help me decide! EPoX or Giga Byte?!?

[EdipisReks]

i am going to be ordering a motherboard and 1.6a P4 on thursday. i don't have a ton of money, so i was looking at the cheapish but good looking Giga Byte GA-8SRX and EPoX EP-4SDA . both will cost about $85-90, and have a lot of similar features. the only real review of the boards is at tweaktown.com, and both motherboards got a rating of 9.5 out of 10. on the one hand, the Giga Byte board has a windows flashable, dual bios sytem, and a great bios for overclocking. on the other, the EPoX has a great bios for overclocking, and can give a TON of voltage to every component. i am probably going to use the wire trick to give 1.7 volts as default to the processor, so voltage isn't such a concern, really, but i am having a really hard time deciding which to get. my only experience with EPoX was a DOA kt266 board, but i am willing to put that experience behind me if the EPoX EP-4SDA is better than the Giga Byte board. if someone could give me some personal experience with either board i would really appreciate it.

thanks a lot,
--jacob

 

[EdipisReks]

^BUMP^

 

[Arithorn]

Don't take me as an expert, but I've had two Epox motherboards, and they've both been very reliable and easy to work with. Flashing with a floppy drive really isn't that much trouble, so don't take that as a factor when you weigh the two boards. Good luck!

 

[CraigRT]

I've only used 1 EpoX, and a few Gigabytes. both experiences are good, however if it was me, i'd lean a little towards Gigabyte.
some people say they make the most stable mobos on the planet.

 

[EdipisReks]

i don't even own a floppy drive anymore, so it is somewhat important to me that the gigabyte can be flashed from windows . i wish that there were more reviews of these motherboards! i am rather leaning towards the Giga Byte board, both from Giga Bytes reputation and the fact that there are good overclocks in the overclockers.com database with this board.

--jacob

 

[ahsia]

Go with the Gigabyte 8SRX. It performs better than other SiS645 boards, and has a TON of overclocking options. Check out this thread:

Gigabyte 8SRX vs. ASUS P4S333 Thread

Seems like the 8SRX is the board of choice for SiS645 chipset. I got one myself, but haven't had a chance to use it since the memory I ordered hasn't arrived yet.

 

[EdipisReks]

i read that thread, and it seems that at least some people are having trouble with FSB speeds of over 133. do you know if that is wide spread? i'm willing to give my CPU a lot of voltage with the wire volt mod, so if the problems are simply caused by the bios not giving as much voltage as is reported, i don't think i will have that problem. the overclockers database shows people getting above 133 rock solid. i bet that it has something to do with the chip not getting enough voltage, which has happened with other boards.

--jacob

 

[xxsk8er101xx]

i have a gigabyte board ... i find them to be very stable so far. I've had my computer running 24/7 for well over a couple months and still going.

Look and compare features ... epox have there problems though and arn't widely popular where gigabyte is the top 5 motherboard makers in the world. Everyone knos gigabyte, asus, and abit.

I had a epox board and i did have problems with it. it was an old mvp3 chipset mobo though so ...

but i recommend gigabyte

 

[Dink]

I'm running the GA-8SRX and I love it. It's running at 141FSB (1.6a@2256) and the memory clock at 176Mhz with 2x256mb crucial PC2100 memory. I'm very impressed with it. This is my second gigabyte board in a row (GA-7DXR) and with the quality of the 2, i'm definatly going to continue buying their boards.

On a side note about the stability of the board above 133. Mine was very unstable above 133fsb and wouldn't even post with the memory over 150mhz. I was using a generic 300watt PSU. I upgraded to a 400watt antec and now it's running 141/176. Nice improvement. Just thought i'd let everyone know, it seems like good power is important to this mobo.

 

[EdipisReks]

i have a high quality channel well tech 420 watt Power Supply, so i think i'll be good to go. i'm pissed that newegg is out of stock on the 1.6a's, though. i hope they get more by friday .

--jacob