 3500+ or my 3200+. I could barely get it 100MHz over stock. All the same components were used in the other 2 boards, so I was rather perplexed. I loved the layout of the video card slots though. If you want a stable machine at stock speeds, this is a nice board, but I still would take the MSI as it felt a little bit faster.

Abit, haven't tried their new ones. Maybe later, but I think I am done for Nforce 4.
 
I found the DFI's onboard sound to be very nice. The whole Karajan module thing was a rather unusual way to do it, but it works well.

The main complaint I've heard with DFI is also one of its strongest points to others. It has hella lot of options in the BIOS. People that want the thing to "just work" without having to tweak anything are better off with the MSI counterpart. But if you want to get some good overclocking in and have lots of things to tweak, it's great.
 
ashmedai said:
I found the DFI's onboard sound to be very nice. The whole Karajan module thing was a rather unusual way to do it, but it works well.

The main complaint I've heard with DFI is also one of its strongest points to others. It has hella lot of options in the BIOS. People that want the thing to "just work" without having to tweak anything are better off with the MSI counterpart. But if you want to get some good overclocking in and have lots of things to tweak, it's great.
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I was originally going to get the MSI board, but now I want to get the DFI because I have found that it is a faster performing board and I like the layout of it better. However, I have never built a computer before. Is it really that hard to just plug everything in and boot without issues on the DFI, or do I need to know a lot about BIOS tweaking to get the board to be stable at stock speeds?
 
It was plug and go for me...I've seen people that had to tweak a few things first though. I think it depends a lot on your memory and such. Odds are you'll be fine...the BIOS defaults by nature are intended to work out of the box with as wide a variety of hardware as possible, and auto-detection get things close enough to run most often.

Of course once you've got everything up and running, you have a large number of tweakable things that can get your latencies down, speeds up, etc etc and so forth.

Corsair, especially Corsair Value RAM, has been one of the main culprits...not just with the DFI board either. Sucks too, they usually do so well. AFAIK their high end stuff isn't suceptable to the same issues...but with TwinMOS Speed Premium and Crucial Value both being really cheap and really good overclockers...WTF would I want to pay out for Corsair XMS or something like that when it'll cost over twice as much and not do as well as the cheaper memory? Overclocking just kicks ass like that...do your homework, and you can be paying a lot less for a lot more performance.
 
ok,
abit, dfi, asus, msi - have heard good things -
you might want to look at epox too - as I have had no probs with them
Ironically - the cheapest board I have ever bought - I am using right now - biostar - its a 2nd tier and dont expect much out of them. but stable - little overclocking - go with the dfi to overclock and I like the extras they have too - epox stable with some oc capabilites and they can come with a problem code indicator helps big time when trying to figure out what is wrong - abit and asus - stable with lighter overclockabilities than the dfi - msi usually a decent oc -
 
I plan on getting Crucial Ballistix with the DFI UT NF4 SLI-DR. That RAM should be ok with this mobo right?
 
3-Phase said:
I plan on getting Crucial Ballistix with the DFI UT NF4 SLI-DR. That RAM should be ok with this mobo right?
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I don't see any reason why not.

You might want to switch to TwinMOS TMSP/400 though as you can get a pair for about 110 and you should be able to get a bit faster clock and a bit lower timings.

TwinMOS you have to give about 3.2V which is no problem on the DFI nF4 motherboards (which can go up to 4V, which is way more than you need...3.4 is about the most I'm comfortable with, 3.6 for occasional use). Ballistix is almost as fast and almost as cheap, and takes less voltage so you can use it in more motherboards. If you go ahead with the DFI motherboard though, you don't have to care, so get the cheaper faster TwinMOS SP.
 
So the Ballistix can do the same speeds as the TwinMOS SP but at lower voltages? What limits the Ballistix from getting a faster clock with lower timmings?

Could you give me a link to the specific TwinMOS RAM you are talking about?
 
TwinMOS Speed Premium 400 uses Winbond CH-5 chips which typically hit about 250-270MHz, and do so with extremely tight timings. The catch is they require about 3.2V to do so.

Ballistix uses Micron -5b g chips, which don't clock quite as fast or do quite as tight timings. However IIRC it only takes about 2.9V which is more widely supported without modification. But since you're getting the DFI motherboard that can do 3.2V and then some, I recommend that you go with the TwinMOS. It's cheaper, faster clocks, and lower latency.

TMSP/433 (if you can actually find it) uses the infamous Winbond BH-5. CH-5 and BH-5 are pretty similar, CH-5 is more of a glutton for voltage. Again, with the DFI motherboard, you don't have to care.

Link to the TwinMOS "TMSP/400" on Newegg. Their prices go up and down by a few bucks every so often, but you can usually get the stuff for about $110 for a pair.
 
How hot do these TwinMOS SP sticks get? Would heat spreaders be a good idea?

I saw that the CAS latency was 2.5. When you first boot, do these sticks run at 2.5 and 3.2V, or is 3.2V the voltage required to run them at 2-2-2 timings?
 
At 3.2~3.4V as long as you have decent airflow I wouldn't worry much.

Heat spreaders are pretty much a marketing scam, they tend to have a negative effect on cooling instead of helping any.

When you first boot it'll use the SPD autodetect and come up at something like 2.6V, CAS 2.5, and so forth; whatever it's labeled as. 3.2V is usually necessary to get it up to 250MHz or whatever. IIRC it runs at 2-2-2 with stock voltage. CH-5 tends to show decreased stability with looser timings at any speed, unlike say TCCD where you have to relax the timings the higher you clock it. CH-5 is sweet that way, tight timings all the way up.
 
i didnt read all of hte thread, but as long as we are compariing manufacturers, ill chime in.

DFI - i have had no exp with them, but giving the number of problems and RMA's that pop up around these boards, i wouldnt trust them with my rig.
MSI - hate, absolutly abhor MSI. ive had to RMA both MSI boards i have, and one gateway board i had was an MSI OEM board that just gave me all sorts of shitty problems. never again will i buy an MSI board.
Abit - used a few older boards, as well as an IS7-E that i love and an NF8 that i used briefly. both of these boards have been awesome to work with, easy as hell and never given me any problems. i would go with Abit over MSI or DFI or Epox or (insert brand here) any day of the week, and i really want an AN8 Ultra ATM. (to replace this damn neo2)
Asus - i love asus boards, and i love their BIOS layout the most. in my house, currently, i have an a7v133, a7v8x-x, and a7n8x deluxe running great, and unless i hear tons of problems with a particular board (like the A8N-SLI when it came out) i wouldnt hesitate to drop cash on an asus board.
 
GeForceX said:
Without making a new thread, I would like to ask-- what is the difference between the DFI Lanparty NF4 SLI-D and the DFI Lanparty UT NF4 SLI-DR?

The huge price difference does not make sense to me.

-J.
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The DFI Lanparty NF4 SLI-D uses the NForce 4 Ultra chipset and the DFI Lanparty NF4 SLI-D uses the NForce SLi chipset.

The SLi version is the only one gauranteed to work with Nvidia SLi.
 
Stay away from Asus. MSI is quality I've had things crap out with Asus never with MSI.
 
Glow said:
Stay away from Asus. MSI is quality I've had things crap out with Asus never with MSI.
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ive had the oppisite expierence. i have 3 asus boards running strong ATM, havebeen for a few years.

i have 2 MSI boards running ATM, and have had to RMA both of them.
 
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