Best PC Gaming Motherboard Under 200 2014

If you're looking to build a good gaming rig, then you're going to need a solid motherboard. It may not make all of your components directly faster, but through reliability and easy overclocking, you can get quite a performance boost out of your motherboard. In this post we'll look at some of the best motherboards for the money in the $200 category.

Intel Motherboards:

There are two main types of motherboards for use with Intel's Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge processors; socket 1155 and socket 2011. Socket 2011 motherboards are compatible with Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge enthusiast processors. The P67, H67, and Z68 chipsets, released in the first half of 2011, for socket 1155 motherboards are compatible with 32nm Sandy Bridge Processors while the GEN3 Z68 motherboards are compatible with both Sandy and Ivy Bridge as well as PCIe 3.0. Compatibility for these motherboards does require a BIOS update. The Z77, Z75, and H77 chipsets are compatible with Intel's latest Ivy Bridge processors as well as backwards compatible with Sandy Bridge. The "77" type motherboards have Intel Smart Response Technology which allows for SSD caching while the "Z" type motherboards allow for CPU overclocking.

AMD Motherboards:

Socket AM3+ motherboards are compatible with AMD's new FX or Bulldozer series of processors as well as their previous Phenom II, Athlon II, and Sempron 100 series of processors.

One of the most popular motherboards of the year is the Asus P8Z77-V which has a lot of great features including Fan Xpert2, Digi Power Control, and WiFi while also being extremely stable.

Technical Details for the P8Z77-V include; Up to 32 GB Dual Channel DDR3 memory at up to 2600 OC, PCI Express 3.0 x16; 2 (x16/0 or x8/x8), 4 x SATA 6Gb/s, 4 x SATA 3Gb/s, rear ports include; D-Sub + DVI, HDMI, DisplayPort, 2 x USB 2.0, 4 x USB 3.0 (onboard 2 x USB 3.0 + 8 x USB 2.0), 1 Optical, Quad-GPU SLI and Quad-GPU/3-Way CrossFireX Support!, USB 3.0 Boost, SMART DIGI+, and it comes with an Asus 3 year parts and labor warranty.

Although this motherboard is Ivy Bridge compatible I'd only recommend it with a Sandy Bridge build. While Ivy Bridge may be the latest processor, Sandy does a more than adequate job for gaming and performance processors like the i5-2500k still give you a lot of performance for the money.

Also look for the $40 Rebate that puts this under $90!

I love the black and blue color scheme of the UD5H but it's the features that really give it an edge up at this price range including; WiFi, Dual LAN, Gigabyte all digital power engine, ultra durable 4, 3D UEFI BIOS+, Virtu MVP, and Gigabyte 333 onboard acceleration. It also includes a 3 year parts and labor warranty.

Rebate Available makes this motherboard Under $100.