Biostar?

[Zim]

I've been a Gigabyte fan(boy!) for the last N years. I just like their quality, though they might not have all the motherboard tweaks and squeaks of other brands. However, I have everything assembled for my new Sandy Bridge HTPC and no Gigabytes in sight. There is, however, on NooEgg a BIOSTAR TH67+ board that has all the specs I'm looking for. I have an i5 2500K but I don't want to OC it - I just want a nice fast stable HTPC. I've never owned a Biostar, but always considered them in the same league as ECS. Are Biostar OK, and would a Gigabyte board with the same specs be a lot more expensive? Discuss.

LINK: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813138296

 

[Engineer]

My 1156 board is a Biostar and it has had no issues. I'm building a P67 1155 Biostar at the moment but won't be turning it on until tomorrow or Monday. It's the next model up, BIOSTAR TP67B+ and I paid $78.xx after rebates, discount and cash back (from Newegg also).

I'll let you know how this one goes...I've had the original (non B3) for over a month and never got around to building it. Received the B3 version yesterday (sent old one back) and started about an hour ago. Too tired to go much further.

The one thing about that board that I wish was on mine is the straight up SATA ports. For some brainfart reason, Biostar decided to place the TP67B+ on 90degree connectors (plug in from the side parallel to the board). Will see if this is an issue for me or not (no problem on that board). Only other difference is that board is mATX and the board that I have is ATX (besides H67 vs P67).

 

[Elixer]

The one thing about that board that I wish was on mine is the straight up SATA ports. For some brainfart reason, Biostar decided to place the TP67B+ on 90degree connectors (plug in from the side parallel to the board). Will see if this is an issue for me or not (no problem on that board). Only other difference is that board is mATX and the board that I have is ATX (besides H67 vs P67).

AFAIK, most board makers do that so you can fit long cards in, otherwise, they get in the way, and you lose ports.

No issues with the Biostar I got, the BIOS layout could be better though.

 

[you2]

How does the B+ differ from the XE ? Do they both support crossfire ?

 

[mb103051]

biostar builds fine motherboards...if it has the features you want and the price is right then go for it..biostar is in no way ecs quality...they are i would say up there with the tier 1 motherboards in most cases these days..ive has many biostar boards in builds and never had an issue with any of them...you might find them cheaper in price compared to asus,giga,msi, but usually the biostar wont have all the over the top features but for a good dependable board there fine...

 

[Engineer]

How does the B+ differ from the XE ? Do they both support crossfire ?

My board has Crossfire silkscreened on it so I assume so. The 2nd PCIe slot runs at 4X though (not sure if that makes a difference).

 

[Conroe]

I've been eying that board. I've had a few Biostar boards. The T-Force 6100-939 was great except a few quirks common to the nvida chipset. I still have a T-Force P965 in use. The latest BOIS says it supports the 1333 FSB CPUs. IMO that's good support. They didn't have to make the board work with chips the chipset was never meant to work with. I even have a crap ECS mobo running a BSL moded E4300 for years now. It was worth the $25 I payed for it. Biostar is a step up form ECS. For the most part they are positioned at different parts of the market.

 

[BTA]

I use an AM3 biostar board for my HTPC. Works fine.

The only issues I ever had with it were needing a bios update to get sleep/wake to work properly but that was a small issue.

 

[coffeejunkee]

AFAIK, most board makers do that so you can fit long cards in, otherwise, they get in the way, and you lose ports.

This, and it also makes routing the sata cables behind the back easier. Unless ofcourse you don't have a case with cablemanagement features.

 

[VirtualLarry]

TBH, I'd probably pick Biostar over Foxconn.

 

[mb103051]

^I would most any day

 

[Zim]

I ended up getting a Gigabyte...

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813128475

UPDATE: canceled it. Too expensive. I'll hold out a while longer.

 

[Vette73]

I prefer Gigabyte myself but have used Biostar before. I just don;t ever use asus.

 

[Zim]

I prefer Gigabyte myself but have used Biostar before. I just don;t ever use asus.

Snap! I do not like Asus either. That Gigibyte is about $20 overpriced. It's almost $150 shipped, which is just a bit silly.

 

[airdata]

I had a few gigabyte boards in a row and REALLY liked them. BUT, went w\ biostar for my current build and I'm really happy with it.

I like the on-board power/reset buttons too. Come in handy for testing and troubleshooting.

After I built my current build, I used biostar boards in 2 other builds also. I still <3 Gigabyte though. They're one of my favorite brands for anything, cases or mobo's

 

[Zim]

I ended up getting the GIGABYTE GA-H67A-UD3H-B3 from SuperBiiz.com for $132 shipped (after $15 coupon code 'PADDY15').

They also have the GIGABYTE GA-H67MA-UD2H-B3 in stock.

 

[WhoBeDaPlaya]

I recently built a bunch of systems using Biostar TA870+ and TA880GB+ mobos - rock solid, unlocked all my PII X3 740 BEs to quads and OCed them to an average of 3.7GHz with ease.