Difference between 965P and 975X chipsets?

CaNNoN_1981 · 3 May 2007 at 11:43

Hi guy, little advice needed,

Since my DFI CFX3200CF-DR/G borked up last month and looking highly unlikely thats its gonna be replaced due to them being discontinued, rather than buying another sck 939 mobo i've decided to go C2D.

Meaning new mobo, new mem, new cpu. I'm looking along the lines of a E6600 and some G.Skill 2GB DDR2 HZ PC2-6400. only i'm alittle unsure as to which mobo to go for and what the diff is between the 2 chipsets.

If someone could explain the diff and also recommend a good crossfire C2D mobo that would best suit me, it would help a lot. (around £150ish)

An alternative option is selling my 2 X1950 pro's and getting a 8800 so if someone could suggest a mobo for an 8800 and a C2D that would be helpful also.

Cheers CaNNoN.

Darg · 3 May 2007 at 12:59

DS3P for crossfire.

EVGA 680i or Asus P5N-E for SLi.

The DS3P is probably the best and most stable unless you need the advanced features of the 680i or 650i boards. The 650i board also have 2xIDE and 3xPCI if that's important to you.

The 975 chipset is old and not really used anymore. 965P is best for C2D.

Monstermunch · 3 May 2007 at 12:59

CaNNoN_1981 said:
Hi guy, little advice needed,

Since my DFI CFX3200CF-DR/G borked up last month and looking highly unlikely thats its gonna be replaced due to them being discontinued, rather than buying another sck 939 mobo i've decided to go C2D.

Meaning new mobo, new mem, new cpu. I'm looking along the lines of a E6600 and some G.Skill 2GB DDR2 HZ PC2-6400. only i'm alittle unsure as to which mobo to go for and what the diff is between the 2 chipsets.

If someone could explain the diff and also recommend a good crossfire C2D mobo that would best suit me, it would help a lot. (around £150ish)

An alternative option is selling my 2 X1950 pro's and getting a 8800 so if someone could suggest a mobo for an 8800 and a C2D that would be helpful also.

Cheers CaNNoN.

Either the new DFI Infinity 965 board, or a DS3

Nelly · 3 May 2007 at 13:51

Just get the cheapest to be honest, they will all do the same job more or less, the DFI P965-S hopefully in UK next week, unless DFI change their minds.

I would go for a 965 chipset if your intending on ATI crossfire.

Gigabyte GA_965P_DS3P
DFI P965-S Dark Infinity (When Available)
Abit AB9 Quad GT
Asus P5B Deluxe
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

If you intend on going the Nvidia Sli route.

EVGA nForce 680i (Excellent EVGA customer support)
Asus P5N-E SLi nForce 650i (Nice guide on clocking E6600 upto 3.6ghz on the forums)

CaNNoN_1981 · 3 May 2007 at 14:36

Cheers ppl great help so far, seems pretty straight forward, just unsure on wether I should stick with my 2 x1950pro's xfire or get rid and get a 8800 (dx10 and all that) again been ati all my life so unsure on whats best option and whats diff between GTS - GTX etc

Darg · 3 May 2007 at 14:58

Stick it out til ATi reveals their range and prices then you'll have a clearer vision. Two weeks to wait.

Generally accepted that a 8800GTX is better then 2x1950Pro. Some games (Source engine) might run better with the ATi cards but in general the single card is always best.

smit101 · 3 May 2007 at 19:49

Darg said:
DS3P for crossfire.
The 975 chipset is old and not really used anymore. 965P is best for C2D.

Can't agree with this! The 975x chipset is clock for clock the fastest chipset for core2Duo and is still used by many,with the right handling 975x boards will clock in the 400+ fsb region,making them very suitable for the higher multi chips such as the E6600.

If crossfire is a requirement then a 975X board deserves serious consideration as it can provide dual x8 pci-express in crossfire mode,965p will only provide x16 x4 which leads to a 3d performance drop.

CaNNoN_1981 · 4 May 2007 at 08:07

Do none of the c2d boards support dual 16x pci-e in crossfire?

CaNNoN_1981 · 4 May 2007 at 09:48

Hows this look?

DFI INFINITY P965-S

Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - Retail

G.Skill 2GB DDR2 HZ PC2-6400C4 (2x1GB) CAS4 Dual Channel Kit (F2-6400PHU2-2GBHZ)

Any thoughts? Staying with crossfire for now of course....

jbloggs · 4 May 2007 at 10:20

CaNNoN_1981 said:
Do none of the c2d boards support dual 16x pci-e in crossfire?

