Build now or wait...

OverDrive · 3 Mar 2012 at 13:36

Hi everyone,

I am looking into buying the Asus P8Z68-V PRO GEN3 Intel Z68 (Socket 1155) mobo. I have read that it is Ivy Bridge and PCIe 3.0 ready. I would really like to get an Ivy Bridge CPU, however, it looks like it could now be around June until its released with the latest delay.

Is it worth building a system with this mobo now, buy a 2500k and then upgrade just the CPU when Ivy Bridge comes out this summer or wait?

Basically, I really do want to upgrade to Ivy Bridge, but will Asus release a new line of mobos when Ivy Bridge is released that would be better for Ivy Bridge than the P8Z68?

Cheers guys.

Stinger53 · 3 Mar 2012 at 13:38

well if u get the 2500k there isnt much point in upgradeing as it wont be much that better. so if u rly want ivy i would wait.

R088ieS86 · 3 Mar 2012 at 13:54

The new line of Ivy bridge boards are the Z77 range (I presume the lower spec board will be H77 etc as well) Asus will have their P8Z77-V

From the rumours it sounds like the mobile Ivy Bridge chips have been pushed back till June and the desktop CPUs will be any time between April/June, not so much pushed back because Intel said Q2 and that date range is their Q2.

If you desperately need a PC then sandybridge will last your for quite a while yet.

OverDrive · 3 Mar 2012 at 19:23

Thanks for the replies. If it is likely that the Ivy Bridge desktop CPUs will be released before June then I might as well wait.

Why is the P8Z77-V board so expensive? Will Asus release a new lower cost Z77 board that will be the Ivy Bridge equivalent of the P8Z68-V?

On chipsets, I had a read of Wikipedia and I see that there are several chipsets for both Sandy Bridge and Ivy Bridge. How would you know which is the best chipset/mobo to buy? How come the Z68 is the current Sand Bridge chipset of choice and not any of the others? Just trying to understand as much of this is new to me.

Thanks again

R088ieS86 · 3 Mar 2012 at 20:50

Asus will no doubt release a different variety of boards varying in colours and features and price.

In the current range your looking @
Z68
P67
H67
H61
From most to least features. (as a general rule)

On release the Z77's will be the best baords you can buy, they only release a new board range if they need to add some features which change the board considerablely.

On Sandy Bridge release the P67 board was the top end, but then they added features like SSD cahing and Lucid Virtue so they titled them the Z series.

When the boards are released you should find some good review threads pop up in the motherboards forum. There are already a few about the announced Z77 boards: here