• Competitor rules

    Please remember that any mention of competitors, hinting at competitors or offering to provide details of competitors will result in an account suspension. The full rules can be found under the 'Terms and Rules' link in the bottom right corner of your screen. Just don't mention competitors in any way, shape or form and you'll be OK.

Gaming CPU...

Associate
Joined
19 Oct 2011
Posts
151
Location
Cornwall, UK.
I am reading that Intel Core i5-2500K is the best bang for buck processor at the moment...

Whats the best mobo to pair with this? Up to around £200-250 mark.

Cheers.
 
It is indeed the processor to have at the moment and overclocks damn well also.

There may not be a need to spend £200-250 on a motherboard, do you want SLI/Crossfire? do you want SLi/Crossfire with more than two cards?
 
Ok then,

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-360-GI&groupid=701&catid=5&subcat=1990
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-337-GI&groupid=701&catid=5&subcat=1990

With Gigabyte and MSI you have the benefit of a UK RMA center (to clarify, MSI has a Netherlands based RMA center if the retailer doesnt help with a 3year UK warranty) so don't have to send a faulty board to another country after the first year of warranty with the retailer.

The Z68XP-UD3P has the Z68 features of Lucid and Quicksync because it does have a display connector on the back of the board, the UD5 doesnt have those two but they both have SSD caching.

The UD5 does have a 20 phases CPU VRM setup vs 12 for the UD3P
 
Last edited:
the ud5 would be more recommended than the Asrock Z68 Extreme4 Gen3 then? What advantages would the better of the two have?
 
There seems to be a few issues popping up about the Asrock,

Usually about bent pins in the CPU socket, the retailer then doesn't help and accuses the buyer of damaging them or dropping something into the socket.

If the retailer don't help its left with the buyer to ship the board to some country at their expense to fix the problem. Gigabyte will assess the situation on a case by case basis and usually doesn't charge for a repair, you only have to ship to Milton Keynes too.


The UD5 vs UD3P. the extra phases should help with a better higher more stable overclock, the VRM's spread the load and thus remain cooler and more stable. But saying that theres zero reason why a UD3P wont see you getting close to 5GHz (also depends how good the chip is;)), the UD5 will just go higher still. Hopefully.

A comparison of the features - http://www.gigabyte.eu/products/comparison/list.aspx?ck=2&pids=3912,3848
 
Last edited:
hmm looks like ocuk have upped the price of the ud3p, was £128 previously.
not sure if it's still the case but going by a forum post on the gigabyte forums couple years back, gigabyte offer rma for bent pins.

asrock did replace the extreme4 gen3 for ge3000(he had missing pins rather than bent), but they ask for £15 to cover the return shipping to you(you also have to take into account the cost of posting it to holland to asrock in the first place which is another £15+). I'm going to have to send my extreme7 which has bent pins, not contacted them yet as trying to decide what to do been a week since got it back from ockuk and been charged £22(+13 to send to them) for the privelage of a rejacted rma(ontop of being called a liar).
 
Awesome advice thanks very much! :)

Now the $64,000 question.

Will the UD5 + 2500k trounce my p55-ud5 + i3 530 3.8mhz?
 
Last edited:
What would you guys recommend for the same CPU but not requiring crossfire or SLI?

Looking not to spend more than £100 - £120 if possible, only requirement really is a full size board, don't want micro ATX and would be good to have USB3 for the future.

I like Asus boards as have had good experiences in the past, same for Gigabyte, getting myself bit confused between the P67, H67 and Z68 chipsets and can't really make a decision.

Any ideas?
 
What would you guys recommend for the same CPU but not requiring crossfire or SLI?


http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=mb-364-gi&groupid=701&catid=5&subcat=1990

http://www.kitguru.net/components/m...-z68ap-d3-z68-review-bargain-buy-of-the-year/
http://www.vortez.net/articles_pages/gigabyte_ga_z68ap_d3_review,1.html
http://www.techradar.com/reviews/pc...herboards/gigabyte-ga-z68ap-d3-1026263/review
http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/motherboards/2011/10/11/gigabyte-ga-z68ap-d3-review/1

getting myself bit confused between the P67, H67 and Z68 chipsets and can't really make a decision.

To overclock these "K" CPU's you need a P67/Z68 chipset board so you can adjust the CPU ratio/multiplier. Adjusting the BCLK is a NO NO and doesnt work well at all.
 
Last edited:
Cheers for that stulid, looks like a good board, ordered that along with a i5 2500K and 8GB of Corsair DDR3... hopefully should receive it tomorrow.

:D

Been wanting to upgrade from my C2D for a while, Skyrim and BF3 finally sealed the deal.
 
Back
Top Bottom