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Perhaps the most pertinent decision for users wishing to build a new PC or upgrade an old one, is what motherboard to choose. This is the foundation upon which the remainder of the system is built, dictating your choice of processor, memory, storage and more.
The common perception that surrounding components, including hard disks, processors and graphics cards, determine performance is spot on. However, these parts all rely on the motherboard to transfer data, placing tremendous significance on this often overlooked area.
Naturally, there are many aspects of a motherboard that dictate its effectiveness. Primarily, there can be confusion over the various types of chipset. These dictate the speed and type of components that can be supported, their configuration and ultimately the performance of your PC.
We put nine Intel motherboards through their paces. All of the submissions support the latest 0.9micron Prescott CPUs and were tested using a 3.2GHz Prescott Pentium 4 with 1GB of PC3200 Ram and a 256MB Radeon 9800 XT graphics card.
In order to determine our overall winners, we looked at several factors including value for money, speed and the number of extra features provided, such as serial ATA compatibility, network support, and more. AMD fans needn't feel left out, as next month's group test will look at motherboards for Athlon 64 processors.
Abit IC7-Max3
Aopen AX$SPE Max II
ASRock P4S55FX+A/ASR
Chaintech Zenith 9CJS
DFI Lanparty Pro875-B
Gigabyte GA81875 Ultra
MSI 865PE Neo2-P
Sapphire Axion RS300-AA38
Soltek SL865Pro FGR
More group tests:
Corporate anti-virus tools
Office Suites
Colour laser printers
Linux
Firewalls
See also:
All Motherboards
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