Quantcast
PCWorld.com is upgrading some back-end systems. Some site features, such as user registration, may be temporarily unavailable.
Subscribe to magazine

Motherboards for All Budgets

Loaded Asus boards take top honors on our chart, but low-cost models like Gigabyte's GA-K8N Pro-SLI perform just as well.

Eric Dahl

Compare ProductsCheck boxes to
A8N32-SLI Deluxe Motherboard (Athlon X2/ Athlon FX/ Athlon 64/ Sempron, nForce4 SLI X16, Socket 939, ATX, 4GB DDR, 1000MHz Bus) PCW Rating: 83.0PCW Rating: 83.0PCW Rating: 83.0

Last Rated:

BEST BUY!

1. ASUS A8N32-SLI Deluxe Motherboard (Athlon X2/ Athlon FX/ Athlon 64/ Sempron, nForce4 SLI X16, Socket 939, ATX, 4GB DDR, 1000MHz Bus)

nVidia nForce4 SLIx16 chip set, SLI dual-graphics support (16X), Four SATA-300 ports, two SATA-150 ports, two PATA ports, RAID 0, 1, 0+1, 5 support, Price when ranked: $215

Bottom Line: This model packs pretty much every feature you'd ever want into one place, with plenty of options for overclocking. But it ain't cheap.

Full Review • Test Report • Check latest prices 		Check Latest Prices
A8R-MVP Motherboard (Athlon X2/ Athlon 64/ Sempron, Socket 939, Radeon Xpress 200 Crossfire, ATX, 4GB DDR, 1GHz Bus) PCW Rating: 83.0PCW Rating: 83.0PCW Rating: 83.0

Last Rated:

2. ASUS A8R-MVP Motherboard (Athlon X2/ Athlon 64/ Sempron, Socket 939, Radeon Xpress 200 Crossfire, ATX, 4GB DDR, 1GHz Bus)

ATI Radeon Xpress 200 CrossFire chip set, CrossFire dual-graphics support (8X), Four SATA-300 ports, two SATA-150 ports, two PATA ports, RAID 0, 1, 0+1, 5 support, Price when ranked: $99

Bottom Line: The A8R-MVP is a very solid motherboard for building basic systems. Though it lacks some of the features of other boards, it's also significantly cheaper.

Full Review • Test Report • Check latest prices 		Check Latest Prices
GA-K8N PRO-SLI Motherboard (Athlon 64, Socket 939, nForce4 SLI, ATX, 4GB DDR, 2000MHz FSB) PCW Rating: 81.0PCW Rating: 81.0PCW Rating: 81.0

Last Rated:

3. Gigabyte GA-K8N PRO-SLI Motherboard (Athlon 64, Socket 939, nForce4 SLI, ATX, 4GB DDR, 2000MHz FSB)

nVidia nForce4 SLI chip set, SLI dual-graphics support (8X), Four SATA-300 ports, two PATA ports, RAID 0, 1, 0+1, 5 support, Price when ranked: $105

Bottom Line: The GA-K8N Pro-SLI has a few quirks (such as the poor placement of the SATA sockets), but it is a fully-featured motherboard with a number of features that can make life easier if you like to tweak your system for maximum performance.

Full Review • Test Report • Check latest prices 		Check Latest Prices
LANPARTY UT RDX200 CF-DR Motherboard (Athlon X2/Athlon FX/Athlon 64/Sempron, Socket 939, Radeon Xpress 200 CrossFire, 4GB DDR, 1GHz Bus) PCW Rating: 79.0PCW Rating: 79.0PCW Rating: 79.0

Last Rated:

4. DFI LANPARTY UT RDX200 CF-DR Motherboard (Athlon X2/Athlon FX/Athlon 64/Sempron, Socket 939, Radeon Xpress 200 CrossFire, 4GB DDR, 1GHz Bus)

ATI Radeon Xpress 200 CrossFire chip set, CrossFire dual-graphics support (8X), Eight SATA-150 ports, two PATA ports, RAID 0, 1, 0+1, 5 support, Price when ranked: $169

Bottom Line: A funky motherboard with a number of nice touches, the UT RDX200 CF-DR could form the core of a cool gaming system, but it lacks a number of important features.

Full Review • Test Report • Check latest prices 		Check Latest Prices
nForce4 SLI Motherboard (Athlon 64 FX, Socket 939, nForce4 SLI, ATX, 4GB DDR, 1000MHz) PCW Rating: 79.0PCW Rating: 79.0PCW Rating: 79.0

Last Rated:

5. eVGA nForce4 SLI Motherboard (Athlon 64 FX, Socket 939, nForce4 SLI, ATX, 4GB DDR, 1000MHz)

nVidia nForce4 SLI chip set, SLI dual-graphics support (8X), Four SATA-300 ports, two PATA ports, RAID 0, 1, 0+1, 5 support, Price when ranked: $129

Bottom Line: The nForce4 SLI-AMD is a solid, reasonably priced motherboard, but regrettably it omits some features found as standard on others (such as FireWire and digital audio)

Full Review • Test Report • Check latest prices 		Check Latest Prices
P5N32-SLI Deluxe Motherboard (Pentium EE/Pentium D/Pentium 4/Celeron, Socket 775, nForce4 SLI, ATX, 16GB DDR2, 1066MHz FSB) PCW Rating: 83.0PCW Rating: 83.0PCW Rating: 83.0

Last Rated:

BEST BUY!

