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Non-MVC alternatives to ajax for passing data to usercontrols

I'm in a huge bind.
Long story short, I am working on a big project and am learning ASP.NET, C#, everything as I go.
The elementals of my project are comprised of user controls. My line of thinking was that I could create many user controls, each performing a function for a "component" of the project I'm building. Up until now I have been using clientside scripting to postback ajax calls to the code-behind on each of my user controls. AJAX worked well because it allowed to me pass data(that I need from the client) to my user controls and then I could return something in order to do an action.
I have been using a method for generating querystrings to create a callback "action" in order to determine what method needs to handle what data when the postback is sent to the code-behind side.
My problem now is that I need to start using many user controls one page -- and so now whenever ANY control does a postback ALL of the controls go through a page load. I thought my callback solution would take of this, but it isn't. Particularly when I drop a custom registered control into another user control.
I have done multitudes of research and having seen various ways to get around this, the best of them being [WebMethod] and controllers. However the project I am working on is NON-MVC.
I am also attempting to use UpdatePanel controls to minimize postback to the entire page but have had little success.
What can I use as alternatives? I feel like I'm running out of options or am missing something very basic here.
TL;DR -- I need a non-MVC method to pass data to user controls that can distinguish between multiple controls. Cannot use pagemethods(or page). Manual ajax calls are not working out. Cannot afford to do a full postback

Take a look at:
updatepanel vs page methods
Based on this:
My problem now is that I need to start using many user controls one page -- and so now whenever ANY control does a postback ALL of the controls go through a page load.
This might sound simple but have you tried to use if(!this.IsPostBack) in your load events?
Well not, the only way to avoid this situation, is using PageMethods or create a Script Service to handle AJAX requests (Web services with the ScriptService attribute or WCF REST services)
Note that even if you use the evil UpdatePanel, absolutely all the page life cycle will execute, which means that the whole page viewstate has to be sent in each post, the only advantage of using UpdatePanel controls is that you gain partial rendering, that's it, the performance on the server side doesn't change at all.
So you could use PageMethods or Script Services. But there's a catch, if you start using them you will notice an incredible performance change, your application will be more responsive (RIA applications), but the catch is that you won't be able to use the benefits of the ASP.Net server controls such as GridView, Repeater, etc. In other words you would need to change most of your view controls (this is the approach followed when working with MVC applications)

You can create static methods on your aspx page and mark it with [WebMethod]. Then you can call the method using jQuery ajax from the user user control markup. Take a look at this blog

Using ASP.Net Web Databound Controls to create Jquery Sliders tickers type controls

I am working on a B2B portal web app, where i need to display upcoming news , products and company info on regular interval (say as slideshows and tickers).
For example :
Scenario 1. I need to display the latest company(registered in this week) in a marquee style. Where companies will be pulled out from database.
Scenario 2: I have some products categorized as hot products, that will be displayed as slideshow on the home or somewhere else.
I know using Jquery and Static pages its possible. But i havent idea about how to do this with ASP.Net databaound controls like grid, repeaters, datalist etc. We are not in favour of purchasing third party controls, instead it will be a last resort for us.
Please help me through buil-in controls. Any help will be highly appreciated.

You should decide whether you want to do with JQuery Widgets or ASP.NET controls (or third party ASP.NET controls like Telerik). Can you use both - yes you can, but you are only going to add more complexity to your app because ASP.NET controls don't know about your JQuery Widgets and you have to provide the glue to tied them both and keep them synched up. So if you decide to build everything in JQuery - convert your static html pages to .aspx pages then add additional serverside functionality to return the data. For AJAX behavior, you can use what is called Page Methods in ASP.NET or write seperate Script Services. You will make use of what is called a ScriptManager. That way you can keep your existing markup and rely on ASP.NET to provide you with Data. The other alternative is to convert everything to ASP.NET Controls - and rely on the builtin or third-party control suite to provide the functionality.

Form POST in ASP.NET

I'm trying to convert a classic ASP page to ASP.NET 3.5. The page has several forms on it for several different things.
In ASP.NET, there's a server form control wrapping the entire page, and form controls don't work within a server form control, and you can't have more than one server form control on a page.
So in order to keep this functionality, I can either:
Remove the server form control that's wrapping the page, and leaving the html forms on the page.
Create button click events for every form and perform the POST in the code-behind.
What's the preferred method here?

I wonder if converting to vanilla asp.net (aka webforms) is a bad idea here. Personally I'd go to MVC instead - allows multiple forms etc, and the views are much closer to he HTML, a lot like ASP.
I guess I'm saying there are some glitches vanilla asp.net introduces that you don't have to suffer.

I would go with the second option, any button click is going to post the whole page back anyway so you're not saving any bandwidth. Simply handle each button appropriately.

Check the answer I provided to a similar question here :-)
How to get past embedding a html form for paypal buttons asp.net
If you're going to use different button clicks, you still need to use this override to disable the non-related buttons in each handler, otherwise it won't work. You can only have one form tag at a time - this way you can toggle/disable the ones you're not using as appropriate.
Better still, refactor your application to use a single form. While MVC would be a closer match to the model you're using right now, it wouldn't make sense to go that route unless you were experienced enough with it; Web Forms is an easier jump.

Getting value from a Masterpage in the controller Asp.Net MVC

How do I get value of a textbox that's placed in the masterpage?

I agree with Pete.
Sometimes it is convenient to put general items into the master page. In contrast to classic asp.net it is harder to get the value with every post. In classic asp.net there is only one formular on the html page wich will be posted and all works well. In mvc there could be more formulars on the page. You have to put the textbox into a every form to get the value in every post - no solution.
A custom user control (ascx) might be a solution. Put the textbox in and place the custom control into the form where you need the value. If you have more forms or a complicated layout, than it is no solution.
A hidden field might be a solution. Replicate value changes of your original textbox into hidden fields placed in the formulars where you need the value.

I would find another solution. The purpose of master pages is to decouple the general layout from the specific pages (or controllers). You should be free to change the master pages without breaking the application.

When should you use standard html tags/inputs and when should you use the asp.net controls?

As I put together each asp.net page It's clear that most of the time I could use the standard HTML tags just as easily as the web forms controls. When this is the case what is the lure of the webforms controls?

HTML controls will be output a lot faster than server controls since there is nothing required on part of the server.. It just literally copies the markup in the ASPX page.
Server controls however require instantiation.. Parsing of the postback data and the like, this is obviously where the work comes in for the server.
The general rule of thumb is:
If its static (i.e. you dont need programmatic support), make it a HTML control. HTML controls can easily be "upgraded" to server controls so there is no real issue of maintanence at a later time.

Webform controls have more server-side pre-built functionality (server side hooks, methods and attributes), I tend to use HTML controls only when I require a high degree of formatting (styling) as that bypasses the way .Net renders it's controls (which, at times, can be very strange).