Help in building a new system

Anything Gigabyte...

 

The Gigabyte GA-EG41MF-US2H, is a great 775 board. I own one myself. It has all the features you are looking for. Only downside is that to occupy 4 dimms you need to use single sidded ram modules. I dont know if other Gigabyte boards have the same limitation.

 

I think that question will always be useless. They are both very high quality and top performance brands.
What I think is best, maybe won't be for you.

So it's better to ask : Which do you 'prefer'.

In my case, allthough Gigabyte is still among the best, I prefer Asus.
Never had any issues or disadvantages using asus boards.

Just ordered an i5 with an asus p7p55d deluxe mobo, and can't wait to see how it performs.

If you don't know s**t about the different brands, just pick one, cause in general they are both about evenly good.

 

The dimms are the slots where the ram is placed into the motherboard. Some Gigabyte boards only accept single sided ram when using all 4 slots. As you have bought ram already be sure to research whether your new board will take all the ram you have. As Gen555 said Asus is also a good choice. Take a look at EVGA too, very good gaming boards.

 

Another plus for the Gigabyte boards i forgot to.mention. Dual Bios, two bios chips. If the first is corrupted or badly flashed then good bios is loaded from the bakup chip. A very handy feature i think.......

 

Asus boards have similar features, like Maximus II formula and p5q series, and some others.
In fact, they are highly recommendable for a q-series quadcore.

If you want VT-x, you need to worry about the processor supporting it, not the motherboard.

for gigabyte, GA-EP45-UD3P is a very solid and reliable board. Has dual bios, a good range of oc-features, off course VT-x if your cpu supports it.
Asus, look at p5q deluxe or Asus Maximus II formula. Both have dual bios feature, solid and rockstable oc capabilities, VT-x...

Really, for a good mobo, even between asus and gigabyte, choices are plenty.
It's getting the rest of the hardware tuned to your mobo that'll show it's true potential.
Much more important.

You always need to do some research before you start buying.
This is to ensure you have a fine tuned system.

First determine what kind of rig you want/need/can afford.
Then based on that, pick a mobo that will suit your needs. Consider things like price, features, FSB speed, SLI, Raid, (e-)SATA,...

Now you need to determine what kind of mem you need to suit the mobo : ddr/ddr2/ddr3, pc800/pc1066/pc1333, latency timings,...
And make sure your the sticks you want to buy are compatible by checking your mobo's QVL (Quality Vendor's List).
(Not listed ram could work, but you won't be certain untill you try).

Then choose a cpu that will also support same FSB speed and things like VT-x, which type (c2d/quad/i5/i7),...

If you want to oc, consider ram that's clocked slightly higher then mobo/cpu FSB.

If you're a gamer, graphics are of essence, and you will need a top-ranged card, preferably ATI (or two when SLI/crossfire).
If you're not a gamer, just buy a budget or lower ranged card for a few quid, and you'll still be better of then you'd be with onboard graphics.

Throw in a decent PSU with high efficienty output rate, and determine it's output wattage.
There are several psu calculators available on the web for free.

Some additional/custom fans or heatsinks for cooling when oc'ing (CPU, case, nb/sb, hdd, ram, gpu,...)

when you have stuff like that sorted out, you start looking at decent places to buy from.
These are just very basic steps...




In your case, you'll have to go through the list backwards. See which mobo will suit your hardware and wanted extra's/features best.

 

FYI, the Gigabyte board i mentioned does support hdmi, dvi and vga onboard. I know this because i have this board. However as Gen said if your gaming you WILL want a decent gpu, onboard isn't man enough for the job.