SHOOTOUT: 25 Motherboards tested

How we tested the motherboards



We tested out the most feature rich boards available by different vendors for various processor platforms. The shoot out features boards for Pentium 4 PGA 478 processor, Pentium 4 LGA 775 processor, AMD Athlon 64 bit 754 pin and AMD Sempron/ Athlon processors. 

The tests run on all platforms were similar. We ran Business Winstone 2002 and Multimedia Content Creation Winstone 2003 to test out these platforms on real world applications. 

To test the total PC performance we used PC Mark 2004 that uses an array of simulated tests to give a consolidated score on the system performance.

And finally we used 3D Mark 2003 to test out the system performance on Direct X 9 and Quake III to test the 3D performance of the system.

The processors used respectively for each category of boards was Pentium 4 3.4 GHz Prescott, AMD Sempron 2400+ and Athlon 64 2800+.

The hardware used for boards supporting these processors was a Gainward Geforce 5900FX card with 128 MB RAM and AGP 8X, a Seagate 40 GB 2 MB cache PATA HDD and 512 MB DDR 400 RAM.

For the LGA 775 based boards, we used an Intel Pentium4 3.6 GHz Prescott, Gigabyte GV-NX59128D PCI-Express x16 card with 128 MB RAM based on the Nvidia 5900 chipset, Maxtor 250 GB 16 MB cache buffer HDD and 1 GB DDR II RAM(wherever supported).

Features Considered



We also considered the following features for evaluation 

Onboard RAID: Here we considerd the what was the kind of onboard RAID supported. It included both SATA as well as PATA RAID.

Onboard Sound / No. of channels: Most motherboards these days are coming with 6 channel sound. Here we gave higher weightage to boards with 8 channel sound and

S/PDIF support.

FireWire Support: Here we looked for the type of Firewire port on the board. FireWire2 (1394b) boards got higher weightage here.

Networking: Here we took into account the extra networking features like multiple RJ-45 jacks and onboard WiFi.



No. of PCI Express Slots: Here we looked for available PCI Express slots. Higher slots were given more weightage. This weightage is not taken into account for boards that did not support PCI Express.

Overclocking support & IrDA: The Motherboards with Ir and Overclocking support got higher weightage



Front Panel USB/ Sound: Here the type and number of connectors on the front panel determined the weightage.


Lastly, we took into account the prices and warranty of each board. Lower price and higher warranty are better. We used the Brown Gibson model to arrive at the weightages of each parameter in the comparison.

AMD Athlon 64 Based Boards

Gigabyte GA-K8VM800M



Just lost out a bit on the features, otherwise this board from Gigabyte had all the ingredients of being the winner. Good performance, neck to neck with the winner, is complimented by a great price point of about 6k. This makes it a lucrative buy for the performance oriented buyer who is not concerned about the features much.

But, though the mother board is not overflowing with features it does not disappoint either. Some of the prominent features include DDR 400 RAM support, SATA RAID and 6 channel sound. 

Looking closely at the performance we find that the board loses a bit on the regular application benchmarks from the winner, but performs better in Direct X and OpenGL tests. This makes it an obvious choice for a gaming freak over the

MSI board. RQS# E65 or SMS 131065 to 9811800601

MSI K8N Neo Platinum Edition



MSI was just behind the winner in the Intel LGA775 category, but it manages to come on top here. It manages to do this with a good set of features and a consistent performance. Dual IDE RAID ( SATA and
PATA), combined with 8 channel sound and FireWire support take it way ahead of all the other boards in its category in terms of features. 

The board performs quite well on real world applications and PC Mark 2004 but fizzles out on 3D mark a bit. The results here were a little low than expected. But because of its strong performance in the other benchmarks, it was able to make up

all its lost ground and stood out as the best performer along with the Gigabyte GA-K8VM800M.

The best part is that all these features are packed in a neat price tag of under 10k. This price tag also plays a very important role in bringing the board to the top of the lot. But, if you do not care for features, you may want to consider Gigabyte GA-K8VM800M that offers you similar performance with a 30% lower price.

RQS# E66 or SMS 131066 to 9811800601

MSI K8MILSR



Unlike its counterpart the K8N Neo, K8MILSR is based on the VIA K8M800

chipset. This gives MSI the leverage to reduce the price but it takes a hit on

performance. Though it gives average scores in the Business and Content Creation

Winstones, it fails to perform in the 3D tests. The scores go well below average

in 3D Mark as well as Quake III arena. 

Thus, this board is well suited for users who would want to use it for

regular productivity applications like Microsoft Office or Dreamweaver. But, we

would not recommend this board if you are a gamer. You can have a look at the

Asus K8NE- Delux, which is the best performer amongst all the boards in the AMD

64 754 pin category.

