Does a socket or chipset matter ?

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9 Jan 2011
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Hi guys
As i noted in a previous post ive been looking at either upgrading my ivybridge cpu,s and motherboards,or replacing the current motherboards ( especially the H61 board ,were as the other rig has a z77 mobo )
so here,s my question ... as long as you have a decent cpu,ram and gpu does the chipset of the board matter .. for example if i was running a i7 3770k,16gb of ram and a GTX980ti would running this on a H61 board really matter ... you would still get pci-e x16 v3.0 support and xmp is also supported by many H61 boards
obviously the above are just examples but unless you have a massive side window and your showing off your rig every day would a basic entry level motherboard be enough ?
one of the reasons im asking this is im planning to move the MSI z77a-g41 board from my spare rig to my main rig and then buy a asrock H61 board to use in the spare rig ( the current gigabyte H61 board has a broken pci-e x16 clip which does not affect its performance but it needs replacing )
ive seen Z77 boards however the only place that sells them is a site called "No Competitors" .. has anyone used these guys and if so are they reliable ?
but back to the question ... does the chipset matter as long as your cpu,ram and gpu can get the job done ?
any help is much appreciated !
 
well, I dont think H61 boards support ivy bridge CPUs, so thats a bit of a problem.

Also, obviously you wont be able to overclock on a H board. I dont know if that matters to you.

EDIT - the board will probably support the chip with a BIOS update, but if you dont have a sandbridge CPU to flash the BIOS with, then you are kinda screwed.
 
With a single GPU you may find minimal difference between PCIe 2.0 and PCIe 3.0 anyway.

Personally, I'd get yourself another MSI Z77A-G41 Z77 motherboard to keep things simple. Failing that, another Z77 motherboard.
 
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