Favorite Motherboards

OK, I have finally been overcome by some kind of motherboard fixation. Decided I want to build some old socket 775 PCs using core 2 extreme and/or Xeons, which can be configured to work in a socket 775 in many cases. Well, I have begun this process and found 2 boards which I purchased that are fantastic:

Biostar TP45E combo.


http://www.biostar-usa.com/upload/Motherboard/b20091009_1.jpg


This thing will take DDR 2 or DDR 3, awesome for a 775 motherboard, but it will supposedly only work with 4 GB of DDR 3. Well, TP45E-c officially blew me away by accepting two 4 GB sticks, in dual channel. So I have 8 GB here now, and I am now waiting on a heatsink/fan I ordered to get further into overclocking the Q9400 presently on the board (3.38 GHz so far). Nice BIOS options for 775, I mean really nice, especially considering it is Biostar. Very solid board in comparison to the inexpensive ones from the company.

Asus P5Q3.
https://www.asus.com/media/global/products/3Ps8dmpKZqQAt7fS/HEQtAZWjKBZlIrgn_500.jpg
This board says it will take 8 GB DDR3. Again, awesome, but there aren't DDR 2 slots on this one. Just got this board and not sure where to go yet with a build, but I suspect it may even run with 16 GB. Have to check that later. So far, I have only booted to safe mode with 2 GB installed. The BIOS is super impressive.

I am sure I will end up building on other boards before it's over. Some chipsets I like are H81 and X79, mostly for the ability to add Xeon processors and still overclock. That said, I am open to ideas for any other cool hardware combinations. Leave them below if you have anything cool happening in your PC or one of them, etc.

Anyone interested in this kind of build on socket 775? It really answered a craving for me. I was on P4 through all of the core 2 fun and I guess until 2010. Always wanted to be able to build the absolute best possible PC on this socket. Seriously, they really perform well, extremely smooth and solid and fun to work on and with...