The

board loses out just a bit on the pricing front also. It is a little costlier

than the corresponding Krypton and Gigabyte offerings. A more aggressive price

offering could have taken it a step closer to being a winner since it will be

competing in the office space that is very price sensitive. RQS# E67 or SMS

131067 to 9811800601

KRYPTON K8NHA-M



Based on the CrushK8S(nForce3 250) chipset by NVIDIA the Krypton is the

second best performer after the Asus K8N-E deluxe. This board is an above

average performer in BW as well as MCCW, but it really takes off while running

3D mark and Quake III Arena. So much so that in the collated results it stands

second in performance. Its consistent performance pulls it through. 

But

performance, is not the only thing that decides the best buy. It has a decent

set of features and the price of the board is also the lowest at 5600. It loses

heavily because of warranty. While all the motherboard manufacturers are

providing 3 year warranty on their board, Krypton offers only one year . It

could actually have been the Editor's Choice in this category if it were to

offer a 3 year warranty. RQS# E68 or SMS 131068 to 9811800601 

Asus K8V-X



Similar pricing and a similar chipset as the MSI K8MILSR the Asus K8V-X gives similar performance too. It gives a little less performance in MCCW thus making it more suitable for regular office applications rather than demanding multimedia applications like

Soundforge, Macromedia Director and Lightwave. 

The same is proven by its relatively lower performance in PC Mark also. Though it tries to make up its loss of performance through features like SATA RAID and 6 Channel audio with

S/PDIF out, these features are not enough to bail it out of the performance loss it faces. Finally, the price of the board is just a bit high as compared to MSI and Krypton against whom it is competing.

RQS# E69 or SMS 131069 to 9811800601

Asus K8N-E Deluxe



Unarguably the best performer of all the mother boards tested for the AMD Athlon 64 754 platform. Though it zooms ahead in performance it loses out on other features that you come to expect from a motherboard of this caliber. 

Though the board offers 6 SATA ports (2 more than the MSI K8Neo), it does not have PATA RAID onboard which are there in the MSI Neo. Features apart, the biggest setback comes in the terms of price. It costs more than 11k, which is a little too much if you compare it to the sub 10K board from MSI that is based on the same chipset and offers similar features. Asus needs to pull up on the price on this one a bit. If you can spend that bit more, this is definitely the board to buy .

RQS# E70 or SMS 131070 to 9811800601

Intel Pentium LGA775 Based Boards

Gigabyte GA-81915G-MF



Big board in a small package. This is one of the two 915 chipset boards in the micro ATX form factor. But the good part is that it does not sacrifice many features. Starting from onboard graphics to FireWire, it has all that most users will need. 

It has one of the lowest scores in the tests, but if you are concerned about the size of the machine then this is definitely a good option. RQS# E71 or SMS 131071 to 9811800601

MSI 915P Neo 2 Platinum Edition



Another one of the 915 chipset based boards, with most features and performance just a bit lower than the best. 

It is the best performer in the Multimedia Content Creation Winstone making it an ideal board if you want to use the board for high performance applications like Lightwave and Director. This would be able to render the graphics faster for these apps.

This is where the onboard RAID will also come handy. It is one of the few boards that offer both SATA and PATA IDE

RAID onboard. At 12.5 K the board is a little expensive. But remember the Asus P5GD2 that performs just a bit better costs about 7K more. RQS# E72 or SMS 131072 to 9811800601

MSI 915G Combo



Based on the Intel 915G platform, this board offers on-board graphics in addition to the PCI-Express x16 slot. Though extremely feature rich with on-board Giga-bit Lan, 8 channel audio and DDR2 RAM support, it misses out on a firewire port and wi-fi support. But, you would not miss these features much because of the price. This is the cheapest of the boards that support the Intel LGA775 prescott processor. 

It loses out on the performance front with lower scores in graphic intensive tests such as 3D Mark and MCCW, but it fares quite well in the Business Winstone. Thus, a good buy for the price sensitive business user who is not concerned much about the graphics . RQS# E73 or SMS 131073 to 9811800601

Intel Desktop Board D915GAV



Based on the Intel 915 chipset, the G in the model number stands for integrated graphics. It also has a PCI express x16 slot also if you want to have your own way with graphics. This board uses DDR 400 RAM instead of DDR II supported by other motherboards. It gives equivalent performance with the other 915 based boards. As a matter of fact it is one of the top 5 boards in performance. 

