$200-$300 mobo for i5 2500k

[rmcron5296]

3I am making the change from AMD to Intel and I was able to sell my Crosshair V Formula and 955 BE CPU. I would like to spend anywhere between $200 and $250 dollars unless an amazing deal is found. Please help me pick a good mobo because I do not know much of the offerings for Intel's mobos.

The rest of my rig is in my sig so if you have any questions about that feel free to ask. Thanks again or the help!

 

[rmcron5296]

Thank you for so many options. That is the main reason I want a high end motherboard because I enjoy tinkering with the settings for overclocking. That's the same reason I bought the Crosshair V Formula to be able to overclock the crap out of a FX8150, but that didn't pan out like I had hoped. I also plan to crossfire so I wanted the fewest amount of ports block by a crossfire setup as possible.

I have had ASUS boards most of my time with computers, but I'm open to other options. I love the Crosshair V and what it offers, I am just not as impressed with Bulldozer for gaming. I hear good things about ASRock and Gigabyte, but if there is an awesome one I'm missing, let me know 😀


My setup will remain the same pretty much other than a second GPU and a SSD down the line so if you had around 200 bucks to spend on a mobo that would be used for overclocking and gaming, which would you pick?

 

[geekapproved]

So you were unable to overclock your 8150? I heard 4.6 was a breeze.

Anyways, with a single video card, it doesn't matter if you have a stock 8150 or 5ghz 2600K, your still going to pull the same framerates when your gpu limited and the majority of games with the exception of some MMO's are gpu limited.

I mean my i3 @ 3.1 with pull the same framerates with a GTX580 in BF3 as it would with 2600K @ 3.4. Why? Because the bottleneck is the gpu, therefore ANY overclocking is just a waste of electricity and component life.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/battlefield-3-graphics-performance,3063-13.html

Pretty much even your basic $100 Asrock Z68 is going to have no problem hitting 4.3-4.5. You'll most likely be limited by your cooling first.

 

[rmcron5296]

EDIT: I know I said I was able to sell the board and CPU, but I haven't yet. It's to a buddy who is getting his money up. If I do keep my stuff, I am going to help him build a good computer regardless.

I never purchased the 8150 because I didn't really see enough improvement from my 955 to warrant the cost of the 8150. I overclocked my 955 to 4.0 very easily with the Crosshair V formula. I was moving to Intel, but I really think I might just get the 8150 and a Noctua NH-D14 and a second 6950 and go from there. I'll make an Intel rig down the line.