Yet another one: Please Scrutinize :D

[H a r m l e s s]

Hello all, I am overjoyed to find this site. Upon reading reviews both here and elsewhere, I have chosen the following parts:

AMD Athlon 64 3500+ w/512 Cache (Retail Box) 349.95
AMD retail Heatsink and Fan
Kingston HyperX 1GB PC3200 Dual Channel DDR Kit(2 x 512MB) 239.95
Seagate 80GB Barracuda 7200.7 Serial ATA w/NCQ, 8MB Cache 84.95
NEC-Mitsubishi ND-3520A 16x16 Dual Layer DVD+/-RW w/Nero,Black OEM 89.95
Sapphire Radeion x800xl 256MB GDDR3 PCI-E w/Tv-out, DVI 449.95
(Prices are in Canadian Dollars at www.memoryexpress.com)

I am in a dilemma over the motherboard.
Site in the 939 mobo section, I am deciding between the
1. Asus A8V-E Deluxe w/ DualDDR400, 7.1 Audio, Gigabit Lan + WiFi-g, SATA, PCI-E x16
2. MSI K8N Neo4 Platinum/SLI w/ DualDDR400, SB Live! 7.1 Audio, Gigabit Lan, PCI-E x16 SLI
3. Gigabyte GA-K8VT890-9 w/ DualDDR400, 7.1 Audio, Gigabit Lan, SATA, PCI-E x16
4. Gigabyte GA-K8NF-9 w/ DualDDR400, 7.1 Audio, Gigabit Lan, PCI-E x16

I have read that the A8V-E is not a good buy due to its lack lustre performance when compared to other mobos, despite being a top 10 card on pcword. Can anyone confirm this? Also, I have read that the k8vt890-9 board causes a 10fps drop when used with d3d sound. I wish to have the sli MSI board; however I think it would be a waste of money since i'm getting a radeon card.

Thank you for taking the time to help me.
H a r m l e s s

 

[ProviaFan]

Gigabyte boards are good, but ASUS boards and other boards with the Nvidia NForce4 Ultra (or SLI) chipset are also worthy of your consideration. I have an A8N-E waiting for a CPU, but have heard good things about its stability. DFI is supposedly very good for overclocking, but can be finicky.

 

[H a r m l e s s]

Provia, what cpu are u getting?
Thanks for the reply.

I just read for the a8v-e board it Supports up to processor stepping: E3 while other boards support E6. Does this matter?

Please keep the responses coming :thumbsup:

 

[ProviaFan]

I'm getting an X2 4400+ - the multitasking capabilities will be greatly used, and I don't game much. For best price / performance, I suggest a 3200+ "Venice" core CPU along with a board that supports it (that's where the E6 stepping comes in), but I'm not sure if this is the same value in terms of Canadian pricing as it is in the US. For that matter, I'm not sure how the 3500+ Venice compares to the older 3500+ in pricing for you, but it's worth checking out.