Anyone familiar with these motherboards?

I am considering purchasing an Athlon 64 2800+ or 3000+ and the three boards I am considering are the Soltek SL-K8AN2E-GR $99
Chaintech VNF3-250 $78
DFI LANParty UT nF3 250GB $127, all from Newegg.

Now I don't really care about the gigabit ethernet, but it comes standard on the Soltek and DFI. Anandtech in their user guides recommends the Chaintech for entry level systems, but this isn't really an entry level system, but seems like a good board.

The Soltek seems to a be a nice board, but I am unfamiliar with this brand. Might anyone have experience with them?

Also, memory, I might decide to delve into oc'ing a bit, so what RAM might you suggest? Crucial Balistix seems a tad overkill unless I go with the DFI board. What are your thoughts on OCZ 400512EL PC-3200?

Underlying all this is that I currently run an AMD Thunderbird 900 and tis time to upgrade. Will be sticking with my Gforce 4 Ti4200 128mb vid card for the time being, not running RAID or SATA. I plan on this system lasting at least until the nForce 4 boards have had a chance to mature and the prices on both them and the 939 90nm chips to come down, and at that time build a really nice rig. Was considering an Athlon XP system, but as they are discotinuing them early '05, I figured socket 754 was the way to go.

Thank you in advance for you thoughts, comments, and other helpful hints you all might have.

 

[NiMhBatt]

Well, I only recieved my DFI LANParty UT nF3 250 a week and a half ago but as far as operation goes it is fantastically stable so far.

The only bad thing I have to say about the DFI is that when they do their soldering they really need to clip the wire closer to the board. In some instances some of the component wires on the back of my board extend more than an eighth of an inch which was causing one corner of my motherboard to ground out on the back plate when I first got it. I have since elevated it with acrylic washers and longer screws so that this is no longer a concern but it was very disconcerting at first.

If you want the overhead for overclocking you should probably go with 3500 or better. OCZ is supposed to be really good. I use mushkin pretty religiously and have never had a problem with their memory but I don't overclock much.

Oh, and I did have some trouble setting up raid, but that is a topic for another thread.

 

[globalcitizen]

I have the vnf3 and it has been rock stable for over a month now. It is a great motherboard although some people have a slight whining sound coming from the motherboard. You should definitely consider it.

 

[vladmech]

I'd recommend against the DFI. My cousin and a friend of mine both bought DFI Lanparties and both boards crapped out on them in under 6 months. Maybe they both caused it, but it seems unlikely as they're both rather skilled with computers and know how to properly treat hardware.
My 2 cents

 

[rpmcrash]

chaintech vnf3 250 mine runs great its been running stable for 2 months.

 

[Cerb]

I think you're on the right track as far as upgrading to socket 754 to hold you over, for one thing.

What does the DFI really get you? If you're not going to really use those extras, all it has are more cables--might as well just save a little and get the Chaintech.

 

[rpmcrash]

if your looking for a pure overclocking board and no extras . then i would go
with vnf3-250. as far as cables go ive been rapping my own with color electrical
tape for years. With extra money you save you can add to mem or vid or hdd.
im allways looking for more bang !!!! FOR MY DOLLARS.