MSI Big Bang Xpower, Asus Rampage III Extreme or Gigabyte X58A-UD7?

S

Sunfox

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First, I should preface by saying I am NOT a big overclocker. I typically do a minor overclock and sure I like to game, but primarily this will be a work system (which includes lots of video editing). My priorirties are stability, performance and features.

Until now I've sworn by Intel motherboards - sure they're typically expensive, low on frills and may not perform the highest, but they've all been utterly stable and a joy to use. My current 3.5+ year old D975XBX2 system has been on 24x7 and never once given me a BSOD. An older system I built in Rambus days ran for over 8 years straight without issue. However I absolutely cannot stand Intel's lackluster X58 board, so I need to turn elsewhere, and not having used any other brand in quite a while I need some advice.

I'm looking to pair the board with a 980X + Thermalright Venomous-X, 12gb DDR3, Sapphire Vapor-X 5870, X25M 160gb SSD, 3 x WD Caviar Black 2TB, all in an Antec P183 + CP-850.... plus misc other stuff.

Right now I'm eyeing the Gigabyte GA-X58A-UD7, ASUS Rampage III Extreme and MSI Big Bang Xpower.

I don't need SLI support at all (1 good vid card is enough for my needs). 1 standard PCI slot would be nice, but I can work around not having one. USB 3 and SATA 6.0 isn't absolutely necessary, but would be nice to have for the future. I prefer Intel-based gigabit LAN, but I'm not stuck on it. Must have a PS2 port for my ancient keyboard that I can't live without. Would like good case fan speed control. Audio quality was originally important to me, but I now think I'm going to try using the ATI for 6-ch LPCM via HDMI to my receiver, so I probably don't need to care about onboard or discrete audio. And if I do decide I want good sound, I'd probably turn to an Auzentech.

Before the last 6 Intel-based systems, I always used ASUS but then I realized that every single one of my boards either died or developed issues after 1 to 3 years, so I switched off them. However right now I like the R3E the best, but I've heard good things about the Gigabyte... and the MSI seems very interesting. Which is the most stable and least likely to cause issues?

And are there any other premium boards I should be looking at (besides eVGA, which I don't actually like)?

Thanks!
 
If you get the UD7 make sure it is revision 2 as that was redesigned to better support Gulftown overclocking.
 
SolidBladez said:
If you get the UD7 make sure it is revision 2 as that was redesigned to better support Gulftown overclocking.
Click to expand...

Not to thread crap but did you read his first line? :D Although I do agree that newer revisions of motherboards is always a safe bet.

My MSI Big Bang Power X should be arriving today but I'm still a few weeks out from getting my build up & running, I haven't purchased the CPU yet. If you haven't decided by then, I'll let you know how it handles.
 
MSI X-Power is not mature enough yet...

I had the same decision to make and, like you, I have owned a lot of Asus before and strayed when they had long-life issues. I have a A7N8X Deluxe motherboard that is still running great after like 8 years, as well as a ASRock 939Dual-SATA2 board that has been running for 3-4years (upgraded with the AM2 daughterboard and used every day by my girls). but in between there have been 3 or 4 that just didn't last.

Having gone with Foxconn boards (nVidia chipsets, as in a BFG 590SLI and a Foxconn Destroyer 780a) and found thier support to be greatly lacking (once a board is out for 3-6 months, all support outside of critical BIOS fixes are non-existent).

Last year I upgraded to an Asus Maximus III Formula board when I went to a Phenom II X4 955, and found it to be an excellent board. Feature ich, good temps, great build quality, etc...

I was so impressed, that when I decided to go i7 this year my first purchase was an Asus ROG G73JH-A3 laptop (1920x1080 LED, core i7-720qm, 8gb 1333 DDR3, 5870m 1gb video, dual 500gb Seagate Momentus XL hybrid drives) and once again the build quality is top notch, the system is one of the best engineered in regards to heat (as in no heat underneath the laptop, it all is out the back), and the features/warranty is top-notch (30 day no bright pixel warranty, 1 year accidental damage coverage, 3 years full-coverage warranty). I am typing this right now on it and it is a such a solid i7 platform I decided to upgrade me desktop to an i7 setup as well.

I looked at the UD7, the MSI X-Power and the Asus Rampage III Extreme and the R3E just made sense. I know the build quality is top-notch, all the features are there, and, since it is a flagship model the attention is there from the support side. The warranties are all the same with any of the 3 you outlined, and the UD7 is a solid platform as well. I also liked the slot spacing on the R3E and the X-Power, but the R3E has Intel Gigabit Ethernet and the X-Power is still too immature.

In the end they are all top performers and it really comes down to features and personal preference. I doubt anyone would be able to tell a difference in running between the three, unless you are a hardcore overclocker...
 
