Asus P5Q vs Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3L vs ECS P45T-A

[TASADAR-F]

My personal opinion:

Both Asus and gigabyte are the best motherboards.
8 years ago Asus was lots better than gigabyte (mainly Asus was more stable and more BIOS updates for fix problems and support new cpu, Asus test his motherboards better than other comanies).

Now both are very very similar. I prefer Asus because Asus have more BIOS updates and I think asus is a bit solid(stable) than gigabyte.

Analisys of motheboard differences.

realtek ALC1200 vs ALC888. Are very very similar They use the same driver in my Ubuntu alc1200 appear as ALC888 because use the same driver.

LAN atheros atl1e vs realtek 8111C. Both are gigabit and support linux good.



BEST OF ASUS.
best bios updates and 8 phases.

Best of gigabyte
dual bios and price.

Asus or gigabyte are a very very good buy.
For me ECS is not a good choose.

I'm not a english speaker.Sorry for my bad english

[Kano]

There is no dual bios on gigabyte anymore. Only the old boards had two chips, now there is not even a socket for the chip anymore. But basically the boards are working.

[TASADAR-F]

In the gigabyte's web appear this feature in this model:

http://www.gigabyte.com.tw/Products/Motherboard/Products_Overview.aspx?ProductID=2844

[Mguel]

Thanks a lot TASADAR-F for the detailed answer (and your English is good for me , I'm not a native English speaker neither).

I believe I'll stick with the P5Q then, although the price of the gigabyte is tempting... but if asus is more solid, more efficient with the 8 phase, and has more features (that maybe in the future I could use), considering I don't change my desktop regularly... I think its the best option.

I'll probably start putting the pieces together on Thursday, when I finally will have all the parts (the CPU E8500 and the nVidia GF-9800GT arrive to the store on Thursday), so maybe I'll ask you more questions then.

Thanks again,
Mguel

[Aradreth]

Didn't see this answer before:


Motherboards are not only the North Bridge chipset. There are problems with p5q that don't have to do with p45 chipset: ie network (Atheros) and Audio (Realtek ALC1200), which are different from the other p45 MoBo I mention (Realtek 8111C and Realtek ALC888). The solutions mentioned for the network problem requiered compiling the kernel which I would like to avoid, and prefer an out of the box working system.

I thought you were only worried about the sata problems mentions on the first page, I didn't bother going further into the thread. As for the network Atheros is one of the better wireless chips to get (at least in my experience). Can't really comment on the sound though never had a 8111C.

Both Asus and gigabyte are the best motherboards.

Yup they tend to be the best MB makers if you want an enthusiast board.

[Mguel]

Finally I kept the P5Q and it worked as you mentioned me.

Only changed the bios HDD setting from ide to achi... and after a usb not detection I changed the usb setting on bios mentioned on http://linuxrevolution.blogspot.com/...therboard.html and that's it... the system working great.

Now I'm trying to activate audio output through hdmi... but it's only an option I would like to have to the 5.1 direct output I have allready working. It's not really an issue

My whole system:
ASUS P5Q - Intel? P45 / ICH10R
CPU INTEL CORE 2 DUO E8500 - 3.16 GHZ 1333 MHZ DUAL CORE BOX
MSI V146-09S GEFORCE N9800GT T2D512-OC PCIE 16X DX10 512MB
RAM Corsair XMS2 DDR2 2Gb (2x1Gb) PC6400C4DHX
HDD 500 gb sata2 western digital 7200rpm
TOPOWER M2 600W ATX 12V2.0 20+4 PINES BLACK
Antec Three Hundred Case
Samsung LN37A450 37" working @ 1360x768px through HDMI cable
Kubuntu 8.10 w/KDE 4.2 (beta)

So thanks a lot for all the help and assistance!!!

Cheers,
Mguel