AMD Athlon Buyer's Guide - Part 1: Motherboards

Summary

Out of the four Athlon motherboards that we took a look at in this part of our Athlon Buyer's Guide, the ASUS K7M is clearly the most robust and solid solution available.  This is not to say that it is the best motherboard we have ever seen, because it is far from it, but it is without a doubt the best Athlon motherboard we have had the pleasure of testing in lab. 

Unfortunately ASUS has more than one reason to not want to push for the sale of the board.  They are on fairly friendly terms with Intel and their products based on Intel chipsets do sell very nicely as they are of a very high quality, so why would they possibly want to ruin that relationship in order to sell an Athlon motherboard that wouldn't nearly generate as much revenue as they could earn from their Intel BX or 820 based motherboards?  It seems like ASUS isn't willing to sacrifice sales figures in order to supply the killer motherboard we have been able to test.  While ASUS may not manufacture the K7M under their name, it wouldn't be surprising to see it kept alive under an OEM name for at least a little while longer.  So what do you do if you can't get your hands on the K7M?

First of all, realize that the K7M, albeit the best Athlon motherboard available today, doesn't offer all that much over the competition.  The FSB tweaking options can help improve the performance of an already high performing CPU by up to 7%, in the grand scheme of things, that's not a tremendous margin.  At the same time, the stability of the K7M in normal scenarios is on par with that of the Gigabyte & MSI boards that we took a look at so long as the system is configured according to AMD's specification in terms of meeting power supply requirements, etc...  So if a vendor is selling a K7M for considerably more than a Gigabyte or MSI board, don't hesitate to save a few bucks and go for one of the latter two. 

That brings us to the Gigabyte & MSI boards themselves.  With a few bug fixes provided through BIOS updates, the Gigabyte 7IX is finally beginning to resemble a board that is deserving of the Gigabyte brand name.  The 7IX still has its quirks and even refuses to work in some configurations based on AMD recommended power supplies (we will be addressing this issue in particular in an upcoming addition to this guide) but overall it isn't a poorly designed motherboard.  The MSI 6167 is slightly superior to the 7IX and it receives AnandTech's pick for runner up to the best overall Athlon motherboard out of the four (the K7M takes the first place spot).  Unfortunately both of these companies are having difficulties getting the word out about their motherboards without worrying about the possible ramifications of doing so.  Don't expect to see a 6167 or a 7IX on every street corner, but with a bit of searching you may be able to get your hands on one of the two.  

The FIC SD11 is by far the most widely available Athlon motherboard on the market, simply because FIC is not afraid of Intel.  They have had a history of defying Intel by producing and making widely available motherboards based on VIA and other alternative chipsets.  You had better believe that they jumped on the Athlon bandwagon as soon as they could.   Unfortunately FIC's quality of design is not the best in the business, in fact it can be said that the SD11, while being the most widely available Athlon board, is one of the worst if not the worst Athlon motherboard on the market.  If configured properly in a system the board will work with an Athlon processor, however in the most stressful of conditions the motherboard fails miserably.  FIC has never been known for producing high quality motherboards, and the SD11 is the latest addition to that reputation.   You'd be better off considering any one of the three other options.

In part 2 of this guide we will discuss the overclocking options offered outside of the motherboard, so stay tuned for that update.