Choosing A Motherboard

I was irritated due to the hassles and delays that I have been having, getting a refund on the purchase of an Asus M4A89GTD, but when I just started looking for another source, I checked the most negative reviews on it at Amazon:

Amazon.com: Customer Reviews: Asus M4A89GTD PRO/USB3 Socket AM3 AMD 890GX/SB850 6 SATA USB 3.0 ATX Motherboard

And it appears that it may have been for the best. However my dilemma now is trying to find an alternative motherboard of the same capabilities and price range.

It took me a long time to pick this MB, and I really need some suggestions for a new choice, otherwise I may never get my new build finished.

I would prefer not to spend more than $150, but $200 is my maximum.

Thanks, but I will need to give that motherboard a lot of thought before jumping off into it. The primary reason is because of a series of problems that I once had with a number of identical motherboards of theirs, that I couldn't make work...once bitten, twice shy. On top of that, there were a couple of customer reviews that didn't sound particularly good. Of course, that is true of almost all computer components.

It's not looking good for that Gigabyte motherboard, because there are 5 revisions of it, and the vendors that I have contacted so far, are either unable or unwilling to guarantee what revision that they will send me. I sent a question about this to Gigabyte, and their reply was little more than a stonewaller, saying to check the label on the box for the revision number. Of course, it is not possible to do that when buying online. From what I read in one user review, Gigabyte doesn't provide firmware updates, they simply release new revisions of the motherboard, and it isn't possible to update older revisions.

seekermeister said:

Gigabyte doesn't provide firmware updates, they simply release new revisions of the motherboard, and it isn't possible to update older revisions.

I presume that Gigabyte is like other manufacturers: motherboard revisions involve hardware changes, not updated firmware.

Gigabyte provides firmware updates, but they won't magically convert a board to a newer revision.

The distinction doesn't make much difference, if you're concerned about getting stuck with an old board rev.

Britton30 said:

Just my 2 cents. I have a Gigglebyte mobo, and will be the last. I had to return it twice to the factory, the 1st time returned, nothing had changed. The 2nd time they had updated the BIOS which fixed the issue. the issues were serious, not recognizing the graphics cards, SATA ports didn't work.
They were not courteous in emails nor knowlegeable, always want me to reinstall Win 7 and told me I should not have switched from XP. Also this board (in specs) will run a HDD on only one SATA port and a SATA DVD combo it listed as a ATA device.

I find your comment very helpful, even though it would be different motherboard than your's, because I loathe companies that provide inferior and worse...discourteous service. So much for Gigabyte.