Help with motherboard selection

[kburn]

HI all,

 

I'm putting together a gaming system for the first time.  I've decided on the following so far:

 

i5 4670k

Gigabyte GTX 760 2GB

Seasonic G Series 550W Gold

Kingston HyperX SSD

 

What I can't seem to decide on is the motherboard.  I'm bouncing around between:

 

MSI Z87-G45 Gaming

Gigabyte Z87X-UD3H

Asus Z87-A

 

All have similar features including 8 phase power for a modest overclock later.  And of course, they all have mixed reviews.  The MSI seems to have a ton of problems at setup, but appears to be stable and a great board once that's done.  I've had gigabyte boards before and never had any issues.  Never worked with Asus.  I'm leaning towards the MSI, but would be interested in any factors I may not be considering.  In the end, I want something that's a solid performer.  It may be that it doesn't matter which one I go with, but would like to poll the masses for experience.  Any other boards I might have overlooked?  My price range is $150-$170 CAD.

 

Thanks for looking and I appreciate any input.

[ForsakenLive]

Fitting a gold themed motherboard is kind of hard, also the non ROG /Pro /WS Asus motherboard ain't that great.

The brown PCB of the MSI G45 is a straight now IMO (unless you don't care about looks).

The Gigabythe UDH3 is a good looking solig mobo, I would pick that,

[Fuzzy112]

Gigabyte.

[WhatTheQuack]

I would go with Gigabyte, but it really depends on which one you like the look of the most. Motherboards make almost no difference to the overall system performance, so it doesn't matter which one you choose. I would just pick one than can allow you computer to be easily upgraded (supports SLI, Xfire, overclocking etc.)

 

EDIT: Also welcome to the forum

[kburn]

I would go with Gigabyte, but it really depends on which one you like the look of the most. Motherboards make almost no difference to the overall system performance, so it doesn't matter which one you choose. I would just pick one than can allow you computer to be easily upgraded (supports SLI, Xfire, overclocking etc.)

 

EDIT: Also welcome to the forum

 

I agree regarding the performance point.  I'm most interested in quality.  Regarding SLI however, does running in x16 x16 really give a noticeable improvement over x8 x8 (which these motherboards do)?  I would like this build to last quite a while, and adding a second GPU in the future could be an option for me (with an upgrade to PSU as well).  And thanks for the welcome!

 

Fitting a gold themed motherboard is kind of hard, also the non ROG /Pro /WS Asus motherboard ain't that great.

The brown PCB of the MSI G45 is a straight now IMO (unless you don't care about looks).

The Gigabythe UDH3 is a good looking solig mobo, I would pick that,

 

Yeah the gold theme is definitely ugly.  I never really noticed the mobo on the MSI was brown.  The pictures don't show it that well.  I think I am swinging towards the gigabyte.

 

Thanks!

[WhatTheQuack]

I agree regarding the performance point.  I'm most interested in quality.  Regarding SLI however, does running in x16 x16 really give a noticeable improvement over x8 x8 (which these motherboards do)?  I would like this build to last quite a while, and adding a second GPU in the future could be an option for me (with an upgrade to PSU as well).  And thanks for the welcome!

 

 

Yeah the gold theme is definitely ugly.  I never really noticed the mobo on the MSI was brown.  The pictures don't show it that well.  I think I am swinging towards the gigabyte.

 

Thanks!

 

Most motherboards of this price run SLI in 8x 8x, the performance difference is less than 1 frame per second, so 8x 8x mode is fine.

[kburn]

Most motherboards of this price run SLI in 8x 8x, the performance difference is less than 1 frame per second, so 8x 8x mode is fine.

 

I've decided and put the Gigabyte mobo, CPU and GPU on hold.  Now to find a case!

 

I appreciate everyones input.  Fingers crossed I don't run into HW problems