A thread for cheap motherboard buyers

[TridenT]

Just wondering what your experience has been. I just bought this motherboard (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813130731) to go along with my 7970, i7-4770, 840 EVO, and 8gb of ram.

The only thing I found out after purchase (didn't read the details closely enough) was that it is PCI Express 2.0. That was a bummer, but I don't think it'll be a big difference. HardForum tested it and said there were some figures that showed 10% difference, but even they were skeptical of the real world performance difference. (Saying that it was basically next to no difference except in a very few tests and even showing that PCI Express 2.0 won in some tests)

Outside of that, no USB 3.0 front header option blows (Knew that one though). But, again, not the end of the world.

So, your experience with cheap motherboards?

Coming from being burned on the $200-$300 motherboards, I'm finding the $53 market to be pretty sweet. (Especially since I got the mobo + CPU for about $340 thanks to a coupon)

 

[ElFenix]

what board is it? getting a redirect error from AT's referral link

edit: there it is MSI H81.

didn't know intel was still putting out pcie 2.0 chipsets. guess they have to cheap out somewhere.


i've had generally good luck with cheap boards. i've only RMA'd 2 boards total and one was a mid range ASUS board. the only other board that died was an MSI board from the athlon XP days (leaky caps). i've had plenty of ECS, jetway, albatron, whatnot boards without issue.


K7S5A in the house.

 

[TridenT]

what board is it? Getting a redirect error from at's referral link

msi h81m-p33

 

[zir_blazer]

There is something weird there. Any decent Motherboard topology with a single PCIe 16x slot should have it coming from the Processor integrated PCIe controller, which on ALL Haswells is 3.0. No Haswell Chipset supports PCIe 3.0, they're all 2.0 - only the Processor integrated PCIe controller is 3.0.

 

[TridenT]

There is something weird there. Any decent Motherboard topology with a single PCIe 16x slot should have it coming from the Processor integrated PCIe controller, which on ALL Haswells is 3.0. No Haswell Chipset supports PCIe 3.0, they're all 2.0 - only the Processor integrated PCIe controller is 3.0.

What is a good way to test if I have PCIe 3.0 or 2.0 when I get the motherboard?

 

[Nec_V20]

I cannot understand anyone silly enough to cheap out on either a motherboard or a PSU, if they are going to fork out big bucks on other components.

 

[hackerballs]

I agree....Why do you think they call it a Mother Board for? It's what you should spend the extra money for. Not that everyone needs a 300/400 MB, but with those parts you should spend 150+ for sure.
You paired up all good components on a cheapo MB? WHY?

 

[TridenT]

I can see a bunch of low count posters who don't haveuch experience with buying cheap motherboards...

Anyone who has run high end components in a cheap motherboard before?

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Anyone who has run high end components in a cheap motherboard before?

*raises hand*

It worked fine. I wasn't overclocking or anything. My first few homebrew builds were fastest-CPU-I-could-find + cheapest-everything-else-I-could-find. Played a lot of StarCraft that way.

My "cheap" boards were mostly low end ASRock and Biostar models, though, not anything really weird. (FIC and A-Trend, iirc, were brands to avoid for a while.) I mostly saved money by skipping features, not by buying brands that were known to be crappy.

I've had a couple motherboards fail, but it's always been my fault for one reason or another.

I'd assume the cheap motherboards have the same tradeoffs cheap everything-else has - less robust construction, fewer features, shorter lists of approved/validated components, no english-language support, etc.

Now, counterfeit hardware is a whole 'nuther ballgame. Bought a whitebox video card many years ago that had a heat sink made from plastic. Crazy.

 

[el-Capitan]

K7S5A in the house.

IIRC, this was a an example how cheap boards can bite you in the ass. I remember having to exchange mine more than once.

I have a cheap $75 Biostar mobo in my HTPC. A mistake and I wish I had spent a little more.

 

[hackerballs]

TridenT


A silly thing to say as you don't know how much experience everyone has. You have posts cause you joined 7 years ago. Means little, get down off your high horse.

If you wish to place high-end components in a cheap MB, go for it dude. I notice you don't post your specs so we can see your cheap MB that you use. Ya, I thought not.

I never said they won't work, just not right for high end parts like the op is using. Don't even see that the MB in question has even "phase control" Risky with $$$ parts

 

[Nec_V20]

I can see a bunch of low count posters who don't haveuch experience with buying cheap motherboards...

Anyone who has run high end components in a cheap motherboard before?

Low count posters here you mean.

In my own case I have been a computer techie for 30 years now sonny, so I have pretty much been there and done that with regard to hardware in general and motherboards in particular.

But why one would want to put high end components onto something one could only describe as a Mutha-board escapes me.

 

[TridenT]

Yeah, OK, buddy. Talk to me when you've put high end components in cheap motherboards. They aren't going to explode or die. You've bought into a lot of marketing.

I was just wondering if anyone here has done it.

To add to the confusion of the PCI-Express x16 lane: In the manual it shows a diagram with it saying it's PCI-Express 3.0 x16. I don't know if they just did a copy-paste from another manual and forgot to change it to 2.0... or if it's really 3.0.

Again, anyway to test this?

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Yeah, OK, buddy. Talk to me when you've put high end components in cheap motherboards. They aren't going to explode or die. You've bought into a lot of marketing.

I was just wondering if anyone here has done it.

To add to the confusion of the PCI-Express x16 lane: In the manual it shows a diagram with it saying it's PCI-Express 3.0 x16. I don't know if they just did a copy-paste from another manual and forgot to change it to 2.0... or if it's really 3.0.

Again, anyway to test this?

If you actually have a rig up and running, you can find out with a utility like Sandra.

