Best P45 Board under $200? Get the Biostar I45 or Asus P5Q Pro or P5Q-E?

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GundamF91

Golden Member
May 14, 2001
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I wonder if I should get this Biostar I45 motherboard, or get the new Asus P5Q Pro motherboard. They're pretty comparable feature and price wise, both P45 chipset, but the I45 is top of the line Biostar board aimed at enthusiasts, and P5Q Pro is only a mainstream board from Asus. However, Asus is a much bigger brand, and the P5Q Pro has options that make it very OC friendly. I just dont' know Biostar very well, and not sure how well they make the products, but being the top of the line product, they may make it really nice.
 
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AmberClad

Diamond Member
Jul 23, 2005
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A lot of people seem to be curious about that particular Biostar. Maybe you should be our guinea pig :D?
 
Sylvanas

Sylvanas

Diamond Member
Jan 20, 2004
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The Biostar sets and FSB world record not that LN2 and FSB overclocking mean that much to the general user but it goes to show this motherboard would be a good candidate for any overclocker. Biostar are a reputable manufacturer who make solid boards that usually don't break the bank- I wouldn't worry about quality, all reports indicate it's top notch.
 
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Mucker

Platinum Member
Apr 28, 2001
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just ordered the P5Q-E only 10 bucks more than the Pro at the Egg. I'll actually be able to use the 2 pci slots vs. the Pro where I'd be limited to 1. Like the eSATA and firewire too. Both seem to be great boards for the cash.
 
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AmberClad

Diamond Member
Jul 23, 2005
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Originally posted by: Mucker
Originally posted by: GundamF91
Amber, how do you like your P5Q Pro? :)
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Yeah, how is it AC?
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The board is just fine for the most part - no big complaints. I don't feel like there's anything lacking or that there are any features on the higher end models that I'm missing out on. (The -E and -Deluxe do look nice and slick though!)

I do have some minor nitpicks. My old Foxconn board had some BIOS features I would have liked to see in this board:

- You have to set jumpers on the Pro to configure the wake-on-USB settings, instead of configuring it through the BIOS. Also, it lacks additional options for specifying whether you want to enable wake-on-USB-keyboard or wake-on-USB-mouse, or both. You have to either disable it completely, or enable it completely - there's no way of setting it to only wake on keyboard events.

- The board is set up so that your case PWR LED blinks when it's on standby - I really wish it'd just turn off completely like on my Foxconn, or that there was an option for Blink or Off.

- You can only seem to specific 1 HDD and 1 ODD in the boot priority order. So, for example, I might have a Samsung and a Seagate HDD, and a couple of Lite-On DVD drives (one burner, one ROM). All the drives are detected properly in the BIOS, but the boot priority menu only lets me change the boot order between the Samsung and the Lite-On burner. My other board can search through and boot from any of the available drives.

Really, those are my only complaints. Pretty minor stuff for the most part. It has some really handy features, like saving and loading two sets of BIOS configurations. It can reset the BIOS settings itself if it detects that changes in the BIOS options caused a POST failure.
 
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Gary Key

Senior member
Sep 23, 2005
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Flip a coin... the two top midrange P45 boards we have tested so far are the Biostar TPower I45 and ASUS P5Q Pro. I have heard a lot of good things about the P5Q-E (I would go this direction for the extra $10) and Gigabyte EP45-DS3R, both are arriving tomorrow. At the lower end of the price range I like the MSI Neo3-FR, ASUS P5Q, or the Biostar TForce TP45HP if you just want a really good stable board with decent overclocking. ASRock and abit have sent their lower end boards in for review also, those should arrive by the weekend.
 
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geek101

Junior Member
Jun 21, 2008
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I went for the 30$ discount on the P5Q Pro when getting the ASUS Radeon 4850, also looks like an overside video card wont block any SATA ports on the Pro model compared to the P5Q-E. I would like to hear from P5Q-E owners if the SATA ports placement is an issue.
 
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Mucker

Platinum Member
Apr 28, 2001
2,833
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Hey Gary! Any info about the new SiI5723 SATA controller on the P5Q-E. Better, worse, same as ICH10R?
 
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cbuchach

Golden Member
Nov 5, 2000
1,164
1
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I needed a board to replace my P5W DH to better support my new Q6600 and went with the P5Q-E. Seems like a real solid board from the early reviews and the specs are nice.


Question for you P5Q-E owners--I have an old slot loading ATAPI/PATA Pioneer DVD drive that I have always loved. Does the Marvell controller support this on the board, or am I stuck getting rid of it?
 
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cbuchach

Golden Member
Nov 5, 2000
1,164
1
81
Originally posted by: Gary Key
Flip a coin... the two top midrange P45 boards we have tested so far are the Biostar TPower I45 and ASUS P5Q Pro. I have heard a lot of good things about the P5Q-E (I would go this direction for the extra $10) and Gigabyte EP45-DS3R, both are arriving tomorrow. At the lower end of the price range I like the MSI Neo3-FR, ASUS P5Q, or the Biostar TForce TP45HP if you just want a really good stable board with decent overclocking. ASRock and abit have sent their lower end boards in for review also, those should arrive by the weekend.
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I was looking for an AT review on these boards, and that explains it.
 
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