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What would you say the best 650i board was?
Least problematic 680i board?
- Thread starter citizen__erased
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citizen__erased said:
ASUS P5N-E SLI, but if you don't need SLi then you'd be far better off with a P965 board eg. ASUS Commando, Abit QuadGT, Gigabyte DS3P, ASUS P5B-E Plus etc.
They'll all clock very well, but they don't carry the whole SLI chipset added cost. And don't forget the New 680LT chipset either. The XFX 680LT board has literally just launched in the UK and it's under £125 delivered. This is a board that has been tested and found to clock very well, so it could also be an option.
WJA96 said:
Of course it's entirely possible that the question that they should be asking is: "Why can't I overclock this board?", which is not the same thing at all. As I've said elsewhere, I have an E6600 at 3700 on air on one, so my feeling is that the board overclocks just fine. But I do however, have one caveat: I've not run the bus over 410 yet, so I'm not sure how it handles very high bus speeds. But since it makes **** all difference to performance compared to the same CPU speed at alower bus, I'm not that worried anyway.
M
Meridian said:
Well, we were both in one of those threads and there was only guy who got an overclock, and he had mis-identified his P5N-E SLi 650i board as a P5N32-E SLi and he got 3.4GHz within 20 minutes by running the 'recipe' settings I gave him.
I'm not saying it isn't a good board, I'm just saying that if you get stuck there is little or no assistance available. The guy with the E6400/P5N-E SLi and 667MHz cheapo RAM is sitting at home tonight running 3.4GHz while all those E6600/P5N32-E SLi/PC8000 RAM owners are under 3GHz and frustrated or fuming or both.
The difference wasn't talent or the quality of the parts, the P5N-E SLi user was able to get support becasue there are loads of P5N-E SLi users who've made all the mistakes and know all the Gotcha's. That isn't available for P5N32-E SLI users at the moment.
It is for the Generic 680i boards like the EVGA.
It's a valid argument, but it sorts of agrees with me: the problem is the users, not the board. I'm reminded of DFI boards when they first became good: loads of people swore they were useless because they couldn't get anywhere. Oc course the problem was that they needed a LOT of tweaking to get the best out of them (any board which needs tweaking to run at default speeds has a problem) and people - as you say about the Asus - didn't have the information. Once people got used to them then they became more popular - and still cursed by n00bs. Personally I find them over-rated, but that's another story.
M
M
Meridian said:
I don't think you'll find we ever disagreed that board wasn't good. And you're absolutely right - it's almost a community spirit sort of thing - the P5N-E SLi thread was started on the 23rd of December and has (at 09:12 on the 8th of April) 31,222 views and 1250 posts. Most users post three times;
Post 1: I hate this flippin' motherboard - it's carp!
Post 2: I understand now! I'll try that.
Post 3: Whoohoo! Got it stable! Thanks guys.
Very occasionally we (it's our thread) get a user we can't help and (s)he buys a Gigabyte and is happy. And we're happy for them too.
The Gigabyte DS3P thread is very similar, although they're actually organised and have full overclocking instructions at the top of the thread.
Both these boards are heavily purchased by people who are new to overclocking and they get help. The EVGA board has that support mechanism. The P5N32-E SLi doesn't.
That's why, for me, it's not the least problematic 680i board.
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Would you say the P5N32-E was a decent buy then? I'm not going to be chasing some mega overclock or anything. I may do a little light overclocking however. Can anyone recommend some RAM to go with this board?
citizen__erased said:
If you're not chasing a mega-overclock and you're asking questions at this level, then spending that much on a motherboard is mental.
If you want SLi, buy a P5N-E SLi and clock it. If you don't want SLi, buy a Gigabyte DS3P or an ASUS P5B-E+ and clock it.
Always buy the best RAM you can afford if you're going overclocking. Try this thread for RAM information.
Meridian said:
No, I don't have one currently, but I tested one against my EVGA board and it was missing a couple of very minor BIOS options. I have a very good relationship with my local component supplier as I will, from time to time, drop by and buy 25 motherboards and CPUs from him. So, if I buy something and it's not as good as I was hoping, I can take it back pretty easily.
In terms of where I put my own money - I've currently mainly got DS4's (they run an automated test-suite for SAP client software), the EVGA (bought with an 8800GTX and a big PSU on a one-day-only deal), a pair of P5N-E SLi's, an Abit QuadGT (possibly the best motherboard ever, but not with this BIOS) and an ASRock 775i65 that was £30 and gives 2.7GHz on an E4300 with any old DDR RAM you have lying about. I have had a Striker, the Abit IN9-MAX and more mATX boards in the last 6 months than I care to remember. Most of those stayed a week or so and left again.
They all have their weaknesses, and you just have to find the one that suits you best. The P5Ne32-SLi makes sense in the ASUS line up as a good buy instead of a Striker, but I think the NVidia generic boards are better value in a head-to-head contest. I'm totally unconvinced that anyone can see the difference between a pair of 8x slots and a pair of 16x slots unless you're running 3DMark '06, but I'll quite happily help people spend their money if it makes them feel better about their ePenis.
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When i say i'm not chasing some mega overclock, i mean i would quite like to get an E6600 up to 3Ghz. This sounds like a fairly moderate overclock compared to some of the figures i see flying about here. Hmmm, still leaning towards the P5N32-E 680i board as a top end solution but my wallet is telling me the DS3P is a good choice. Thinking of going for either the Geil or Ballistix 2Gb kit for the RAM. Thanks for everyones input.
citizen__erased said:
For SLI go with the 680i solution. Dunno what monitor you have but in some games the 8800GTX isnt capable to provide 100 fps or more @ 1920 X 1200. if you are that concerned about frame rates, putting in a second card in SLI mode will improve your frames to about 40%. One example is FEAR, where I dont get 90+ frames at this resolution with a single card but SLI mode provides well above 100 fps. With Non SLI boards you are stuck with a single gfx board.
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I currently have a single 8800GTS in my existing A64 3700 (S754) system. I wouldn't mind having SLI as an option but i'm not really planning on it. My monitor is a 930BF (19 inch, 1280x1024).
citizen__erased said:
In that case you might be better off not bothering for the time being. You can get a cheaper non SLi chipset with great overclocking potential that will offer incredible perfomance the day it arrives on your doorstep.
SLi is a bit of a hassle, particularly with Vista. And bear in mind you'll need a strong PSU and big chassis to make that option realistic.
Current single slot 8800 solutions pretty much blow everything out of the water as they are. I'd not spend the extra money just to have a future option.
Best of luck
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