Does the Motherboard have much to do with cooling/quietness?

Wabbit · Post by **Wabbit** » Fri Feb 01, 2008 5:19 am

I have seen odd comments on some Newegg reviews where people say that the motherboard they bought "runs cool". Does the type of ATX or micro-ATX mobo really have that much of a thermal effect? I did a search on the boards, but couldn't find anything that matched this question.

I am trying to put together a very quiet system that will be mainly used for the wife to browse the web and make greeting cards, the kids to play some low-tech games, be an occasional media server, but primarily to have 2 drives: 1 system drive and a pair of large drives in RAID 1 as a network drive location. I know I need a socket AM2 for the AMD BE-2350 cpu I plan on using and I prefer a micro-ATX board. I've had good luck with MSI and Asus. Can anyone suggest a good mobo?

Thanks!

FlorisNielssen · Post by **FlorisNielssen** » Fri Feb 01, 2008 7:17 am

Well, motherboards use power. That's for sure. The amount depends on the motherboard. More fancy features, more power draw.

But to say it's very important if you're going to buy it for a simple computer. Don't know exactly, but I think not.

What's more important for a quiet/cool pc: if you're motherboard allow undervolting of the processor, if you want to. I. Cool 'n Quiet (standard).

With Asus: I've got the M2N (ATX, but various M2N-** mATX available) and I'm very happy with it. Use it to run a 3800 X2 with it. Perfectly undervoltable. I love it. Metaforicly speaking..

jaganath · Post by **jaganath** » Fri Feb 01, 2008 7:20 am

viewtopic.php?t=45832

Wabbit · Post by **Wabbit** » Fri Feb 01, 2008 8:46 am

Ok, I think I am leaning towards this mobo:

MSI K9NBPM2-FID AM2 NVIDIA Quadro NVS 210S Micro-ATX
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6813130065

It has built in video, which I don't normally use, but I wonder if it would adequate for occasional media-pc use, while avoiding the heat of an additional gpu?

Anyone know if this board is ok?
Thanks!