6. ASUS P5N32-SLI Deluxe Motherboard (Pentium EE/Pentium D/Pentium 4/Celeron, Socket 775, nForce4 SLI, ATX, 16GB DDR2, 1066MHz FSB)

nVidia nForce4 SLIx16 chip set, SLI dual-graphics support (16X), Four SATA-300 ports, two SATA-150 ports, two PATA ports, RAID 0, 1, 0+1, 5 support, Price when ranked: $200

Bottom Line: The P5N32-SLI includes an innovative heat-pipe cooling system. The placement of the SATA ports right behind the second graphics card port may be a problem if you want to build a power system containing several graphics cards and hard drives.

Full Review • Test Report • Check latest prices 		Check Latest Prices
G1-Turbo GA-G1975X Motherboard (Pentium D/ Pentium 4, LGA775, 975X, ATX, 8GB DDR2, 1066MHz FSB) PCW Rating: 81.0PCW Rating: 81.0PCW Rating: 81.0

Last Rated:

7. Gigabyte G1-Turbo GA-G1975X Motherboard (Pentium D/ Pentium 4, LGA775, 975X, ATX, 8GB DDR2, 1066MHz FSB)

Intel 975X Express chip set, CrossFire dual-graphics support (8X), Four SATA-300 ports, two PATA ports, RAID 0, 1, 0+1, 5, 10 support, Price when ranked: $229

Bottom Line: The unusual four-fan cooling system of the GA-G1975X is an interesting approach to the problem of getting heat away from the motherboard, but it's only partly successful: It is a little noisy, and the bright blue LEDs that illuminate it may not appeal to all.

Full Review • Test Report • Check latest prices 		Check Latest Prices
AW8-MAX Motherboard (Pentium 4 Extreme/Pentium Extreme/Pentium D, Socket 775, 955X, ATX, 8GB DDR2, 1066MHz FSB) PCW Rating: 80.0PCW Rating: 80.0PCW Rating: 80.0

Last Rated:

8. ABIT AW8-MAX Motherboard (Pentium 4 Extreme/Pentium Extreme/Pentium D, Socket 775, 955X, ATX, 8GB DDR2, 1066MHz FSB)

Intel 955X Express chip set, No dual-graphics support, Six SATA-300 ports, one PATA port, RAID 0, 1, 0+1, 5, 10 support, Price when ranked: $230

Bottom Line: The AW8-Max has plenty of features, and the Guru software and optional Guru clock help to keep an eye on what's going on inside the case. But all these features add up to one of the most expensive motherboards we looked at.

Full Review • Test Report • Check latest prices 		Check Latest Prices
D975XBX Motherboard (Pentium D/Pentium EE/Pentium 4, Socket 775, ATX, 8GB DDR2, 1066MHz FSB) PCW Rating: 80.0PCW Rating: 80.0PCW Rating: 80.0

Last Rated:

9. Intel D975XBX Motherboard (Pentium D/Pentium EE/Pentium 4, Socket 775, ATX, 8GB DDR2, 1066MHz FSB)

Intel 975X Express chip set, CrossFire dual-graphics support (8X), Four SATA-300 ports, one PATA port, RAID 0, 1, 5, 10 support, Price when ranked: $250

Bottom Line: Not surprisingly, Intel knows how to design a clean, easy to configure motherboard. But this model had slightly lower performance scores than did others that used the same CPU and memory.

Full Review • Test Report • Check latest prices 		Check Latest Prices
955X7AA-8EKRS2 Motherboard (Pentium D/Pentium 4, Socket 775, 955X, ATX, 8GB DDR2, 1066MHz FSB) PCW Rating: 79.0PCW Rating: 79.0PCW Rating: 79.0

Last Rated:

10. Foxconn 955X7AA-8EKRS2 Motherboard (Pentium D/Pentium 4, Socket 775, 955X, ATX, 8GB DDR2, 1066MHz FSB)

Intel 955X Express chip set, No dual-graphics support, Four SATA-300 ports, four SATA-150 ports, three PATA ports, RAID 0, 1, 0+1, 5, 10 support, Price when ranked: $179

Bottom Line: The three RAID controllers, dual gigabit ethernet adapters and three PCI and PCI Express X1 slots would make this a good choice for the foundations of a server or video editing system.

Full Review • Test Report • Check latest prices 		Check Latest Prices

All motherboards were tested under Windows XP Home on systems with 256MB of RAM, a VisionTek GeForce4 Ti 4600 graphics board, a Lite-On 40X/12X/48X CD-RW drive, and an IBM Deskstar 120GXP hard drive.

  • Recommend this story?
  • 0 Yes
    0 No