thinking of upgrading but need some help

bigjimmyauk · 1 May 2011 at 21:52

thinking of switching from my rig in sig to a 2500k

i'm totally stumped tho, can someone explain the differences between the
P67,H67 and H61motherboards

many thanks

RJC · 1 May 2011 at 21:54

The P67 allows you to overclock the K series CPU'S but does not allow use of the integrated GPU.

The H series boards can utilise the integrated gpu's but do not allow any overclocking.

The new Z motherboards will allow both, I think these are due 8th May ~

EdwardTeach · 1 May 2011 at 21:55

The p67 are the only motherboards which will allow proper overclocking. I.e they should be paired with the k series processors.
I think the z68 are exPected in a couple of weeks. They will allow overclocking & use of integrated graphics.

sk82jack · 1 May 2011 at 21:55

RJC said:
The P67 allows you to overclock the K series CPU'S but does not allow use of the integrated GPU.

The H series boards can utilise the integrated gpu's but do not allow any overclocking.

Z68 combines both! (If your interested

)

DJ_Hughesy · 1 May 2011 at 21:56

is this just an upgrade itch or do you have a real need to upgrade?
ie are u a video editor or something? i mean you current spec should still be good for a few years right?

bigjimmyauk · 1 May 2011 at 21:57

is there any reason to be interested in the integrated GPU if i already own a 5850?

bigjimmyauk · 1 May 2011 at 22:03

DJ_Hughesy said:
is this just an upgrade itch or do you have a real need to upgrade?
ie are u a video editor or something? i mean you current spec should still be good for a few years right?

A bit of both really i have seen the gaming performance differences especially on cpu hungry games like arma 2 (which i have recently been getting into. And i've also been creating levels using the hammer editor and it takes some time to compile a large level so thinking a move forward might be a good time.

sk82jack · 1 May 2011 at 22:07

bigjimmyauk said:
is there any reason to be interested in the integrated GPU if i already own a 5850?

Z68 review quote:

If Quick Sync means nothing to you, and SSD caching doesn’t sound all that appealing, a P67 board is probably fine.

bigjimmyauk · 1 May 2011 at 22:09

sk82jack said:
Z68 review quote:

thanks for the link reading now.

*edit* i don't think the Z68 has any features i would need, do you know what the P67 crossfire lanes are like. such as my current motherboard allows 16 by 16 does the P67 allow this

DJ_Hughesy · 1 May 2011 at 22:12

bigjimmyauk said:
A bit of both really i have seen the gaming performance differences especially on cpu hungry games like arma 2 (which i have recently been getting into. And i've also been creating levels using the hammer editor and it takes some time to compile a large level so thinking a move forward might be a good time.

personaly i always thought sandy was a bit over rated... any 4ghz quad should be good for a while.. even in *cpu intensive* games.. any ive played havent touched my quad.. (admitidly only tried arma 2 demo... didnt play long to many buttons for my liking lol)

but yea like u say compilin maps in hammer will be alt faster with sandy

danclivo · 1 May 2011 at 22:16

bigjimmyauk said:
is there any reason to be interested in the integrated GPU if i already own a 5850?

Never a bad thing incase your 5850 fails someday, especially if it's the only graphics card you have. If you have more than one then I wouldn't bother.

DJ_Hughesy · 1 May 2011 at 22:20

danclivo said:
Never a bad thing incase your 5850 fails someday, especially if it's the only graphics card you have. If you have more than one then I wouldn't bother.

knows this from experiance

currently using motherboards gpu as my 9800gt died finaly

sk82jack · 1 May 2011 at 22:26

bigjimmyauk said:
thanks for the link reading now.

*edit* i don't think the Z68 has any features i would need, do you know what the P67 crossfire lanes are like. such as my current motherboard allows 16 by 16 does the P67 allow this

There are a couple that do but you gotta pay premium for it. Most are x8x8 but I remember seeing a bench comparison of x16x16 vs x8x8 vs x4x4 and the differences weren't that big. I'll see if I can find it again lol

Here is SLI comparison.

If you are running on a 30″ display at 2560×1600 or below, an x8/x8 SLI or CFX configuration will perform the same as a x16/x8 or x16/x16 configuration. The only time that you should even be slightly concerned about running at x8/x8 is when you move up to a multiple display setup. When we pushed the GTX 480 SLI at 5760×1200 we saw up to a 7% difference in performance between x8/x8 and x16/x16, in favor of x16/x16, but that was in one game only.

Pretty much a similar conclusion from a crossfire test:

Overall, the change in platforms results in a speedup of only a few percent. Games that ran smoothly before run a little faster, while slower games such as Crysis or Flight Simulator X don't yet benefit from Crossfire optimizations in the WHQL drivers. Currently, going from x8 to x16 for Crossfire really only offers a tangible payoff in higher resolutions. At the highest resolution of 1920x1200 pixels, only a single test enjoyed a really meaningful speedup as a result of the faster interface, going from 53 to 63 fps. The remaining resolutions were already running smoothly at more than 70 or 100 fps, so any improvements here only help the overall performance rating, not real-world playability.

DJ_Hughesy · 1 May 2011 at 22:31

sk82jack said:
There are a couple that do but you gotta pay premium for it. Most are x8x8 but I remember seeing a bench comparison of x16x16 vs x8x8 vs x4x4 and the differences weren't that big. I'll see if I can find it again lol

Here is SLI comparison.

i remember that crossfire bench.. x16x16 x8x8 and x4x4 at a typical resolution.. there wasnt much diference between them