Which cheap uATX x58 board?

I'm *almost* ready to spend some money to upgrade my computer. I'm gonna pick up the $200 i7 930 at MicroCenter on Saturday, and I'm thinking about what board and 4GB memory to match with it. I'm looking to go as cheap as possible unless there's something really wrong with the cheap boards. Looking at Newegg, the cheapest I can find are the DFI LANPARTY JR X58-T3H6 and the MSI X58M. I've heard of MSI and not DFI, but they seem to have similar reviews and I like green . Is there anything that puts one board over the other, or another board over both?

Thanks.

The two things that you should never go cheap on are the motherboard and the PSU.
In light of that, why don't you spend $40 more and get a motherboard, instead of risking your entire build failing? This is a great board for $210: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128423

A cheap MB may run the CPU just fine but what you sacrifice in performance and potential problems is not worth the savings.

I would have neither of those boards because when you stress them they may go pop. There is no mention of the phase power so they are useless. Gigabyte and ASUS are your best bets.

Alright, point taken. I'm bound by the uATX form factor though. What's the verdict on this combo? http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.468329

I hear good things about the Asus Rampage but I'm very uneducated about RAM performance. Is this memory worth the price?

edit: Also, the older version of the rampage mobo has an IDE port (saves me having to buy a new optical drive) and a rear eSATA port. It's also $20 more expensive. Are there any advantages that the gene III has over the gene II?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131371

OCZ loves to slap the low voltage sticker on stuff.

Its 1.65v which is "standard voltage" actually according to JEDEC 1.5v is standard meaning its high voltage ram lol


ASUS makes some great products. I never had to RMA an ASUS product until this year and found their RMA process is slow and has absolutely no quality control. The fixed the dimm slot broke the other one and then I had chipset overheating issues as well :crazy:

I do not expect to have to RMA another asus product for 5 years

Just looked through some reviews of the R3E... 8 phase to cpu 2 more to chipset (which supplies up to 50W of power to the CPU according to some articles I have read) and decent OCability.

It wont be an OC monster I believe, but should be very long lasting and capable for a mini board.

And you still have the option for dual gpu if you need that in the future.

edit: scuse the typos this laptop sucks

Get the Rampage III. Why? It's about $25 cheaper.
Here's a new SATA DVD drive for less then $25 - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827151176

So you get a new motherboard, save enough to replace the DVD drive, I don't see a reason not to get the Rampage III.

Thanks for the replies guys. I went with the rampage iii as advised. Hopefully it all works.

im also looking for a cheapest x58 board....buying tomorrow....what do you'll think of this evga x58 lga

http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0312963

moko said:

im also looking for a cheapest x58 board....buying tomorrow....what do you'll think of this evga x58 lga

http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0312963

Click to expand...

Are you looking for mATX as well or a regular ATX sized board?

would like regular size atx