Motherboard woes (Conroe)

[Majestic XII]

I've been waiting for my new system to arrive for a while now (a E6600 processor etc). The mobo I ordered is an Asus P5W Deluxe but Ive been hearing some scary things about it. Looks like Asus got some problems with the BIOS and they are not sure if they will be able to fix it in time for my processor (or rather, the store told me). The P5Ws they shipped before didnt work with Conroes from the start (need to update the BIOS).

I don't want to hassle around with it so I'm starting to look around for another mobo to replace it.

The P965 chipset is designed with the Conroe in mind and will be able to post with a Conroe in it from the get-go. The two mobos im looking at are;

Asus P5B (deluxe... dunno yet)
Gigabyte DS3

They are both at the exact same price and prolly spec-wise too. The Deluxe version of the P5B is a little more expensive (almost as much as the P5W!) and got some more crap like WIFI (and a black pcb) but I really don't need those things.

However, I am planning on doing some overclocking (as much as possible) so stability and OC options are quite essential.

Help me decide Internet!

 

[The Brick]

http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=2797&p=1

 

[Sedako]

I wish nvidia would hurry up with it's nforce 590 SLI intel edition. They don't even have a solid eta so I have no clue when I will be able to finish my new system.

 

[Nemesis6]

Majestic, we're in the same boat. Both waiting for the Conroe to fly to Europe. I ordered mine on a popular Danish site, and they say it'll be in stock on the fourth of next month. However, an unknown company claims to have gotten both the E6600 and the P5W Motherboard thing, so, tomorrow, I'm gonna cancel my order from the first website, and go with the second one. I've waited this long, I can wait some longer, right? Wrong. If I can get my precious sooner, I WILL.

 

[Warbie]

Suprisingly enough, it seems the Gigabyte board is the one to go for at the moment - especially if you plan on overclocking.

 

[Nemesis6]

I don't really plan to overclock, but then again, maybe I will. But I think it'll do just fine without overclocking. But still, what's the advantage of the Gigabit's Core 2 Duo motherboard?

 

[Warbie]

It seems that a few people who were having trouble with the new Asus mobo and overclocking on Intel's 'bad axe' have had better results with the Gigabyte board. Don't take this as gospel, though, I really don't know much about mobos.

 

[nutcrackr]

6300 and 6400 models are available here in Australia, unfortunately the motherboard selection is limited and expensive. I'm going to wait.