Best socket 939 SLI motherboard

Whats the best socket 939 sli motherboard that you can buy? I mean speed, performance, component placement... Best 939 sli motherboard for a gammer.

 

I love my Asus A8N-SLi Premium... price is reasonable, happily clocks my cpu up to 2.8ghz, its silent and has not crashed once @ 2.6ghz or below.

I decided not to go for DFI as I would prefer stabilty and ease of use over obscene overclocking ability and TBH going on my old socket A Asus and DFI the ASUS actaully oc'd higher as the DFI was just so unstable at the same clocks. Thats just my experiences.

The Asus is the best board i've had in my opinion.

 

A8N32-SLi i think... loads of overclocking options, memory up to 3.2 v which might be nice if you have oldskool bh5 like i do... bah... i wish i got that or dfi instead of A8nsli i have now...

 

i would say that my asus a8n sli premium, aside from my msi neo 2 plat has been the best board i have purchased, same as what fibre said.

I think the A8N32-SLi would be the one to go for, i was wanting it at the time of release but i just couldnt wait and got the premium.

edit due to post below* yes people have had problems with the a8n32, such as bios updating etc so a8n sli premium is the one i am reckomending

 

If you search on here, you'll find a few people have had problems with the A8N32-SLi, they all wish they had gone for the model below it!!

I personally have an Abit AN8-SLI and love it, i haven't used it in sli as i only have one gfx card, however it is very stable and has overclocked my old opteron 144 to 2.9GHz (2.8GHz 24/7 over 300htt) and currently has my X2 3800 at 2.6GHz (will go higher i think, but i'm waiting to switch over to water before i push it further). The layout is nice and logical with only the 12V 4 pin connector and a single SLi molex power not being right on the edge of the board.

If you want an alternative to Asus then definately check out the Abit offerings.

 

I've used the A8N32-SLI, A8N-SLI Premium and the DFI Expert for extended periods of time (not to extended with the A8N32, as the layout sucks and I got rid of it after 2 weeks)

I would rate them: Premium > Expert > A8N32 for a 24/7 rig
If you're really into benching and overclocking (ie spend more time doing that than actually using the system) then the Expert would be a better choice IMO

 

Funny... im asking this because ive gone through two a8n-sli premium boards, and i want a new one that wont break. Im considering going with DFI, or abit.. what do you guys think? Not sure why the boards broke.. i have a good psu (Ultra 500w modular psu)

 

hmm i think the dfi motherboard range is the best motherboard for the 939. It is the 'overclocking motherboard' (hence why nearly all extreme overclockers use it).

 

It's not SLi, but the RD 580 PURE Advantage is most likely the best socket 939 out there, even if it does have some layout woes, with a 14w chipset dissipation, the entire board can be passive, no heatpipes, no nada, with more options than a DFI and a much more well-designed power phase.

Have an A8N32 and a Rx480 PURE Innovation, so I'm not exactly insane here.

TBH, I prefer the ATi chipset. Just seems a more powerful product.

 

Imo the Abit AN8 32 - very stable, quiet & a decent overclocker.
If you want the last nth of control & the last Hz of overclock everyone is gong to recommend a DFI but you don't get anything for nothing & that means that it may be temperamental & it will certainly require very good supporting hardware.

& just to prove that ymmv contrary to the post above me having had both an RD480 board & now an RD580 board whilst the ATi runs cooler I can't help but think that the nForce is just a more mature, rounded package.
Not to mention that you can't currently do SLI on ATi chipset boards

 

I am not to clear as to thinking that this is a good PSU,(if its the very shiny one with UV cables) fair enough it looks good but cpc a while back did PSU testing using very expensive equiptment to test various PSU's to test the claims that the company's make about each PSU. They drew the claimed power from ultra PSU and it caught fire and blew up after 10seconds !!! . saying that though, I had one and i loved it. never had a problem.

 

I've tried a few 939 boards and have now settled on this Abit AN8-SLi, fantastic array of BIOS options and rock solid performance, my 165 can get 2.7GHz on air and the 146 before that got 3.0GHz without a single crash, best mobo I ever bought

(it's fanless too )

 

There are several very good socket 939 SLI motherboards - here's a list of some worth considering (in no particular order):

• DFI LANParty nF4 SLI-DR
• ASUS A8N-SLI Deluxe/Premium
• ASUS A8N32-SLI Deluxe
• ABIT AN8-SLI
• ABIT AN8-32X

Some may dislike the layout of some of these boards, but IMO, they all have some quirks - it just depends on which quirks you consider to be bigger than others.

 

I put a vote in for the DFI SLi DR-Expert, this one is amazing and I've had no issues with it at all so far, not even minor niggly ones.

 

I feel I owe it to anyone who's considering the A8N32-SLI Deluxe to say there is a divider issue on that for some people. This is across various ram types, and with CPU's ranging from venices around 3000, to Opties, to X2 4400's. It doesn't happen for many people, but for some, the dividers will be useless.

 

I would have my doubts on Abits quality control and customer service after my AN8-Ultra died and the way they handled it. Shame as i loved my last Abit board.

My DFI ran great out the box, is an overclocking monster and has been trouble free compared to the Abit. I have no experience of a s939 Asus board but all their others i have used have been great.

 

ive got a Asus A8N sli-premium, and ive nothing wrong with it, i had more troubles with my old old old Asrock mobo, those were the days

 

I'd agree with this.
Layout is always user/case preference. And with DFI its the bling too. (for some)

 

Abit is over the hill now - they were in some serious financial trouble, but that was solved by USI's acquisition. I would be very surprised if you recieved poor support again.

 

Tbh I get the feeling that this was almost a case of a self-fulfilling prophecy where the rumour/threat of a problem actually caused a slowdown in sales which led to a decrease in R&D/slow to market with new products which thereby caused an even larger drop in sales & created a very real problem that hadn't really existed before.