I'm looking for a good mobo, has to be AM2. Preferably minimum of 3 PCI slots. Would it be worth getting SLi or Crossfire? Is there much of a difference between nForce 570 and nForce n90? I have seen a couple that catch my eye the Asus M2N-SLi Deluxe (Socket AM2) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard nForce 570, MSI K9N Neo-F nForce 550 (Socket AM2) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard. Could anyone tell me if they're any good and suggest an even better one? Are PCI slots that important? Thanks in advance guys
SLI and Crossfire make use of 2 video cards working in tandem to boost peformance significantly (50-80%+), with nVidia or ATi-based video cards, respectively. What's this system going to be used for mainly? If you're not a hardcore gamer, SLI and Crossfire aren't something you'll need to have handy. However, there are a decent selection of motherboards supporting SLI or Crossfire. Right now, SLI is limited to nForce SLI chipsets while Crossfire is limited to ATi chipsets. There are hacked drivers (as that's the only limitation), but I don't know how well they work. In any case, MSI and Asus are good choices. Another good choice seems to be the Epox (EP-)MF570SLI, which should be in your price range. I'm not sure of the availability in the UK, however.
I'm desperately trying to get into all this PC lark, all that stops me is the £££ and knowledge of decent components. I'm trying to get into the gaming side too. And build a setup to rival the quality of the Xbox 360. I also want it to be future proof to a certain extent. AM2 ready for AMD's quadcore, SLi/Crossfire for added performance etc.
