Can someone possilby clarify the difference in performance in motherbords and how spending money on a beast is a worthwile addition to your pc? ive always thought that they were there to link all your stuff togeather and to hold the cpu, any peice of plastic can do that. But what is the differnece between a £150 and a £50 one?

features. quality. umm. features. up to dateness. theres some reaons.

Mostly the chipset. There are slower and faster/better chipsets. The more expensive mobos you see have later/the latest chipsets, others have older ones that arent as good. Also things like how fast of a CPU it'll take, how fast the FSB can go up to/how fast the ram can be, onboard LAN, USB slots, Serial ATA, Raid, etc. Give us 2 links, a cheap mobo you have in mind, and a more expensive mobo you have in mind. Maybe then we can sum up then differences/whats worth what

yeah. he described it more. good one agissi.

Ive somehow managed to save 120 quid and i carnt save any longer, i need to buy somthing. So i dont know weather to spend it on another 512 ddr 400 ram (totaling 1024 ddr 400) or to get a new mobo.

o and my current mobo is a gigabyte 8sg 800

Motherboards are the heart and soul of your system....more expensive ones not only have newer, and usually more efficeint chipsets, but also provide a VAST amount of BIOS options for the enthusiast who likes to overclock his machine, and have control over every possible feature...

If you're not overclocking, save your $$, and just grab a solid mid-range mobo w/ a decent chipset...

Well said 'Swine. The most expensive motherboards at the top end are aimed at enthusiasts and overclockers - and have features at accomodate this - this pushes the price up over a very similar mid-range board. If you are not into tweaking the hell out of your PC then any mid-range board will perform nearly as well as save you a few $.

Steg

Higher prices don't always mean more overclocking options/tweaks.

You have high-end board makers such as Tyan that will sell you workstation boards a lot more expensive then Asus but that is because they use the best quality components for things like capacitors, thermal probes & such, making sure the board is syable in all work conditions ( even if it isn't the fastest ) & have longevity. & at the same time, you will never find any overclocking options on these boards.

Server boards are also a lot more expensive & rarely have overclocking options too but that's another matter.

thanks for the info all