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How to choose a new motherboard without overpaying — scoping out the features you need, and what you might never use as component costs soar
Just because you pay more doesn’t mean it’s beneficial
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Buying a motherboard today can be a daunting task. There are more options than ever, with more features than ever, making it harder to know what you really need. Prices have also climbed consistently over the last several generations, with flagship motherboards now routinely costing as much as a high-end CPU or graphics card.
Modern motherboards range in price from under $100 for the most basic, to well over $1,000 for flagship/Halo-type boards from the ‘Big 4’ (Asus, ASRock, Gigabyte and MSI). But more expensive doesn’t always mean a better experience, especially if you’re likely not to use the hardware and features you’re paying for.
Several factors drive motherboard pricing. From the PCB layer count and copper content at your most basic level, chipset (some, like X870E, have two chips), power delivery, to controllers and premium components, they all increase the Bill of Materials (BOM). So what do you actually gain by spending more? It depends on the board, but outside of more robust power delivery, you tend to get additional, improved, or faster everything. Be it storage with M.2 sockets and SATA ports, USB ports, wired or wireless networking, the audio solution, or PCIe slots and bifurcation. And you can’t forget about the aesthetics. In general, the more you spend, the better the specs and the better they look. Some even include integrated screens. But it goes beyond just the hard specifications.
In addition to the hardware, motherboard partners attempt to inject value with DIY-friendly innovations such as toolless M.2 sockets and heatsinks, larger BIOSes with integrated drivers, or even quick-connect Wi-Fi antennas. All things that make building or swapping parts out easier on your PC. They’re even including “AI” features designed to help with overclocking and other functions like networking, or even local AI work, to make getting the most out of your system easier. And while some of those features can be valuable, their true worth is measured by the individual and whether they can get any use out of it.
The real question you need to ask yourself is what you need (and want) for how you use your PC today and in the near future, as every PC user is different. Whether you use your PC primarily for gaming, work purposes, or breaking overclocking records, needs will vary. The point of this article is to help users navigate through a dizzying array of options, determine what’s actually too much versus what you need, and perhaps save money by focusing on the right parts for your usage.
What, outside of marketing forces, drives motherboard pricing? First, there’s the BOM. Everything you see on the board has a cost. Starting with the PCB itself, it comes in layers like a sandwich, allowing all of the connectivity to reach where it needs to go without electrical interference. Budget boards tend to use fewer PCB layers and less copper, think 6-layer and 1 Oz, while mid-range and higher use 8/10 layers and 2 Oz of copper as selling points. Of course there’s validation and engineering costs that go into it, too.
On top of the PCB, you have various bits like the VRMs, which can range from downright anemic and a hindrance to performance, to overkill for anyone except extreme overclockers. Cheap boards tend only to give you the basics: fewer VRM phases and lower-rated MOSFETs (think 50A/60A), chokes, and capacitors. More expensive boards use a higher phase count and higher-rated MOSFETs, around 80A-110A.
For example, the popular 80A Intersil ISL99380 MOSFET can be found for around $2.72 apiece (@ 100 qty), while the less capable Vishay SIC623 50/60A is $1.69 per (@ 3,000 qty). Now, these prices are just what we can find online in lower quantities. If you need 100,000 units, prices will drop, and we don’t know what price the board partners contracted at. But the point is t