Most Stable Nforce 4 Board?

[gate1975mlm]

So whats the most stable Nforce4 board right now? The one with the least amount of problems?

 

[The Pentium Guy]

-They all have problems.
I haven't heard much from the gigabyte and the soltek, look into those.

 

[Astralmind]

I am shopping for an upgrade to A64 and all those NF4 issues are really really terrible. I just can't understand why not even a single review pointed any of those issues (even hardcore OC sites). MSI looked great in reviews but reading posts here and elsewhere tells me to buy something else.

DFI seems to be terribly complexe and picky BUT at least, I've seen most problems being solved and many BIOS revisions are coming up. Other than issues with hardcore VX OCZ pushed to the max and ppl using crappy PSU, this is still my #1 choice.

Asus looked plain terrible in terms of OCing (BIOS issues) and dropped in popularity VS the other 2.
Edit : Looking around and found out that there is a new Asus NF4 U board the A8N-E. Cheap price, have yet to see reviews.

Soltek isn't really popular and is considered by most to be a crap brand (purple ! damnit)

Same normaly goes for Gigabyte although their NF4 didn't get bashed too much.

Abit is way to expensive with their Fatality board but, according to what I've read would be the stability champion (and the rest is good too.. lacking features though).

So what now ? Risk hell with DFI or play safe, go the NF3 MSI Neo2 Plat AGP way ? NF3 kind of scares me in terms of futureproofness (no PCI E .. support for dual core ?)

 

[Trente]

I got a K8NF-9 (nForce4-4x) running Dual-Channel RAM, SATA HDD and a PCI-e 6600GT; I'm using the onboard Gigabit LAN as I type this, and also an exotic sound card (Philips AE) with no issues at all.

 

[grooge]

Originally posted by: Astralmind


Soltek isn't really popular and is considered by most to be a crap brand (purple ! damnit)

Same normaly goes for Gigabyte although their NF4 didn't get bashed too much.

[

Soltek dont have a nf4 board yet, but their nforce 3 offer was a very solid board. I got one and very pleased with it.

I now have a gigabyte k8nf-9 and it is trouble free for now.. But I will probably change it for the nf4 Soltek or the Soltek based ATI radeon xpress200 board when they will be available.

For what I've read and seen, they should be good.

Soltek VIA offer was very good too. Soltek is no crap for me. MSI is much more crap for me..

 

[keeleysam]

Originally posted by: AstralmindSo what now ? Risk hell with DFI or play safe, go the NF3 MSI Neo2 Plat AGP way ? NF3 kind of scares me in terms of futureproofness (no PCI E .. support for dual core ?)

Go with the MSI K8N Neo2. It is WAY stable, and is VERY futureproof. All 939 boards will support dual-core, and AGP will be around for atleast 2 more years. By that time you will want something else.

 

[Astralmind]

Neo2 was my original plan but I realised that even if AGP is still around in 2 years, prices and disponibility won't be good.

The problem with NF4 is that I have yet to find a board (any!) which got a negative pro review. On the other end, I haven't found one yet that didn't have a major problem.

Just checked the Gigabyte, reviews are positive but state that the OC capabalities aren't very impressive on it.

I don't want or need SLI. Saying that Soltek was crap was a stupid comment, sorry about that,., just trying to eliminate a few options. Thanks for your feedback guys

 

[T3mplar]

well I can recomend the Asus A8N as stable IF and only IF you do the following:

1) Don't use any RAID functions on the NV contrller
2) Don't bother with the NV Firewall, it's very buggy and uses a lot of CPU! It also has a weaknes in the older drivers (maybe in the new ones too) where you could simply rename a program to IEexplorer.exe and the firewall would allow the app through LOL LOL LOL how about a lame bug eh!!)

Just use the SIL SATA contrller and the Marvell NIC and you're good to go.


Simon

 

[tallman45]

Originally posted by: Trente
I got a K8NF-9 (nForce4-4x) running Dual-Channel RAM, SATA HDD and a PCI-e 6600GT; I'm using the onboard Gigabit LAN as I type this, and also an exotic sound card (Philips AE) with no issues at all.

Almost the same rig for my son

K8NF-9, 3000+ Oced to 2.0ghz, been running for 2 weeks no issues whatsoever

 

[Puffnstuff]

Well here's my nf4 story. My original mb was the msi k8n neo4 platinum and it was flaky right out of the box even with a 600w enermax noisetaker atx 2 ps. I had to rma it and while that was going on I ordered an abit fatal1ty an8 which absolutely rocks and it super stable. I can't say enough good things about my abit. Well anyway I decided to go ahead and use the msi to upgrade my oldest sons machine since I was going to have another nf4 mb around. Well the new msi board came and guess what? It lasted a week before we started having problems with the cpu socket so I'm going to have to rma it as well. I ordered a dfi lanparty nf4 ut ultra-d yesterday and when it comes I'm going to put it in my sons machine and when the next replacement k8n neo4 comes back it may very well join another garbage board that I've got, aopen ak79d-400max, in a drawer in my garage. I never even used that mb when it came it, just looked in the box to make sure everything was there and then stuck it in a drawer since I'd bought 2 abit nf7-s v2's to power our machines at that time. Of all the mb brands that I've used over the years abit has been the best for me bar none which is why I spent the extra bucks and got the fatal1ty.

 

[nick1985]

Originally posted by: Astralmind


Soltek isn't really popular and is considered by most to be a crap brand (purple ! damnit)

can i ask wtf you are talking about? soltek makes great boards

 

[housecat]

i'd recommend old DFI

.. but dont have a personal testament on this yet as i have yet to recieve mine.. but from everything i've read.. overall its the pick of the litter

 

[pudds]

Id recomend the DFI. Ive owned the Asus a8n and the dfi is ten times better. No issues as far as i know. There seems to be a rumour going round that its unstable due to one review which was posted but nobody else has experienced this.

 

[gate1975mlm]

I am really starting to think I should build an intel system instead!

 

[Steg55]

Originally posted by: gate1975mlm
I am really starting to think I should build an intel system instead!

What ever you do, DONT do that.

The Asus is working fine for me, yes with a RAID array on the nv controller and with the nv network controller aswell, admitidly without the firewall. The many bios revisions Ive been through in the last month it has got more stable.

The as-of-yes unreleased AN8-SLI Premium is supposed to be bugfree, having had long in the RnD process, or at least slightly more bugfree....

Steg