There's nothing wrong with a Biostar motherboard. True, their cheapest models are very cut rate and have compromises galore done to them, but that's true of every motherboard manufacturer, incl. Asus, Gigabyte, MSI, etc.
And I know it's easy to allow history from 15 years ago color what perceptions one may have today, but today's Biostar is nothing like what Biostar was in the mid-to-late 1990's. Even ECS has shown dramatic improvements in the last 5-10 years with the durability of their boards. I've built dozens of computers with both Biostar and ECS boards and they're all still trucking along. I've had more failures from boards in use from Gigabyte and Intel than I've had from ECS and Biostar.....but then again, the systems built from ECS and Biostar tended to be very low end, entry level computers and are never stressed, while the mid level and higher computers tend to be pushed/abused by "knowledgeable" owners.
I'd considered building my current SB computer with a Biostar board, but only bought a Gigabyte because of the sale price Microcenter had on it, trouncing the Biostar's price by quite a bit.
The Biostar brand reminds me of the progress Subaru has had over the decades.....search the Subaru 360 as a prime example of what Subaru first exported to the U.S. A fine example of cheap, cheap, cheap and not so good, it was a sub-1000 pound car with a 360cc 2-stroke engine that was horrible at its best. I spent a summer with one in the early 1970's.
But today, Subaru is completely different, just like Biostar and its offerings. But other horrible motherboard brands from days past....like FIC, PC Chips....still are horrible and cheap.
But Gigabyte's as good as anyone else. Just don't cheap out too much on the motherboard and give up features you may find useful later, like a rear eSATA port or enough USB ports or the like. Remember, as the price decreases, so do the features and the parts on the board used in its construction (fewer solid caps used, fewer VRM's, etc.)
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