In your experience what are the toughest motherboards?

[HeXploiT]

What in your experience are the best motherboards to handle punishment?
I'm not talking about the absolute best overclockers or a specific board with all the latest gadgets but the best highest quality motherboards when it comes to being able to take the abuse of heat and overclocking and keep on ticking.
I might or might not be talking about manufacturers.
I'm so sick and tired of RMAing "performance" boards because they can't handle my abuse.

 

[akhilles]

ASUS/Gigabyte with GB a tad higher. Case in point, when bios flashing fails, most boards would need rma. Not ASUS/GB. ASUS uses either CD/floppy. GB uses USB drive in addition the CD/floppy. You just insert the drivers CD, boot it up, it will flash back to the default BIOS on the disk. Abit = worst offender where one bad flash = instant RMA or buy a bios chip from ABIT.

Aside from bioses, ASUS/GB/MSI/DFI/ABIT all make tough mobos. However, you get what you pay for. If you get a $50 board, what do you expect from it? A high-end board comes with more than the bells & whistles. i.e. more phase power regulation = more stable cpu power. Also, better cooling. i.e. the NB sink on DFI X38 is the only stock one I'd use. It's similar to Thermalright's.

 

[HeXploiT]

I have a very high quality PSU and have been using the 122-CK-NF68 680i which I originally paid $270 for and have since rma'd 4 times. When it worked it was an amazing board but an rma every 3 months kills me. I think this goes to show you don't always get what you pay for.

 

[Cutthroat]

Well the 680i chipset is notoriously buggy as well, your story doesn't surprise me, I went through a couple too. Try an Intel chipset on an Asus or Gigabyte board, you'll likely be happier.

 

[krnmastersgt]

Or upgrade to 780i? I've worked with 680is and yes they are incredibly annoying/break down often. I haven't had any problems with my 780i but maybe I just got lucky? I hear lots of problems with this board are common too but I have yet to come across one until recently, can't even ID my culprit either. But yeah Gigabyte with an Intel chipset will probably relieve a bit of that stress you seem to have worked up from the 680i.

 

[saveyourgreenbacks]

Buy this and never look back! I've used Gigabyte P35 based boards for several builds and overclocked all of them. Plain and simple these boards just work and they keep working.

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moderator allisolm

 

[tcsenter]

Originally posted by: akhilles
ASUS/Gigabyte with GB a tad higher. Case in point, when bios flashing fails, most boards would need rma. Not ASUS/GB. ASUS uses either CD/floppy. GB uses USB drive in addition the CD/floppy. You just insert the drivers CD, boot it up, it will flash back to the default BIOS on the disk.

lol! Go tell the folks at ASUS Forums how secure and reliable ASUS BIOS flashing features are. The first five stickies at ASUS Forums are warnings about the uncommon failure risks when flashing the BIOS on ASUS boards, using the ASUS utilities and instructions. Numerous motherboards have update warnings on their own official BIOS download pages along the lines of "Do NOT use this or that utility version or method of updating the BIOS. Instead, only use this other specific utility version or method, else your BIOS will be corrupted and require service."

Of course, if you are using the ASUS Update Utility to locate BIOS updates rather than going to the BIOS download page in your web browser, you will never see these special update warnings or instructions, which is why so many persons have bricked their boards using ASUS Update.