Spec me an LGA 775 DDR2 Mobo.

Le_Petit_Lapin

Le_Petit_Lapin

Le_Petit_Lapin

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Right, I had another thread that was similar to this where I was thinking that I would like an SFF (and if a mod sees it, I'd love it to be deleted), but I decided that it would be a complete headache for me to drop from a server cube case to a SFF case, so I've decided to get the Antrc 900 instead seeing as its on offer this week. I'll get to SFF eventualy, baby steps are the way to do it. :)

So, given that I know what case I want to go for all I need to fix my PC (hopefully) is a new motherboard, seeing as everything should fit into a 900 unless I do something seriously wrong. :D

So the following bits will be coming with me:

Core 2 duo e6600
Powercolor 4850 1gb pcs
2x2gb ddr2 ram 6400 (ocuk value stuff )
Creative xfi gamer sound card
1 x 750gb hdd
2 x PATA HDDs (forgot the size and might just dump them for another 750gb anyway)
Dvd drive pata
Corsair hx 520w psu

I haven't really followed the PC parts "scene" for a good year and a half now at least, and it sems to me thats theres a bewildering array of LGA775 chipsets out there and i'm confused.

All I really WANT from it is to be able to overclock my CPU to 2.8Ghz that it has been running at for a year now. And 4 x USB 2 headers. Oh, and Vista x64compatable. Thats it really. If its not a goring green colour thats a plus I guess. :)

Can anyone offer me any suggestions?
 
Gigabyte P45 DS series

That CPU should do atleast 3gig on stock voltage on stock cooling no hassle with almost 0 risk - so sitting at 2.8 would be wasting cycles :P and with uprated cooling it should do 3.2-3.6 no hassle.
 
I'll second that Gigabyte recommendation. I just got the GA-EP45-UD3P and it is great. I also like the quality over the recent ASUS' I have purchased. No point in a DFI for your low expectations. Why not look at the UD3 series also though?

Oh and nit-pick* - sorry, I'm an uncontrolled pedant...

Certainly look at the P45 series.
 
I would certainly recommend the gigabyte boards as the one i currently have (GA-EP45-DS5) is the most hassle free motherboard i have ever had and is a dream to work with. Also it has not been picky about the ram in it i have 8gigs of ocz vista gold and it picked up all four sticks without any trouble.

Overclocking on the board is easy and relatively trouble free to the point where i was able to clock my cpu to 3.2 despite never having oc'd a cpu before with little hassle thanks to helpful people on here. Features wise they are as good as anyone else (unless you want the quick boot thing on asus p5q) and for me the 10 sata ports was the winning thing for me as i use nine of them and it was the only board at the time i bought it that had so many sata ports.

It runs fast cool and stable and so far i havn't had a single bsod due to mobo or chipset drivers unlike my last asus board where 3-5 a week was the norm although i put that down to nvidia nforce chipset rather then asus directly.
 
Meh, I changed my mind again, going with this:

DFI Lan Party JR P45-T2RS Intel P45 (Socket 775) PCI-Express DDR2 Motherboard
Thermaltake VF1000BWS Lanbox - Black
Zalman CNPS8000 CPU Cooler (Socket 754/939/940/AM2/LGA775)
Akasa AK-186-L2B Amber Ultra Quiet 60mm Fan - 3 pin
AC Ryan TWIN20 CCFL Light - 2 x 20cm Red (ACR-CC9642)

:)

Probably have to ditch a PATA HDD. Oh well. We'll have to see if the 4850 turns the little case into an oven.
 
Le_Petit_Lapin said:
I'm going to nip-pick here.....any particular reason? :)
Click to expand...

Because I've used a range of motherboards from DFI, Asus and Gigabyte (and built a few MSI based rigs for people on demand) and overall the experience was much smoother and less hassle with gigabyte and they are also solid, reliable boards in general.

MSI seem to be decent boards for running stock but not the best for overclocking.

DFI were once great but went through a troubled patch and I don't have the confidence in them anymore that I used to - tho their recent releases are supposed to be a somewhat return to form - but gigabyte boards have been so good for me recently I've not been tempted back.

Asus have taken a massive nose dive and anyone who reccomends them are unaware or ignoring a raft of issues imo. The component build quality is sub-standard for one thing. Unfortunatly they tend to do very well in reviews especially overclocking - where the tester hasn't had the board long enough to run into the hideous problems lurking beneath the surface.

Gigabyte aren't flawless (there was a bad run of rev 2 P35 boards for one thing) but overall their boards have been very dependable, very easy to setup and get running and reasonably priced. They are also the only ones imo who have managed to tame the nForce 6 chipset (no mean feat - and theres a good reason they won't even look at nForce 7).
 