If you're only running one video card and you're not going to do more than a mild overclock, why are you looking at $350 boards? A $150 Gigabyte or Asus will do everything you want.
 
Except I would like the advanced frills that are typically only available on the advanced boards, good performance (even at stock), and very high stability. I figure if a board is designed to be stable with a huge overclock, it should be utterly rock solid with no or a mild overclock. I tend to tax my systems rather hard, where a crash could kill hours of my time, and besides, being a work system I can justify spending the money to ensure smooth running. :)

The MSI is currently at the top of my list, mostly due to the unique components used (for reduced heat/power consumption - the system is on 24x7 doing stuff, so that could save money in the long run). I just worry about its stability due to lack of maturity, as dpbhelps says.

My biggest complaints with the R3E are, first, it's an ASUS (although I actually still have a P2B-LS system running for kicks - although it's a first edition board with a well known bug at 100% CPU load). Second it's slightly more expensive than I realized (damn Canadian pricing), third it only seems to have 2 internal USB (giving max 8 USB 2, when other boards are 10 - I have a lot of USB devices).

My biggest issue with the Gigabyte is the cooling device blocking the top 2 PCIe 1X slots, and the difficulty ensuring that I get a v2.0 for the 980X. Otherwise it would suit my purposes fairly well.
 
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One neat feature of the Asus board if you like to tinker is the RC Bluetooth.

http://support.asus.com/download/download.aspx?SLanguage=en-us

Check out all the utilities that are supported.

I like mine, but I have only had it a week, and have not even began to experiment with it. The packaging and build quality goes way beyond many of the MSI boards I have had. I can not comment comparing to the Gigabyte board, because I have never owned one. I would by another RE3 if I needed it.
 
Sunfox said:
My biggest complaints with the R3E are, first, it's an ASUS (although I actually still have a P2B-LS system running for kicks - although it's a first edition board with a well known bug at 100% CPU load). Second it's slightly more expensive than I realized (damn Canadian pricing), third it only seems to have 2 internal USB (giving max 8 USB 2, when other boards are 10 - I have a lot of USB devices).
Click to expand...



What's wrong with Asus? I've had several of their motherboards that far outlived their usefulness if you're looking at it from a reliability standpoint.
 
I'm going with the R3E in my build next month. It was pretty much on par with the GA but if I'm paying this much for a mobo it better have Intel lan via the PHY. Realtek / Marvel on high end boards is a cheap out.
 
I think I mentioned in my first post, I've had bad luck with them, and I've been using them since the Pentium-90 days. My main issues have been after 1-3 years, they either got flakey or completely died. I have a shelf of old dead motherboards to attest to this.

The last ASUS I used was a Pentium IV 3.2GHZ system (don't remember the exact model, but it was Intel chipset). I was having difficulty with that system and after much frustration ended up buying two of everything, including motherboards, but I ended up with the Intel-branded version (essentially the exact same board otherwise). It turned out that the actual CPU was bad - go figure - but by that time I had re-assembled my entire system with the Intel board, and while it had less frills I just stuck with it (and never had an issue). I eventually built all the spare parts into another system for my father. Finally, I replaced my system and the Intel-based one went to an uncle. At that point I realized there was a significant difference between the systems: the Intel-based one was rock solid, and the Asus-based one would crash about once every 4 days (zero overclock, and I even tried disabling all performance features). These were absolutely identical systems except for the motherboard, and they were both based on the same chipset. After that I switched to Intel mobos and never had a single problem.

However Intel's X58 board sucks, so i know I'm going to have to get back into other brands. I've owned one Gigabyte board in the past. It failed and required warranty service, but the replacement was fine. Never owned MSI although they've certainly been around. My friend built a 980X system earlier this year... P6X58D Deluxe was defective, and since he couldn't wait for a replacement (ended up taking 3 weeks) he bought a Gigabyte (not sure which model) which has been working fine.
 
Fact of the matter is, NO manufacturers have ZERO RMAs. All manufacturers have some boards that fail. All manufacturers have bugs with different boards. There are constantly BIOS upgrades to fix issues, and at times, even brand new revisions of givne boards to deal with issues.

Biggest thing is what is the build quality for a board you are going to be buying. There are dfferent levels of product quality based on the market they are being sold into. The R3E, for example, is a premium product in a big lineup. It certainly has higher QC than a $100 budget baord produced by Asus and it has better support (driver updates/BIOS fixes) because it is a flagship product.