The Asus P5WDGs2 WS Pro supports Crossfire.

CaNNoN_1981 · 4 May 2007 at 10:34

jbloggs said:
The Asus P5WDGs2 WS Pro supports Crossfire.

Yeah, but do both slots run at full 16x speed in crossfire or do they both drop to 8x?

jbloggs · 4 May 2007 at 12:14

CaNNoN_1981 said:
Yeah, but do both slots run at full 16x speed in crossfire or do they both drop to 8x?

I believe the 1st runs at 16x and the 2nd at 8x.

CaNNoN_1981 · 4 May 2007 at 12:37

Think i'll just wait for the DFI INFINITY P965-S.

It defo supports dual 16x crossfire.

Darg · 4 May 2007 at 12:39

CaNNoN_1981 said:
Hows this look?

DFI INFINITY P965-S

Intel Core 2 Duo E6600 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - Retail

G.Skill 2GB DDR2 HZ PC2-6400C4 (2x1GB) CAS4 Dual Channel Kit (F2-6400PHU2-2GBHZ)

Any thoughts? Staying with crossfire for now of course....

That looks good but are you sure you wouldn't spend that little extra on the DS3P? It's got the best support on these forums atleast and easily clocks high enough to push your 6600 to its limits.

@smit101: I didn't mean to imply that 975 chipset was useless. It just doesn't get quite as high FSBs as most 965P motherboards.

CaNNoN_1981 · 4 May 2007 at 13:07

Darg said:
That looks good but are you sure you wouldn't spend that little extra on the DS3P? It's got the best support on these forums atleast and easily clocks high enough to push your 6600 to its limits.

@smit101: I didn't mean to imply that 975 chipset was useless. It just doesn't get quite as high FSBs as most 965P motherboards.

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-076-GI&groupid=701&catid=5&subcat=565

This the one you mean?

Also you havent confused the board i mentioned with the DFI Infinity 975X have you, just because the DFI Infinity 965s isnt on ocuk yet and I dont understand what you mean by spending alittle more on the DS3P?

Darg · 4 May 2007 at 14:40

CaNNoN_1981 said:
Also you havent confused the board i mentioned with the DFI Infinity 975X have you, just because the DFI Infinity 965s isnt on ocuk yet and I dont understand what you mean by spending alittle more on the DS3P?

Yea thats the one I mean. And no I haven't confused the two. If you're happy with your choice then that's good. If none of the extras that the DS3P can provide (I'm not sure what differences there are between the two) would justify the extra cost to you then go with the DFI. The only benefit of the DS3P in that case would be the tried and trusted driver support and the benefit of easy overclocking along with a myriad of guides on how to do so on here.

Any new motherboard will have driver issues no matter how well it's tested beforehand. The DS3P however has been out for quite a while and is a very stable board. Consider this before you make up your mind

CaNNoN_1981 · 4 May 2007 at 19:15

Looking on the gigabyte site at the DS3P it says that in crossfire mode the slots runs at 16x and 4x does that mean there will be any loss in performance? as opposed to the DFI INFINITY P965-S that runs at 16x 16x?

If not i'll prob opt for the DS3P for the driver support like you said.

smit101 · 4 May 2007 at 19:56

CaNNoN_1981 said:
Looking on the gigabyte site at the DS3P it says that in crossfire mode the slots runs at 16x and 4x does that mean there will be any loss in performance? as opposed to the DFI INFINITY P965-S that runs at 16x 16x?

If not i'll prob opt for the DS3P for the driver support like you said.

Are you sure the DFI infinity runs at x16 x16? I read that it also runs at x16 x4.

Tbh mate if you want crossfire you'd be much better off with a 975X board which natively supports crossfire,965p has only supported crossfire since catalyst 6.9 and as far as I am aware it only works in D3D so open GL based games will be unsupported.

CaNNoN_1981 · 4 May 2007 at 20:22

smit101 said:
Are you sure the DFI infinity runs at x16 x16? I read that it also runs at x16 x4.

Tbh mate if you want crossfire you'd be much better off with a 975X board which natively supports crossfire,965p has only supported crossfire since catalyst 6.9 and as far as I am aware it only works in D3D so open GL based games will be unsupported.

yep your correct, I mis-read the site. its 16x and 4x DOH!!!!!

smit101 · 4 May 2007 at 20:37

CaNNoN_1981 said:
yep your correct, I mis-read the site. its 16x and 4x DOH!!!!!

The DFI RD600 board is currently available in the clearance section HERE ,at that price I'm quite tempted myself,offers dual x8 for crossfire and great reported overclockability.