Alternative mobo around the £80 (inc VAT)

[doyler78]

Sorry should have put that in the mobo section.

I'm looking for an alternative motherboard as my replacement AM3 mobo was DOA. I now have no confidence in this board so looking for an alternative.

The board I'm looking to replace is a Gigabyte GA-880GA-UD3H

It will be used with an Athlon II x4 640 Processor. It will be used for running VM sessions and general photo editing (nothing too technical). My current setup as in my sig has lasted me for 6 years so I just go for things that will last a while hence why I made the hardware choices I made. I will want to use a Phenom x6 at some point as an upgrade route so the board will need to support it.

I'm planning on using onboard graphics and will add a graphics card later on just to add a second screen for the virtual machine or for following tutorial on one screen and doing the work on the other screen - you get the idea. I will not be gaming on it so crossfire is not required.

I chose a board with USB3.0 and SATA 3.0 because I was thinking about things maybe 3 or 4 years down the line and wanted it there just in case I needed it.

I don't really want to spend much beyond £80 however if there is a compelling reason to do so I will consider it.

It's unlikely that I will be buying from OCUK (shipping charges too high) so any boards that I might be able to get elsewhere (of course no links to competitor sites but board names will be great) can be suggested.

 

[95thrifles]

You've been unlucky with one board, chances of you getting another DOA is v slim indeeed, I'd recomend you just RMA the board and get same, if you really must change then just go for the similarly priced Asus avaiable in Ireland, so long as it has an 880G chipset it will have integrated gfx, check the specs, most will have USB3/SATA 6Gbs too

 

[doyler78]

It's 2 boards now. The original and it's replacement that were both DOA. That's why I'm being put off by this board. I'm concerned that there is a batch of these boards which are dodgy. I wanted to get this sorted before the Christmas holidays as I would have times to get all the setup issues sorted as I have leave then and waiting for the RMA to go through will mean I will not get this board back before Christmas so with my misgivings over the board and the length of time to wait for the replacement board with the holidays thrown in was what was pushing me towards taking the hit on another set of postage and gettting the board early next week (assuming the bad snow we have here at the min clears).

Now I'm not so sure.

Should have also said that in my original request for boards the main reason I was asking was because at some point in the future I will be looking to overclocking the Phenom x6 that I will eventually buy. So it has to be a decent overclocker.

 

[cmndr_andi]

I would give this board a good look - it has decent onboard graphics, but crucially it should be pretty solid for overclocking. It doesn't support USB3 or SATA 6G - but when you do need these features you can simply by an add-in card like this.