Mobo for a beginner?

[Isaac MM]

I am building my computer for the first time, all the other ones were bought ready in stores and i never had to open or to configure anything.

This is the configuration i have in mind

QX9650
9800GX2
4gb ddr3 1333mhz ocz reaper

I have no idea what motherboard i should get tho, as i said i'm not familiar with the hardware world. I want to learn how to overclock and all that stuff, but i don't know how to deal with the BIOS. I was told that the EVGA 790i Ultra SLI is a beginner friendly mobo and easy to use, can anyone tell me if that is true? If you can recommend me a mobo i would really be thankful.

 

[Winterpool]

Golly, your icon is well chosen. You really want to spend that much on your first build?

If you're going with the GeForce 9800 GX2, you probably don't need an SLI board.

Some manufacturers' BIOS menus are more intimidating than others, that's true. It would help to know exactly what you want from your build. Is it ease of construction above all? Reliability and stability? Highest overclock potential? I presume from your video card that you want to play -Crysis-? Heh heh...

Also do you need any particular 'extras' on your board (certain level of onboard audio quality, FireWire, number of SATA ports, etc)?

Most of the 'Pro' boards have features that make overclocking a bit more user-friendly, eg LED codes for diagnosis, automatic reset to 'safe' values, etc.

 

[Isaac MM]

Well i would like a board that won't cause me problems, because as i said i don't know how to use the BIOS, i think it would be frustating if my system won't turn on and i have no idea what to do, i would just like to put everything together and it works without having to play with the mobo. And yea overclocking potential is good too, i don't know how to overclock but i would like to learn. Yea this build is for gaming mostly.

And as i said i am not familiar with the hardware world, i don't know what SATA ports are or FireWire, i never opened a computer before lol.

 

[DarkRogue]

In my opinion it would serve you well to give us more details of what you're going to do and what your planned budget is. Most of us are more budget-minded and will trade off utterly extreme performance to save a couple hundred bucks.

YMMV, and of course a gaming computer means the focus is on the video card, and then build a system to support it, but are you going to game at relatively low resolutions or do you have an HDTV and will game at high resolutions and/or extreme detail settings?

 

[o1die]

I would read some motherboard manuals, available to download online. Intel and Dell boards have simple bios setups, though Intel is supposed to have a few overclocking features on some of it's newer boards. Good manuals by abit, asus, or msi will be easier to understand. Cheaper boards by biostar and ecs have less info in their's. The first sections of the manual will have info about installing the cpu and memory. Heatsinks can be tricky; installing info is available on Intel's website. If you decide to go ahead and build, be sure to do a bare post outside of the case before installing the board. Use just the cpu/heatsink, one stick of memory, and video to power up the board for the first time on a non-conductive surface, such as a phonebook or box. It's easier to troubleshoot problems outside of the case. Then once you get a good post and save the default settings in the bios, you can power down and mount the board inside the case with the memory and cpu/heatsink already installed.

 

[v8envy]

Another take on it: go with the crowd, it'll be easier to find support, troubleshoot and accomplish what you want.

Choosing the most expensive parts for your first build is a bit ill-advised. As a first time builder you may make some mistakes -- not wearing a grounding strap, not inserting standoffs correctly, forcing an AGP card into both PCIe and PCI slots... The list of potential mistakes is huge and endless. And without spare parts it's difficult to diagnose a possible DOA component. With cheaper parts it's easy to just get a spare.

You are right in wanting 'easy' though -- not just for a first build, for anything that's not intended to be a world record overclock. For this I recommend a Gigabyte P35 DS3R or DQ6, Q6600, 4G of DDR2 ram rated to run PC6400 (800 mhz) at 1.8 volts, antec EA500 psu or better, and if you really want it -- that 9800GX2. This way you'll be destroying hundreds rather than thousands of $ worth of hardware if you make a mistake. Keep in mind vendors and manufacturers will allow an RMA of anything, but if inspection shows it's abuse that killed the components rather than manufacturing defect you may still be out lots of $.

Highest end parts are not only pricey, but they're also temperamental (read: not every board will support a 45nm quad without a flash, not every board will even *boot* with highly overclocked ram never mind run right). DDR3 is not widely used by enthusiasts, so you may have a harder time finding someone having solved a problem you're having.

To sum it up: take your budget, divide it in 4, use it to build 4 computers over the next 2 years instead. Other than the first build each of those will be far faster than the best of the best of the best of the best you can build today, so you'll be ahead in 6 months, way ahead in 12, and miles ahead in 2 years. If this is a pure epeen build keep in mind that in less than 6 months mainstream rigs will at the very least keep up with it. Unless you're willing to spend $6000/year to polish your image it'll be more of a "lol look at the noob that spent too much" setup in less than 6 months.