Motherboard recommendations

[Zeno]

Hey all. I'm helping a friend build a new PCI express quad-core Intel computer and wanted to get some motherboard recommendations.

Here is what is important to me (in order):

1) Stable, reliable, and free of any major problems
2) Fastest possible bus and memory speeds
3) Quiet (passive cooling is ideal)
4) No BIOS issues out of the box

The computer won't be overclocked so those options don't matter and the user will probably never need or want SLI, though I don't mind if it has SLI support.

Given all this, would an Intel motherboard be the best choice?

 

[Sxotty]

I think people will say Intel. I don't see any reason why not personally. Given what you said, but I don't know if Intel boards are significantly better than others in this day and age.

 

[ShaidarHaran]

Buy a decent Gigabyte/Abit/Asus P35/P45 board. Decent meaning priced around $100 (assuming you buy online).

As for your "no BIOS issues out of the box" requirement - good luck on that one

 

[Sxotty]

As for your "no BIOS issues out of the box" requirement - good luck on that one

That just cracked me up

Anyway is abit still good? My best boards ever have both been abit, but after their flirtation with bankruptcy and attempt to become hipsters I lost faith in them. I actually filled out their surveys at that time indicating they should focus on reliability first not on nifty color schemes, or pseudo overclocking stuff that did not work.

 

[Zeno]

As for your "no BIOS issues out of the box" requirement - good luck on that one

Yeah, I figured I might be getting too optimistic there. It's not that big a deal, I can walk them through updating it. Do any motherboards still require a floppy for BIOS update or do they all have windows based software for that now?

 

[ShaidarHaran]

I have an IP35E in my E8400/8800GT rig right now. Good board for the price. Nice features and overclocks LIKE MAD. 8x500 on air is fun

 

[suryad]

I have not been looking over on to the other side from Nvidia based mobos and vid cards but I was thinking for Christmas of upgrading my current rig to potentially DDR3 memory, Intel chipset with Crossfire and a couple of ATI vid cards. Not to hijack the thread but to rather build on top of it, currently what is the best Crossfire based video card out?

 

[BRiT]

Amd Hd 4870 X2.

 

[pc0day]

Amd Hd 4870 X2.

+1, I think so also.