As far as the other manufacturers go, no idea how they deal with thier "premium product" lines vs a budget board, but for Asus it is quite obvious they take care and detail with thier premium products. Doesn't mean you can't get a bad one, just means they scrutinized it a little more than some budget model. Hell, I read about known failures with all three of my latest Asus products (Maximus III Formula, G73JH-A3 laptop, Rampage III Extreme), but, it would seem, I have ended up with "good ones" this time around as the Maximus III Formula has been working flawlessly for almost a year now, the laptop has been solid for a month being used heavily daily, and the R3E hasn't had any issues in the few weeks I have had it. Will they last as long as some previous products? Who knows. Hell, I have a couple Dell laptops from 2000/2001 that are still going strong (talk about being buitl to last), I have motherboards from around the same time that are still in service as servers (ECS no less, had to replace caps, but that is expected from that vintage) and have had at least 5 or 6 motherboards die within the same timeframe as well as 2 or 3 laptops.

Best you can hope for is that things will last at least through the warranty period. After that, if they die, you buy a new one. Hell, buy a eVGA if you are worried about it, as they have a lifetime warranty on certain models.

The rest of us have just given you our opinions about what WE would choose and why. Sure, the R3E has one less front-panel header on it. If you really have the need to plug in 10+ devices there is a simple internal port multiplier available from NZXT on Newegg that will allow you to convert a single front panel header to 2 front panel headers and a couple of internal USB ports (which some people find is the hottest thing going as they can mount a USB device inside the computer). But, you give up that front panel header for an Intel PHY ethernet. In my book it is worth the difference.
 
dbphelps said:
Fact of the matter is, NO manufacturers have ZERO RMAs. All manufacturers have some boards that fail. All manufacturers have bugs with different boards. There are constantly BIOS upgrades to fix issues, and at times, even brand new revisions of givne boards to deal with issues.

Biggest thing is what is the build quality for a board you are going to be buying. There are dfferent levels of product quality based on the market they are being sold into. The R3E, for example, is a premium product in a big lineup. It certainly has higher QC than a $100 budget baord produced by Asus and it has better support (driver updates/BIOS fixes) because it is a flagship product.

As far as the other manufacturers go, no idea how they deal with thier "premium product" lines vs a budget board, but for Asus it is quite obvious they take care and detail with thier premium products. Doesn't mean you can't get a bad one, just means they scrutinized it a little more than some budget model. Hell, I read about known failures with all three of my latest Asus products (Maximus III Formula, G73JH-A3 laptop, Rampage III Extreme), but, it would seem, I have ended up with "good ones" this time around as the Maximus III Formula has been working flawlessly for almost a year now, the laptop has been solid for a month being used heavily daily, and the R3E hasn't had any issues in the few weeks I have had it. Will they last as long as some previous products? Who knows. Hell, I have a couple Dell laptops from 2000/2001 that are still going strong (talk about being buitl to last), I have motherboards from around the same time that are still in service as servers (ECS no less, had to replace caps, but that is expected from that vintage) and have had at least 5 or 6 motherboards die within the same timeframe as well as 2 or 3 laptops.

Best you can hope for is that things will last at least through the warranty period. After that, if they die, you buy a new one. Hell, buy a eVGA if you are worried about it, as they have a lifetime warranty on certain models.

The rest of us have just given you our opinions about what WE would choose and why. Sure, the R3E has one less front-panel header on it. If you really have the need to plug in 10+ devices there is a simple internal port multiplier available from NZXT on Newegg that will allow you to convert a single front panel header to 2 front panel headers and a couple of internal USB ports (which some people find is the hottest thing going as they can mount a USB device inside the computer). But, you give up that front panel header for an Intel PHY ethernet. In my book it is worth the difference.
Click to expand...

well said

Speaking of front panel connectors, when are we going to see some usb 3.0 connectors standard on mobo's. Its a bummer that most cases now run usb cords out the back of the case to connect the front panel usb 3.0 ports.
 
I never said I expected 0 RMAs... just that I was tired of 95% RMAs in the past. Burn me once, shame on you... burn me six times, shame on me, right? Some brands have better reputations for producing quality, problem-free products than others. My experience with ASUS is that they *were* fast performing and feature laden, but almost always had severe lifespan issues. Is it the same now? I don't know, but the first 2 parts are still true. :)

MSI, frankly, never had a good reputation in my eyes, but things have come a long way and I don't know if that old rep still carries through with their premium product or not. I hope not.

I'd like to think the market has weeded out the weak players. A lot of brands of motherboards I've used before simply no longer exist.
 
I switched to a Gigabyte x58a-UD7 from an EVGA x58 Classified SLI (760), and I'm really glad I did.

I really like the board. I had problems with the EVGA board, including issues with the rear panel eSata ports controlled by the JMicron controller - it caused stuttering often when the attached drives were accessed (despite different driver versions.)

The Gigabyte has no such issues, even though it uses the exact same controller for its rear eSata ports.
 
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