What should be avoided when buying a new motherboard for desktop?

[uaaquarius]

Hi there,

I'm going to assemble a desktop PC. It would have Intel CPU and nVidia GPU. The main point of consideration for me is the motherboard. As I understand, I should avoid secure boot "feature". What else should I be care of? Maybe optimus?

Thanks in advance

[Kano]

Basically it would be stupid when you buy a new board that is not Secure Boot compatible (marked with Win8 logo) as this implies that it is capable of UEFI 2.3.1. You don't have to enable it but you could if you want (to try it). If you get a new board without that logo it is basically 1 year older at least. I would always boot from SSD via UEFI but for full speed with Fastboot you need a gfx card that support UEFI GOP mode. I only know that latest cards from MSI have it (by default, firmware updates would DISABLE that feature). For others best search for that first. In case you use a card without UEFI GOP the board needs legacy boot fallback to initialize the GPU which is slower and you could never try SB (when properly implemented, some allow lagacy mode + SB which is in reality complete nonsense).

[uaaquarius]

Hello Kano!
Thanks for explaining secure boot stuff!
I've not decided about particular GPU, but for sure it will be nVidia one (I'm going to play some linux steam games on it).
Also, I don't mind if the system would boot for some extra seconds longer

[deanjo]

I only know that latest cards from MSI have it (by default, firmware updates would DISABLE that feature).

FYI, my eVGA Titan also has uEFI GOP.