Wasn't there a problem with the dfi boards and ati gfx cards i know there was with the X2 but am not sure if it is widespread problem with the 4xxx series fullstop sure someone here can clarify that for you. I looked at the dfi when i was doing my upgrade but there seemed to be a few problems with the boards that may well be resolved now. I don't think dfi will ever get back to the days of the old lanparty boards that were a no brainer for a lot of people that wanted the best performance. I still stand by my gigabyte recommendation as personally and after talking to a few others about it they are very good boards that are easy to setup and then just work when you want them too though some have reported problems with the sleep\resume function though i have never had that problem.
 
hmm...certainly food for thought. The dfi's i've used were the good old socket a through to socket 939 lanparty boards.

I wont be able to place my order until monday now anyway, so maybe i should look at the gigabyte matx boards as opposed to the asus and dfi. Stuck on my n95 mobile for browsing tonight though, which is a tad cumbersome, but do-able. One thing to note is that i wont be needing crossfire.
 
Le_Petit_Lapin said:
hmm...certainly food for thought. The dfi's i've used were the good old socket a through to socket 939 lanparty boards.

I wont be able to place my order until monday now anyway, so maybe i should look at the gigabyte matx boards as opposed to the asus and dfi. Stuck on my n95 mobile for browsing tonight though, which is a tad cumbersome, but do-able. One thing to note is that i wont be needing crossfire.
Click to expand...

IMHO, the LanParty skt 939 nF4 board was one of the best made boards of the last few years. Having said that, whilst DFI's are still great boards, I personally find them too complex to work with and sometimes just want a little simplicity.

I've got this Gigabyte now which does everything I want it to and quite ably. It cost me about £3 more than the DFI, however I am still amazingly happy with it as it is so damn stable. Quality is good throughout and I'm just happy. No issues at all.
 
smids said:
IMHO, the LanParty skt 939 nF4 board was one of the best made boards of the last few years. Having said that, whilst DFI's are still great boards, I personally find them too complex to work with and sometimes just want a little simplicity.

I've got this Gigabyte now which does everything I want it to and quite ably. It cost me about £3 more than the DFI, however I am still amazingly happy with it as it is so damn stable. Quality is good throughout and I'm just happy. No issues at all.
Click to expand...

Would agree with this. getting my Ram to at 1066 with OC q6600 is a pain. I have an X48 tho, which isnt supposed to be as good at OC compared to the p45.
If i didnt have a DFI I would go for an Gigabyte, i dont like asus from past experience.
 
I would be looking at the P45 minimum.

No particular reason, it's just that the P45 will probably clock better and has crossfire available. It's only a few £ more that the one you suggested :p.
 
If there a comparison thing somewhere that explains the options in M.I.T?

My DRAM ratio (5:4, 2:3, etc) has been replaced by some "G(MCH) Frequency Latch" and System Memory Multiplier.

What happened to a good simple NB voltage adjustment? I assume MCH core is that? In that case what is "MCH Ref", "MCH/DRAM Ref", "ICH I/O" and "ICH Core"? I probably know them as a different name.

Why did they have to re-name everything.... :( :p
 
Woudnt touch Asus with a bargepole anymore, if anything goes wrong with the board expect 6 to 8 weeks RMA time, 28 days is deemed adequate by Trading Standards.

Reason I went with Gigabyte is the reasurrance that if anything goes wrong can expect a swift rma service for a small cost.
 
Rroff said:
Because I've used a range of motherboards from DFI, Asus and Gigabyte (and built a few MSI based rigs for people on demand) and overall the experience was much smoother and less hassle with gigabyte and they are also solid, reliable boards in general.

MSI seem to be decent boards for running stock but not the best for overclocking.

DFI were once great but went through a troubled patch and I don't have the confidence in them anymore that I used to - tho their recent releases are supposed to be a somewhat return to form - but gigabyte boards have been so good for me recently I've not been tempted back.

Asus have taken a massive nose dive and anyone who reccomends them are unaware or ignoring a raft of issues imo. The component build quality is sub-standard for one thing. Unfortunatly they tend to do very well in reviews especially overclocking - where the tester hasn't had the board long enough to run into the hideous problems lurking beneath the surface.

Gigabyte aren't flawless (there was a bad run of rev 2 P35 boards for one thing) but overall their boards have been very dependable, very easy to setup and get running and reasonably priced. They are also the only ones imo who have managed to tame the nForce 6 chipset (no mean feat - and theres a good reason they won't even look at nForce 7).
Click to expand...


I just felt like adding some food for thought - further to what you're saying about the reliability of gigabyte boards I have to say I've built a fair few systems for people in my time and the ONLY computers I've never had to look at for issues again are those which have used the gigabyte motherboards.. So for stability yes i'd say they're unbeatable :P
 
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