Is there truly a reason i shouldn't buy a 50 dollar motherboard over one that is 120?

[Midiski]

Quality appears to be an issue when it comes to cheaper motherboards especially when overclocking however, i'm currently running an MSI board (currently on newegg with a 3 star rating http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130637) with a Phenom II x4 955 BE installed which is overclocked to 3.8ghz with the vcore set to about 1.56 (won't stay stable unless i set it that high) and i've had it that way for almost 3 years now. Upon later research after i had bought the board i discovered it had issues with quality, particularly with overheating. I suppose though maybe my location has to do with something, considering i live in Washington where its usually quite cold. The hottest my motherboard ever gets during intensive tasks is 42-46 degrees Fahrenheit.

So if i've never experienced any issues with what you may call a "cheap" motherboard is there truly any reason for me to buy

this
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157501

over this?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157483

I know the first one is probably a lot nicer but if all i'm looking for is the ultra fast boot feature and some basic overclocking to go along with an i5 4690k is the 115 dollar price tag of the fatal1ty board even worth it anymore?

 

[ironmask]

There is no difference. I've found this one out. One of my 8320s run on a cheap asus board, and it has been for the last 3 years. I have an MSI Gaming 7 and a Gigabyte Gaming 7 for my 4790ks. I had originally bought a lower tier board, but I swapped them for the m.2 option. No difference. Longevity? I dunno.

 

[Insert_Nickname]

Welcome to the forums...

For Intel its pretty easy. Even the cheapest, lowest-end H81 board will run a 4790K at stock without issues.

Pick one based on what features you need, overclocking is limited to Z-series chipsets of course. So if you intend that, you'll need a board based on one of those. Preferably Z97 for LGA-1150.

For AMD, the situation becomes quite a bit murkier... :whiste:

 

[A.t]

The reliability issue within boards such as your MSI lays in the power phases. Some MSI boards are known to lack sufficient power delivery for overclocking, as such, when overclocked, they fail to deliver or worse, fail to function.

In such cases, what you should do is to do some research to find out what phases your board uses, and how much current they can deliver at how much temperature.

The board temp you're mentioning is the chipset temperature which isn't the temp of the power chokes.

If you want to overclock, you'll need a Z series board anyway. As such, I'd go with the better one.

 

[DigDog]

if you want to do extreme stuff, or if you need special features, then you need expensive motherboards.

if you want to cheap, there are many very cheap mobos which have severely reduced functionality (2 sata ports only, 1 pcie only, 2 ram slots only, etc); they are still functional for everything, including a reasonable overclock, but you need to make sure they have everything you need.

just above the "missing feature" bunch there's my target mobo, which has everything, works well.
i just got a Z97 for £40 (the gigabyte D3H) and i am very happy with it. it might fail after 7 years instead of 8, but as it should be obvious, that's irrelevant.

 

[xLegenday]

There's always some "premium" aka marketing aka components added to pricier mobos. Now, will they last longer? its supposed to.. does it happen in the real life, I guess sometimes when mobo manuf complicate too much their designs over a clean and simplier PCBs even having higher quality components they tent to fail and the simple design last longer.

 

[Midiski]

overclocking is limited to Z-series chipsets of course

Hmm, oh okay i see. Never knew that. In that case i may as well spend money on a decent Z97 board. Just not sure if it would be worth it to go over my budget for overclocking since i'm not much of a gamer. Mainly just use my pc to browse the internet, watch videos, and play around with emulators such as PCSX2. For games in general though i probably lean more towards older titles. Most newer games don't seem to interest me as much. Doesn't mean i won't play some Skyrim or GTA 5 though.

Running out of space on my 1TB Hitachi so i figured if i was going to get a new hdd i may as well update the rest of my computer and try out an Intel setup to upgrade from my phenom cpu.

Anyway, i think my question is pretty much cleared. Maybe i'll just buy a locked i5 and buy a cheap non Z-series chipset motherboard? Any ideas appreciated. Thanks everyone.

 

[Insert_Nickname]

Anyway, i think my question is pretty much cleared. Maybe i'll just buy a locked i5 and buy a cheap non Z-series chipset motherboard? Any ideas appreciated. Thanks everyone.

There is one thing you should be aware of. Z-series chipsets allow all Intel consumer CPUs to run with faster-then-spec memory. So even if you don't overclock and buy a locked CPU, there are a few advantages to buying a Z97 board. Another is that manufactures usually use Intel NICs on such boards. They're not that much more expensive either.

i3/i5 + 2133MHz memory sound good...?

 

[PhIlLy ChEeSe]

I know the first one is probably a lot nicer but if all i'm looking for is the ultra fast boot feature and some basic overclocking to go along with an i5 4690k is the 115 dollar price tag of the fatal1ty board even worth it anymore?

/QUOTE]

No! WOW ultra fast boot! Save money wait a couple seconds..........

 

[BonzaiDuck]

If you just want to build a "good computer" like the Ivy Bridge rig I just finished for my brother, you'll do fine with a motherboard in the $90 to $140 range.

But like another poster said, such a board is likely to have a lesser phase-power design. My Bro's board, an ASUS Z77-A, is a 6-phase board. It will overclock pretty well, but I wouldn't want to use such a board if overclocking is in my plan.

The lesser boards will include a moderate level of features. At the same time, shopping for a top-end board or a board that has some serious overclocking potential, you can find boards in the mid- to second tier which have some fewer features than top-end $300+ boards.

At the low end, you'll also notice that the board's BIOS may allow for fewer adjustments than you'd want to make for over-clocking.

 

[LTC8K6]

Well, one of them has a 3 year warranty, and one doesn't.

 

[piasabird]

It is all kind of hit and miss. If you don't need the extra items on a gaming or overclocking motherboard, like blue tooth or wireless or optical sound out or whatever they have like 3 long lanes for video cards, then you are paying for things you will never use. Asus had this thing that for every motherboard they would sell the basic model and a Pro model. I never bought the Pro version. What I see a lot is that people don't want to purchase the Z chipsets designed for overclocking, then they complain if the H chipset will not overclock well. All of those winey complaints should just be deleted. Intel says only the Z chipsets should be designed for overclocking.

There are 2 sides to every coin.