Input for motherboard decision

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prtzlboy

[H]ard|Gawd
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Aug 16, 2004
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I've been doing a lot of comparisons of z87 motherboards recently and it's come down to 3 choices for me:

Asus Maximus VI Gene
Asus Maximus VI Hero
GIGABYTE GA-G1.Sniper M5

The Asus boards have a pretty good pedigree, and their software package looks great. I'm still currently using an Asus P5Q Pro as a matter of fact! The Gigabyte board is the one I'm really leaning toward, since it seems to have a superior onboard audio solution (comparable to an actual dedicated sound card).

I do plan on overclocking a little, although I'm not the type to bin processors or de-lid or anything like that. I'm mostly looking for the best gaming feature-set for around $200.

I'm wondering if anyone here has made the leap to any of these boards yet, and if so, what's your experience?
 
It seems like Z87 boards are all somewhat similar in terms of OCing (see Hard's Z87-A review), and if you're not looking for anything extreme on the OC, get the board with the features you want. Sounds like you're leaning toward the GB one because of the audio...just get that if you like the audio.
 
The Asus hero is the new name for what was called "formula" in the past.....I'm thinking.
Those boards have a pretty good on board sound as well.
I also really think the Asus bios is superior.

I don't have any experience with the z87 sets but my x58 and x79 boards are Asus Rampage Formula iii and iv and I couldn't be more pleased with the performance.
 
magoo said:
The Asus hero is the new name for what was called "formula" in the past.....I'm thinking.
Those boards have a pretty good on board sound as well.
I also really think the Asus bios is superior.

I don't have any experience with the z87 sets but my x58 and x79 boards are Asus Rampage Formula iii and iv and I couldn't be more pleased with the performance.
Click to expand...

I think they are waiting to release the formula until the chipset gets fixed. I think I will wait for the formula.
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/Asus-ROG-Maximus-VI-Formula,22910.html
 
If you are going with ATX, i would go with Hero, its getting good user reviews in newegg and amazon, and imo very nice layout of the mobo, with triple spacing between PCIE 16x, so if you want to do a SLI down the road, this would be my pick. Personally with how haswell is running so hot, i doubt getting an ultra high end mobo matters much, as it will be restricted a lot by your cooling.

If you want to build on micro atx, both Gene and Sniper seems like good choices, i would probably just value between FanXper2 vs Easytune6, Intel vs Killer Nic, Realtek 1150 vs Soundblaster. But i would take the Hero if i were to build on ATX over either.

If you want to save some $$$, look into MSI Z87-G45 Gaming LGA 1150 Intel Z87 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Pro Gaming with Killer Networking, its getting good user reviews, and its $50 less than any of the above.
 
I would go with the sniper honestly been reading about the features such like they are all good boards i myself have had a few and done a few gigabyte setups all of them have been sold and the owners still have them to this day working perfectly was very impressed with the quality as well.
 
They're all solid boards. Go for whatever is cheaper. By the way, onboard audio can have an effect on fps. Although with most games, it's a non issue.
 
I don't think you can wrong with any of those. Kind of splitting hairs. I do like the ASUS Hero though.
 
prtzlboy said:
...
The Asus boards have a pretty good pedigree, and their software package looks great. I'm still currently using an Asus P5Q Pro as a matter of fact! ...
Click to expand...
Me too!
Though, I just lost a slot on it...

magoo said:
...
I also really think the Asus bios is superior.

I don't have any experience with the z87 sets but my x58 and x79 boards are Asus Rampage Formula iii and iv and I couldn't be more pleased with the performance.
Click to expand...
I agree with magoo, I like the Asus bios for configuration, though that has been my experience and I cant speak on GIGABYTE's bios.

Abula said:
If you are going with ATX, i would go with Hero, its getting good user reviews in newegg and amazon, and imo very nice layout of the mobo, with triple spacing between PCIE 16x, so if you want to do a SLI down the road, this would be my pick. Personally with how haswell is running so hot, i doubt getting an ultra high end mobo matters much, as it will be restricted a lot by your cooling.

If you want to build on micro atx, both Gene and Sniper seems like good choices, i would probably just value between FanXper2 vs Easytune6, Intel vs Killer Nic, Realtek 1150 vs Soundblaster. But i would take the Hero if i were to build on ATX over either.

If you want to save some $$$, look into MSI Z87-G45 Gaming LGA 1150 Intel Z87 HDMI SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX Pro Gaming with Killer Networking, its getting good user reviews, and its $50 less than any of the above.
Click to expand...
I like his advice here, and I think Im actually going to look at getting this Mobo :)

Good luck with whatever you decide!
 
I would go with the MSI GD65 Gaming over the Hero. You are paying a $15 to $20 premium just to get that Asus name brand.
 
Well, I ended up going for the Hero. I decided I wanted a full ATX board just in case I decided to add a soundcard + another vid card in the future. I did actually eye the MSI GD-65, but ultimately I went with the Hero because ASUS hasn't let me down yet, and I wanted to try out that ramdisk software.

If I had waited one more day, I probably would have gotten the MSI Mpower board that was offered with the Haswell combos, though.

Anyway, I'm happy to report that the board is running quite well and there were no hiccups. I did a quickie OC of my 4670k just to explore the BIOS, and it's pretty slick. The UEFI works perfectly and there are more options than I'll ever care to adjust. As soon as I grab another 8 GB of RAM, I'm going to try out the RAMDISK software as well (although I suspect I won't notice much difference since I'm already on an SSD).
 
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