Need Help Picking New MOBO

[sebastian869]

I'm looking to buy the i7-4790 so it would have to be 1150 it would have to use the Z97 chipset. I have always used Asus MOBOs without a problem so I'm leaning there but the other option would be MSI gaming 7 or ASRock. Not sure if the "RUF or TUF" option is better but I plan to use the comp for New release games and once the price drops I will add on another GPU for now just going with (and again still not sure was going with 770 then I read the R9 280X or the 290 are better) really would be grateful for some good feedback.

Also I'm looking to install one SSD for OS boot and any other "mission critical" purposes and i figure 256 GB should be enough. Could you guys please give me your opinion, since it would also influence the MOBO id go with. Lastly, I'm new to SSD could you guys please tell me which drive would be best. From homework I did i got:
Samsung 840 EVO 250 GB ,,,,SanDisk X210 ,,,, but those were not n.2.
Thanks.

 

[ctk1981]

If you're not buying a K model processor you dont need a Z97.....BUT....

If you want an m2 drive, your best and only real option is the Samsung XP941.....can order from ramcity.au. If you are going to go that route, then your only real choice of motherboard is the Asrock Z97 extreme6 board as it uses 4 PCI-e lanes to the cpu for the increased performance. 2 problems with this.....no SLI due to the PCI-E lanes being used. Windows 7 currently doesn't seem to pass the trim command properly. Maybe fixed later.......windows 8 does seem to work fine.

For a regular SSD drive....I like crucial or samsung, have both and both have worked fine for me. Have a 830 pro, 840 pro, and a MX500.

 

[Insert_Nickname]

If you want an m2 drive, your best and only real option is the Samsung XP941.....can order from ramcity.au. If you are going to go that route, then your only real choice of motherboard is the Asrock Z97 extreme6 board as it uses 4 PCI-e lanes to the cpu for the increased performance.

I'll second that. I find the Z97 Extreme6 to be the only Z97 board that's worthwhile. Every other board I've looked at has some sort of compromise built-in. The only "problem" with the Extreme6 is that you'll be "limited" to PCIe 3.0 x8 for the graphics card if you use the Ultra M.2 slot, but the performance penalty is negligible (~1%).

 

[voodoo7817]

I am a fan of the ASRock Extreme6 and got one for my new build. I agree with the two posters above that as long as you're looking to spend in the ~$150-$180 range, it's a great option. If you look around this board you'll see that I_N and I have actually discussed that motherboard a few times in other threads as well.

As for the SSD, even though your motherboard will support it, I don't think it's worth getting an m.2 drive at this point in time. I have an older SATA SSD that I'm reusing for my current build, but if I had to buy one today I'd probably get the Crucial MX100 256gb, mostly for price reasons. However, depending on your timetable you might want to wait a month or so, as it will be interesting to see how Samsung and the other large players respond to that release, and we could be in store for quite a price war. Here's an article about that: http://www.tomshardware.com/news/ssd-samsung-price-war-intel-kingston,27101.html.

The reason I don't think an m.2 drive is worth it right now is there is really only one option (the one ctk1981 mentioned) and it is rather expensive. For me, having the Ultra m.2 slot is more about 'future proofing' than anything else. I plan on purchasing an m.2 drive at some point in the future as I do see it being the dominant form factor, but I'll probably wait for NVMe support and some more competition which should drive the price point down a fair amount. I am hoping that once NVMe becomes standard that the PCIe SSDs will start to show a real performance difference for everyday use, rather than just benchmarks. And that's when I'll spend the money.

Getting ANY SSD in your build is more important than getting the BEST SSD in a build. The 256gb MX100 is about $115 and my guess is that you wouldn't' be able to tell the difference between that and other SSDs in that general price range. Samsung EVOs are good too and the decision between those two probably comes down to which is on sale at your retailer of choice.

 

[bonehead123]

ASRock E6: ++++
SSD : ++++ now
m2...when the price comes down