I'd imagine there's a users forum on the manufacturer's website where you could ask, as well.

 

[Meghan54]

Damn trident, you really know how to come off like a snide little kid, don't you? But what can one expect from you? Take your commentary to the csr in the comcast crap you posted....snide comments again.

Is your life so bitter that you never have anything other than diarrhea ever leave your mouth/fingers?

Sad, really. You're in for a very frustrating, bitter life if you continue in the way you presently are going. Grow up and act like you're older than 14.

 

[WhoBeDaPlaya]

I cheated - not exactly cheap motherboards. Got an open-box MSI P67A-G43 for $9.99 and an ASUS P8Z77-V LX for $29.99
On a non-cheating note, I did remember my trusty old ECS K7S5A.

 

[bononos]

The cheap $50+ mb skimp on quality. VRMs are not going to have robust design so overclocking will be difficult or out of the question. The power delivery components will be cheaper and might burn out under heavy strain. Sub $100 mb generally don't have heatsinks on the mosfets and mediocre cooling on the northbridge.

 

[OGOC]

I never said they won't work, just not right for high end parts like the op is using. Don't even see that the MB in question has even "phase control" Risky with $$$ parts

I don't see any high-end parts worth worrying about in the OP. It's an 84w-TDP, non-oc CPU, and oc is the main reason you'd want a heavy-duty motherboard.

I'd buy "cheap" motherboards all day, depending what I plan on doing with them. If someone plans on setting some records with an 8350, or wants three video cards and lots of this connector or that connector, they have to pay to play. But you don't need a Ferrari to drive 55mph.

...Funny part of that analogy is a typical $20,000 car is probably more reliable than the Ferrari.

 

[TridenT]

Alright... There's a significant downside to this motherboard that I didn't consider or heavily research (Also forgot that my current case fans are different from the ones I had years ago that all had built-in fan speed control switches for Low-Med-High) and that is... lack of 3 pin fan connections. And more specifically, good control OF those fans.

I have 4 case fans currently (Ability to have 5, but the 140mm broke and needs a new one). I cannot plug all four into my motherboard. Even then, they only go down to 50% (assuming the thing actually worked) speed.

Now I need a nice fan controller for my case. Preferably one that I can cover the LEDs up with (I like not having any lights on, period) and offers very low fan speeds without any humming/buzzing noises.

Suggestions? I was looking at a 6 fan controller by Zalman. It's $40, but gets decent reviews. Almost no fan controller out there seems to get absolute 5 eggs on Newegg.

 

[OGOC]

Alright... There's a significant downside to this motherboard that I didn't consider or heavily research (Also forgot that my current case fans are different from the ones I had years ago that all had built-in fan speed control switches for Low-Med-High) and that is... lack of 3 pin fan connections. And more specifically, good control OF those fans.

I'm surprised if that board will lower the speed of more than two fans. I thought all or at least most MSI boards only have two plugs that can actually control the speed, and the rest run at 100%.

If you want low speed but don't need to raise the speed, you could undervolt them and see if 5v makes them slow enough.

 

[hackerballs]

http://www.scythe-usa.com/product/acc/061/ks01_detail.html

I use this and it works flawlessly for a great price

 

[bigboxes]

TridenT


A silly thing to say as you don't know how much experience everyone has. You have posts cause you joined 7 years ago. Means little, get down off your high horse.

If you wish to place high-end components in a cheap MB, go for it dude. I notice you don't post your specs so we can see your cheap MB that you use. Ya, I thought not.

I never said they won't work, just not right for high end parts like the op is using. Don't even see that the MB in question has even "phase control" Risky with $$$ parts

The OP asked if anyone had any experience with cheap (read inexpensive) motherboards. What you replied with was unrelated and is threadcrapping.

 

[SPBHM]

There is something weird there. Any decent Motherboard topology with a single PCIe 16x slot should have it coming from the Processor integrated PCIe controller, which on ALL Haswells is 3.0. No Haswell Chipset supports PCIe 3.0, they're all 2.0 - only the Processor integrated PCIe controller is 3.0.

yes, that's really strange, but not impossible, the bios can easily force it to work at 2.0 if wanted, Intel could have implemented some lock to only enable 2.0 with this chipset, but it doesn't make any sense, since even some H61 boards claimed 3.0 support (when using Ivy Bridge, and 2.0 for Sandy)

as for cheap boards, I've been only buying "$50" MB's since 2005 or 2006, since that era I noticed performance was always the same (no more SIS and VIA memory controller), and quality went up overall, the chipset does almost nothing and the board construction is normally adequate... before Sandy Bridge even overclocking was acceptable many times.

maybe I'm lucky, but my cheap boards gave me less problem than when I used to buy more expensive boards (back in the socket A days), like my $50 board from 2007 still working fine, with a small overclock, every single day being used for web browsing...

so performance is the same, durability seems OK,
if you don't care about the extra connections and OC... I don't see much problem.

but, with the parts you mentioned, I think one of the cheapest Z87 boards would be nice, around $100

 

[JManInPhoenix]

Seems like a perfectly good motherboard for low end usage (email, web surfing, etc).

 

[monkeydelmagico]

I run cheapy $50.- mobo's alot. Currently working on a build for a friend using this:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813135283

A used 2600k and a couple 570's he already has for an sli rig. He's bringing the 570's over from a build that I made for him a few years ago using another cheapy AMD board. It's going to get overclocked for sure.

My sig rig is running on a ASRock Pro4 that was cheap after the microcenter discount. My previous rig also used a cheap ECS black that I ran several different AM2 and AM3 processors and several GPU's through. I always OC my boxes and the cheapy boards do OK.

Several other builds on even cheaper boards for family and friends. Everybody likes what they got at the prices they spent. yay.