Building new gaming system, need suggestions on MB

[blue_wister]

Hi all, apologies if this has been dealt with before but I didn't see anything in the last 3 pages of threads.

I'm considering upgrading my current AGP/P4/DDR system for budget reasons, but I'm also mulling over the idea of starting from scratch.

The motherboard issue seems to have gotten more complex since I built my last machine 3 years ago, and so I'm having a tough time deciding on what to get.

I'm on a budget and cant' justify the $300 for a board. I'm looking for something around $100 or less that will give me good performance and reliability, without all the bells and whistles. My system is mostly used for games like Bioshock, NWN2, Oblivion, Call of Duty4, etc. so I need to have a strong system. I would like to go PCI-E for obvious reasons (though I hear people refer to PCI-E 2.0? should I consider whatever that is?)

Incidentally, what benefits do you get by spending a fortune on a MB? I would think your margin of return would be minimal - that extra money would probably be better off being put towards a beefier CPU or graphic's card, no?

Thanks in advance for any help!

 

[o1die]

Start over; I've never seen 2 gigs of memory for $40 until now. You don't list your current system; that may be why you haven't gotten any responses. I suggest a g31 chipset board for Intel cpu. You could go with 21xx or my choice, the 6750. Fry's electronics stores has this combo for only $198.99. If you want to spend a little more, the p35 boards by abit or gigabyte will give you some overclocking settings in the bios; use with with the 8600gt video card for around $110 or so.

 

[Shadow703793]

Go with a P35DS3L+ E2180.

Here are the 3.2Ghz results for E2180:
http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=bdezm31g2zb&thumb=4
http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=ftmobskndyt&thumb=4
http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=4mp2jnommvw&thumb=4
http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=1bdcoadcns3&thumb=4
http://valid.x86-secret.com/show_oc.php?id=282308

 

[Shadow703793]

The benefit of spending more money on a good Motherboard is that they usually have more OCing potions. This enables you to OC the CPU to great extents. The P35-DS3L/R are really good OCing boards for around $100. The E2180 is about $80. For the GPU I recommend a 8800GT if possible.