mirror, mirror on the wall which is the fairest mobo of them all?

martian_aphid

martian_aphid

martian_aphid

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Hey

Looking for some input from those much more experienced than myself, i.e yourselves =)

A few months ago I made some enquiries regarding component choices for my first ever build. After some consideration I decided that with new cpu/gpus on their way it would not do me any harm to wait. Well now with yorkfield having come [and gone] and the HD48xx here and set to stay I think its about time I started to reconsider my options.

Just to let you know I will most likely be getting Q6600, 4GB of OCZ DDRII-6400, probably seagate 500GB HDD, either 4850/4870, topped off with a Tuniq Tower and a 24inch monitor [also undecided]

At the moment it is the mobo which I most unsure about. At the time I was looking at the x38 and most people also recommended a good p35 but p45 is here now and that looks like the better option over the p35 at this present time. Whats getting me most is whether to consider crossfire. I read a review the other day that put a p5q dlx up against an x48 board [i think it was the gb ex48-dq6] From that it was painfully obvious that running 4850s in crossfire yielded much higher frame rates on dual 16x slots over dual 8x.

I see my options as being - spend a bit more and get x38/48 and have the option to crossfire or get a p45 and not bother and in that case get something like this with one pcie slot:
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-277-AS

What I do like about the p45 over the x38/48 at least from asus is that they have an esata which i can hook my external up to and they have the express gate tech which looks pretty handy.

Anyway I'm still not sure so any advice is appreciated.

If you read all that and still want to help I am extremely grateful ^^
 
Tbh you've pretty much nailed the issue on the head -

Crossfire - X38 or X48

Single card - P45

Only you can really make the decision of whether or not you want Crossfire.
 
There's more than ASUS has eSATA - Both the Gigabyte X48-DQ6 and the J&W JW-X48D2-Extreme have powered eSATA ports on the back panel that you can use.
 
Thanks cob, yea its a tough choice. I'm considering that its my first attempt at building so it could go horribly wrong, also there's nehalem to consider - based on those factors it makes me lean towards the cheaper mobo. Still its not an easy choice as it might turn out down the road I want some extra gaming performance and instead of just getting a new graphics card and banging it in, I have to get a new mobo too :S

any suggestions for good x38/48 boards, esata would be nice as this seems to be lacking on the asus boards ?!?
 
Of course you are right WJA96, I guess I just leant towards the asus boards because their bios looks quite intuitive to a first time builder. I did look at the gigabyte x48-dq6 and am confident it is a superb board but I was a little put off by the price. I will check out the J&W though.
 
ASUS BIOS's are anything but intuitive to a first-time builder. Tho you shouldn't really have any issues with a Q6600.

Traditionally Gigabyte have had the simpliest BIOS and have been really easy to overclock with (tho because of the simplicity they weren't able to reach the steady hights of ASUS/Abit/DFI), but their newer BIOS's do seem to have a lot more tweaking options than before.
 
The great thing about Gigabyte was (and in some ways still is) that you could always use the settings from the old P965-DS3 thread and they seem to work no matter what CPU you had in it.

The loadline calibration thing is a bit of a waste though.
 
Ive just built up a new pc with the DQ6 board and all i can say is its fantastic. Ran my E8500 at 4ghz straight out of the box using 1066memory. ( ive knocked it back down to 3.8 to burn in a little at stock voltages )

The board has a failsafe BIOS so if you overclock and it fails to boot it will reset twice then boot up using the fail safe BIOS.. so no need to reset it manually which is nice.

The heatsink setup is good assuming you have some airflow in your case, it only seems to get very warm to the touch and not HOT, and thats when overclocking.

The package is nice and overall im very impressed with the board.
 
Don't forget the X38 boards either. They are £30-£50 cheaper than the X48, but they do much the same job.
 
Will do. Looks like ocuk only carry the x38-ds4 though

i'll have to check up on the differences between ds4/5 and dq6. I do remember reading about them somewhere but can't remember what exactly it was, something to do with the heatpipes, and quad features!?!?
 
Any reason why the p5e3 is cheaper than the p5e? normal rule of thumb that I have become accustomed to is that the DDR3 variants are usually the more expensive board!
 
oh, ok. I just noticed it was like ~£20 cheaper than the p5e where most DDR3 boards I see are about £20+ more. Of course the ram would set you back much more than any savings.

Also had a look at the gigabyte boards, looks like the x38 are pretty much phased out except for the ds4, with a full range available in the x48 but bit more pricey.
 
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