Bitcoin Forum

Guys, this might be a stupid question...
But I'm thinking about buying a couple new rigs and I have this small question:
Which are the best motherboards out there for mining nowadays?

I'm thinking about using 4 cards, or more, per MB.

Thanks for the tips, and take care.

the number and way you plan to mount the cards is important. if you plan on using a case or don't want to use risers for practical purpouses you're limited to 3 cards a board like this
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157262
hits that limit keep in mind though the last card hangs past the edge of the board.
if you're intending to use risers any pci express slot becomes fair game however without going caseless you're limited to 4/5 cards depending on how much you're willing to spend on a case.

regardless of that your best bang/buck is going to be with an amd motherboard they run cheaper than their intel counterparts and so do their cpu's(this is coming from someone who uses intel chips for most things because of the performance difference)
i've had good luck with ASRock either way however and if i was going to build a 4 gpu system i'd pick a board like this and buy some risers from cablesarus
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157198

Yeah, to go with 4 cards on the board, you're looking at some higher end boards like the MSI 890FXA-GD70 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130274) because not that many have 4 full x16/x8 slots.  Also, if you plan on putting the rig in a case, most cases come with only 7 slots on the back panel, so you'll need to buy a more expensive case as well.

With four cards though I wouldn't suggest going with a case and going with some sort open air setup and risers like this (https://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=29729.0) or this (https://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=27496.0).

If you do go with risers and want to go AMD I've had great luck with the Biostar A870U3 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813138318&Tpk=a870u3) and it's pretty cheap right now at around $65.  You can put that together with a Sempron and a GB or two of RAM for around $100.

If you have some older Intel LGA 775 chips, and can find either of these on eBay you can try either the ASRock P43DE3 (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813157174) or the Gigabyte P35-DS3R (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128050)/P35-DS3L (http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128059). 

All the boards I mentioned above I've been able to get four cards working on them with risers (or on the board itself in the case of the MSI) and windows.

Thanks for the tips guys, they will help.

Also a major plus is the low watts the sempron uses reason alone imo to use it.

If it's strictly for mining you don't need full 16x PCI-E. 1x will do.