The only place you can differentiate the board from the others is with the amount of features on offer and the pricing. Compared to others it is more of a vanilla board with all the essentials built in except a network port. If you need more in terms of features then you better look towards the boards from Asus and Gigabyte. RQS# E74 or SMS 131074 to 9811800601

Intel Desktop Board D925XCV



One of the two boards in the shootout on the 925 chipset from Intel. The X is the performance version. But, the performance we got from these boards was comparable to the 915 chipset boards in the shootout. In the consolidated standings it stands second overall. 

It performed among the best in this category of boards. In PCMark where it was the clear winner, but, somehow, it failed to impress in the 3D Mark and Quake III arena, and these tests were the reason why it just missed being the winner amongst this set of boards.

At 8.5k it stacks in quite a lot including Gigabit and Firewire ports on board and could appeal to enthusiast who wants all basic features, with good performance at a budget price. RQS# E75 or SMS 131075 to 9811800601

Asus P5GD2 Premium



The best performer and one of the most feature rich boards of the lot. The P5GD2 comes out on the tops in its category of boards. It supports everything that you would need in your machine besides an IRDA or Bluetooth adapter and onboard graphics. You have only a PCI Express x16 slot for graphics. It even has a 1394b or firewire 800 port which is a rarity in devices, let alone motherboards. Moving to performance, it is the best performing board of the lot. It is among the Top 3 in almost all the tests and tops in in Business

Winstone. 

One place the product loses out is the price. At 19.5 K it is the most expensive motherboard. Strictly, meant for the enthusiast who does not mind spending a little more for all the bells and whistles onboard. RQS# E76 or SMS 131076 to 9811800601

Asus P5GD1-VM-UAY0Z



Based on the Intel 915G chipset this board from ASUS is similar in features with the Gigabyte GA-81915G-MF. On the features front it loses out on Gigabit LAN as well as a S/PDIF audio connect. 

Though a little less in features, this board is big on performance compared to the Gigabyte mother board. It scores over the it in both Business Winstone as well as MCCW. But, that increase is only marginal. Finally, these marginal results combined give about 5% higher cumulative result in favor of the Asus board.

Straight in competition with the Gigabyte you should go for this board if you want a little more on performance. But, if you need more features then Gigabyte is a much better option that is available for about Rs.400 lesser than this board. RQS# E77 or SMS 131077 to 9811800601

Intel P4 PGA478 Based Boards

Gigabyte 8I865GVMK



At Rs 3900, the intel865GV chipset board performs well in office apps, but not in graphics intensive apps. In office apps test it stood second amongst all the P4 boards. It lags only 4% behind the Asus P4C800-E deluxe in BW benchmark and 3% in Multimedia CCW. In graphics intensives test, such as 3D Mark2003 and Quake3, it performed way below the level as the test were carried using on board graphics as the board doesn't even have an AGP slot. Overall, a low-end, economically priced board that performs well in non graphic apps. RQS# E78 or SMS 131078 to 9811800601

Gigabyte GA-8I865PE-TW



Based on the Intel 865PE chipset, this board is the only one in the shootout that came with a 5 year warranty. At Rs 7500, it has 8 channel sound with jack sensing and 8 USB ports. But, there are only 2 SATA connectors which is less when compared with other boards in the same category. Its performance is definitely above the other 865 chipset based boards, performing the best in all the tests among all the boards, but just marginally. The biggest performance jump comes in the graphic intensive benchmarks, 3D Mark and Quake III arena. It could have been the Editor's Choice if it was better priced. RQS# E79 or SMS 131079 to 9811800601

MSI 865GVM2-LS



The Intel 865GV chipset based MSI 865GVM2-LS is the low-end offering by MSI. Priced at Rs 4500 is slightly more expensive than the Gigabyte 81865GVMK (a difference of Rs.600), even though there s not much difference between the two boards as far as the performance and specs are concerned. The only benchmarks in which the MSI board was beaten by Gigabyte 81865GVMK were PC mark by a small margin of 2.5% and in Business Winstone by 7%. Apart from these in rest of the benchmarks both the boards gave a performance at par with each other with very minor variation.

Over all, a low end board, with average performance and no AGP slot. Can be used as a good alternative in office environments where there is not much you of graphic intensive work. RQS# E80 or SMS 131080 to 9811800601

Krypton I8600G



The Krypton I8600G is strong front, when compared with other boards in the same category it is good in terms of performance and features, it is based on the Intel 865G chipset. Priced at Rs3525 (Plus Taxes) it is the cheapest board in this category. But the performance of the board is board is anything but cheap.

It is almost at par with the best performance boards in this category. And offers quite a bit on features too, including on-board graphics as well as two SATA ports. Thus, great performance, sufficient features and a very aggressive price make this board a winner in this category. RQS# E81 or SMS 131081 to 9811800601

Biostar BI8700P



Features galore at a great price point are symbolic of this board from Priya. With scores marginally lower than the best performing boards, it offers a lot of other features that are not offered by many boards in this category. For instance this is the only board in the category to offer on board Wi-Fi connect. When we compared its test results with the other P4 supporting 875 chipset based Asus P4C800-E we found that the only in one of the tests i.e. 

