Another "Which Board" question.

freak2002 · 9 Dec 2016 at 11:21

Currently in the process of speccing up a replacement for my 7 year old i7-920 box. Been out the hardware game for a few years so need some advice.

I was looking at the following spec -

6600k
16Gb RAM
GTX1060
2 x SSD

I am looking to do a safe overclock on the 6600k, nothing extreme, but I am working on a budget.

Some of the key facts I think will be useful:

- Air cooled
- Single GFX card
- No Raid required
- No 7.1 Required (I have a Creative card)
- 3 SATA HDD + DVD

I see there are a lot of boards that are in the £130+ however I can get the Gigabyte K3 for £100 saving me some money. But not sure it would be suitable.

HoneyBadger · 9 Dec 2016 at 12:24

What standard are you looking at? ITX, mATX, ATX, EATX?

freak2002 · 9 Dec 2016 at 13:28

Its an Antec 1200 Gen 1 so plenty of space for any. Not limited on space or looking to save it.

HoneyBadger · 9 Dec 2016 at 13:41

To be honest, Any Z variant of the 170 chipset will allow you to O/C with a K series CPU, and that board you've posted would be more than suitable. Sure on more expensive boards you have better electrical components in terms of the socket sometimes having more pins to allow to O/C better but in my experience of O/C a 6600K - they're pretty good O/C no matter what board you put them in.

After having a couple of Giga boards, I'm not a huge fan - so I'll throw these ones into the mix - I've achieved my highest ever, stable O/C on an ASRock board, but the reality is that any of the two boards I've mentioned or the one you have will be suitable for what you're trying to achieve.

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/asus-z170-p-intel-z170-socket-1151-ddr4-atx-motherboard-mb-645-as.html

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/asrock-z170-fatal1ty-gaming-k4-intel-z170-socket-1151-ddr4-atx-motherboard-mb-14c-ak.html

freak2002 · 9 Dec 2016 at 13:46

HoneyBadger said:
To be honest, Any Z variant of the 170 chipset will allow you to O/C with a K series CPU, and that board you've posted would be more than suitable. Sure on more expensive boards you have better electrical components in terms of the socket sometimes having more pins to allow to O/C better but in my experience of O/C a 6600K - they're pretty good O/C no matter what board you put them in.

After having a couple of Giga boards, I'm not a huge fan - so I'll throw these ones into the mix - I've achieved my highest ever, stable O/C on an ASRock board, but the reality is that any of the two boards I've mentioned or the one you have will be suitable for what you're trying to achieve.

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/asus-z170-p-intel-z170-socket-1151-ddr4-atx-motherboard-mb-645-as.html

https://www.overclockers.co.uk/asrock-z170-fatal1ty-gaming-k4-intel-z170-socket-1151-ddr4-atx-motherboard-mb-14c-ak.html

I am on a Gigabyte at the mo but have no affinity to them. I will look over the specs! Thanks for the help.