is this a good upgrade?

-Exodus- · 6 May 2008 at 21:13

i'm friend's wanting to upgrade from his gigabyte ds4 p65

getting old now and can't o/c that well, i've just been offered the board in title from guy on msn and saying i already have a good board i suggested my friend might be interested, would this be a good upgrade and is this board a good clocker?

EDIT: left it out of the title, mobo is Abit AB9 QUAD-GT

WJA96 · 6 May 2008 at 21:19

What board are you upgrading to? The P965-DS4 was a top clocker this time last year, and it only really struggles with quads. A P35 board will do much better with quads, but not a lot better with dual cores. The X38 and X48 boards are a fraction better again, but the extra cost doesn't really buy you as much extra performance as the price hike would suggest.

-Exodus- · 6 May 2008 at 21:35

sorry it's a Abit AB9 QUAD-GT

Cob · 6 May 2008 at 21:40

It won't be any better than the DS4.

A P35 based board would be the only half-sensible upgrade for a P965 DS4.

Which CPU does your friend have?

-Exodus- · 6 May 2008 at 21:41

ok, cheers. what's next up from a p35 based board?

Storrm · 6 May 2008 at 21:54

X38. Not worth going for a X48 IMO. I've just got a P5E and its pretty darn good!

WJA96 · 7 May 2008 at 07:29

As you're running a P965 board, then it's highly likely that you've got an early Conroe type Core2Duo so you'll see almost no benefit at all from swapping to a P35 or X38/X48 board, and the cost to change would be substantial.

The only reason to upgrade now would be if you desperately wanted CrossfireX and the two x16 lanes of the x38/X48 boards would then make some sense, but still probably not enough to justify the upgrade as your DS4 supports a 16x and a 4x which is only 15-20% slower.