Input: Sub-$100 AM2 board, OC

[tectona]

My main computer I'm upgrading my 7600GT to an 8800GT (and the PSU with it). I have a second box (also used for gaming) that is running an old P4 on AGP, well past its use-by date.

Given prices, I've decided to reuse the 7600 + old PSU and other parts to budget upgrade on the second box. I'm going to get an Athlon 64 X2 4000+ Brisbane and I want to get a $70-100 board so that with a couple GB of RAM, I can get a pretty nice upgrade for a little over $200.

I've owned a couple Asus boards and my main has an SLI Deluxe that is great. When I read that the M2N-E http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6813131022 is a stripped version of it, I thought I had a good candidate until I read that part of the strip-down was removing OC features.

Other options I'm currently considering are the Gigabyte GA-M57 SLI-S4 http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6813128014 and MSI K9N4 SLI-F http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6813130071.

I'm not looking for a future-proof board, so AM2+ isn't a concern. Nor do I need SLI. Aside from decent OC options, I just want a solid board. One that won't double as a toaster oven would be nice. I don't constantly tweak settings; once I find something stable, I'll leave it at that until the next upgrade.

Does anyone have experience/input?

Apologies is this a repeat post, but the most recent thread I saw on these lines was from about 10 months ago.

[Methious]

I have a M2N-E it's not a real good OC board, has enough features including AI OC, AI gear, OC profile but the voltage control isn't real good on that board. I just got mine back from an RMA to Asus and they replaced it with a new board that exhibits the same poor voltage regulation. If it's any help take a look at the M3A thread in this forum, it's AM2/AM2+ was 97 over at the egg. NB cooler is passive heat sink, I put a $4 scythe fan on it and it clocks pretty good with the X2. It's a little new, only the 2nd bios revision. On the M2N-E I had a x2 3800, x2 4200, and x2 6400 couldn't get a solid OC on any of them, popped the 6400 on the M3A 5 minutes tinkering and 3.52 solid. Not much head room on this chip but it passes Orthos, CPU-Z, and OCCT. Pros pcie 2.0, HT 3.0, forward compatible with Quad. Cons, passive heat sink NB, limited on board fan connectors, 4 sata.

[tectona]

Thanks for the answer, and all the good information in your other thread.

Read some more, and going to order from newegg now.

[Methious]

More than welcome and BTW welcome to the forums!