Crypto 3 - Motherboard

Installment 3 of my crypto currency mining experiment.

The motherboard part of the rig connects all the components together. I like to think of it as the main torso of the computer. 

In the end I think a wide variety of motherboards would work for cryptocurrency mining. What really matters is being able to connect as many video cards (GPUs) as you want into the motherboard with PCI express (PCIe) connectors on the motherboard. The cards will not be directly connected to the motherboard but will be connected remotely through a PCI extender which can connect GPUs to both x1 and x16 PCI slots so what matters is the total number of available slots. 

Many motherboards have 3 PCIe slots and if you are only looking for that number of GPUs one of those motherboards might be adequate. Some motherboards are built expressly for mining - with the distinguishing characteristic being a large number of PCI slots. For example the Asus B250 has 19 PCIe slots. A few more options are listed here. 

As this is an experiment for me at this point I don't want to commit to too many cards. It appears that 6 GPUs is a good number to run at this point. Mindminer recommended the Asus ROG MAXIMUS VIII HERO/Whetstone motherboard and I decided to go with it (with the Whetstone which as far as I can tell is a mouse pad). This is being replaced by an Alpha version. The Alpha version had a few upgrades but I didn't think they added much value for my purposes. In addition, getting parts that are not the cutting edge results in $avings. This is also primarily a gaming motherboard which will potentially ease getting rid of it if I determine mining is not viable for me.  

I honestly didn't put a whole lot of thought into the motherboard choice - 6 PCI slots, not a whole lot of money were my primary technical factors.