what causes motherboards to be more expensive than others? for example:
this motherboard seems to do everything you need it to, so why would you want to pay extra money for a better motherboard? To my understanding you just need to make sure the motherboard is compatible with all your other components and has room for future upgrades. Does getting a more expensive motherboard somehow also increase performance in your PC?
For many people, that won't do everything you need. Most glaringly, it's Socket AM3+, so it won't run an Intel processor. It also won't run Llano or the upcoming Trinity.
It also doesn't offer USB 3.0 front ports or proper CrossFire/SLI support.
And that's before you wander off into more obscure things like eSATA, FireWire, a parallel port, or enough power to be suitable for liquid nitrogen overclocking.
While it's already been stated feel free to check out the following link:
http://www.ehow.com/how_4730517_choose-motherboard-processor.html
Just to be clear, there are a lot of people for which that motherboard will do everything you need. If you're looking to set up a budget gaming system with an AMD quad core processor and a single video card, then the motherboard you linked makes a lot of sense, unless you can get something equivalent for cheaper. Once Vishera launches, if there aren't new chipsets for it, it might even make sense to build a somewhat higher end gaming system around that motherboard.
But my point was that there are some people for which it does make sense to pay substantially more for a motherboard. But only some.