3D Mark2003 it managed to beat the Asus board by a margin of 17%. In all the other benchmarks the Asus board scored over this board. Again, a very aggressively priced board with unmatched features in this category that will get the enthusiast going. RQS# E82 or SMS 131082 to 9811800601

Gigabyte 8VM553M-RZ



Falling in the same price segment as Gigabytes's 8S651M-RZ, the VIA P4M533 chipset based board falls in the lower segment, but lags behind 8S651M-RZ in terms of performance. In terms of performance the board is one of the lowest performers out of all the boards supporting P4. The only benchmark in which it was able to beat the 8S651M-RZ is 3D Mark2003; it managed to win by a margin of 21%. 

The performance hit that it takes can be justified by the 266 Mhz memory that it supports. It is lowest amongst all the boards in this category. Even the 8S651M-RZ supports 333 Mhz memory. This board can serve as a low-cost alternative to the budget buyer. RQS# E83 or SMS 131083 to 9811800601

Gigabyte 8S651M-RZ



Based on SiS 651 chipset the Gigabyte 8S651M-RZ is the cheapest board that we received. It is priced at a mere Rs 2800, which is the same as the Gigabyte 8VM533M-RZ. On the performance front it performed much better than its competitor the 8VM533M-RZ in most of the benchmarks except 3D Mark2003 which is a DirectX based graphics test. In BW and MCCW the board bests 8VM533M-RZ by 17% and 20% respectively, but only in 3D mark did the 8S651M-RZ lag behind by 21%, which is a bit surprising. 

Thus, this board it not well suited, even for an occasional gamer. All in all a board that is

very easy on your pocket and the performance is also not bad considering the price and other players in the same segment.

RQS# E84 or SMS 131084 to 9811800601

Asus P4C800-E Deluxe



With 4 SATA connections, FireWire support, Gigabit LAN and dual channel RAM this board boasts of impressive features and performance. Obviously good things come at a price, this being the most expensive board in this category at more than 14k. The Intel 875P chipset based board is even more expensive than most of the Intel 915 chipset based PCI express boards in the shootout.

In performance this board is far ahead of the Krypton BI8700P, which is almost half its price, and is the only other board based on the 875 chipset. It offers SATA/PATA RAID and AGP Pro that are not offered by most of

the boards in this category. RQS# E85 or SMS 131085 to 9811800601f

AMD Sempron Based Boards

Gigabyte 7VM400M-RZ



The low-end offering by gigabyte is based on the VIA KM400 chipset, comes at an affordable price of Rs 3200 and a three year warranty. It ceases to impress on performance as its results are the lowest among all the Sempron based boards reviewed in the shootout. 

The consoling factor is that the Gigabyte board did not lose by a big margin in the graphics intensive tests. The other features of the board include 6 channel sound, 6 USB ports and a free CD of Easy Tune 4 that comes with the board. It is only recommended for the budget buyer with price as the chief concern. It fails to impress in any other way.RQS# E86 or SMS

131086 to 9811800601

Krypton I8G400



This is by far the best performer among all the Sempron processor based boards that we received. In terms of features there is nothing really great to boast about except 1 IR (Infra Red) port, It is also the most expensive of all Sempron processor based boards although the price difference is not much. The board is based on the Via KM400 chipset.

Performance wise it gave results which were better than the other Sempron boards Comparing its performance with the MSI KM4MV we found that Krypton managed to take the lead in all the benchmarks, even though the margin was not that much. The difference was 4.4% in PC Mark. It's margin of victory was 9.4% in the graphics intensive 3D Mark benchmark. RQS# E87 or SMS 131087 to 9811800601

MSI KM4M-V



The advantage that this board has over the other Sempron based boards is that it supports SATA, unlike any other. In terms of performance the board did not manage to impress much as it lagged behind the Krypton C18G400 in all the benchmarks, but then it does support SATA connectivity and is more economical than the Krypton. Comparing the boards performance with the Gigabyte 7VM400M-RZ we found that the MSI board gave better results. In MCCW, MSI won by a margin of 18.5% and the lead was further extended to 20% in a test for running day to day office applications tested using BW. 

The other features of the MSI board include 6 channel sound and 8 USB ports. Even though the MSI board is a little more expensive than the Gigabyte board but the extra performance and SATA connectors justify the price difference. RQS# E88 or SMS 131088 to 9811800601

Motherboards: Specs Table