To wait or not?

Pighardia · 13 Mar 2011 at 04:06

hi everyone.
My current situation is that i have a phenom 965be @4ghz on this mobo
http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-402-AS

i am thinking of getting an AM3+ board when they come out, but i'm not sure what to do.
the problem is, my current mobo does not support crossfire, so i def want to get a board that does so that i can get another 5850 when i need to.

i am torn between getting a crossfire enabled mobo now, or waitinf for AM3+, was happy to wait, but there's been no news!!

my plan is to put my phenom into the new board anyway so i'm not bothered about bulldozer straight off, but if i get an AM3board,i am ruling it out.

what would you do?
get an AM3 board now, or wait fr AM3+(whenever that is)

Also, another concern is that i currently run 2 f3's in raid0. would ihave to reformat the drives if i get a new board? also, would i need to reinstall OS?

Thank You

Pighardia · 13 Mar 2011 at 04:07

post is a bit rambling. But it is 4 in the morning.. I'm tired

Pighardia · 13 Mar 2011 at 04:10

was looking at this, but not sure about only having 1 pci slot

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=MB-010-SP

cmndr_andi · 13 Mar 2011 at 04:18

Hi there,

Most likely you would have to redo the RAID with the new board and it is strongly recommended that you do a new install of Windows with a new motherboard.

My first question is - do you currently need more graphics power for what you are doing, is the 5850 not keeping up?

According to this recent leak, It looks like we won't be seeing Bulldozer until June 20th - so about 3 months to wait if that is correct.

If you feel you will need a second 5850 before then, I would suggest buying a nice AM3 board as well as a second 5850. Then sell your existing board on the Members Market and get some of your money back.

For a new board, this one does x8/x8 crossfire (more than enough for dual 5850s) and only costs £60. If you feel you want a x16/x16 board then the price tag is a lot more.

Pighardia · 13 Mar 2011 at 04:25

from the (limited) research that i have done, it seems that there isn't a £60 difference between x16/x16 and x8/x8. Is that right?

5850 is fine atm, except for a few online fps's, but only on the VERY highest settings. I think that i would like to crossfire it in teh future though as i am very happy with it in terms of heat/noise etc. althoughi know crosfire will increase heat at least.
Its a twin frozr card, and i find them excellent in terms of temps/noise.

I'm not sure, as i'm not bothered about bulldozer, but thought that as i would be getting a new board anyway, i might wait.
Crossfire mobo and 5850 for £200 seems quite apealling atm.

cheers

Pighardia · 13 Mar 2011 at 04:28

i would have to go for the crossfire mobo that i linked, as i use ddr3 ram though.

cmndr_andi · 13 Mar 2011 at 04:36

Yea, the performance drop going from x16/x16 to x8/x8 with dual 5870s is less than 4% - so in real-world terms a drop in performance that won't be noticeable.

Pighardia said:
i would have to go for the crossfire mobo that i linked, as i use ddr3 ram though.

Ah, right - in that case I would suggest this DDR3 790X board instead.

Pighardia · 13 Mar 2011 at 04:39

yeah, i'll do that, but with the 890gx as my ram is ddr2

cheers.

cmndr_andi · 13 Mar 2011 at 04:43

Sorry, I read your 6th post and edited my reply - the board in my post now will work with your DDR3 RAM (Asus 790X).

That said, the one I linked to is only £5 cheaper than the 890X one - so if you feel you will use the extra features of the 890X board, then I would go for that one.

Pighardia · 13 Mar 2011 at 04:46

do you think that the Raid0 would be more likely to transfer to the ASUS board, as its the same as the one i have now?
I know it's not certain that it will work with any board.
Don't want to downlaod 600gb of steam again.
external hdd, i leant to my sister who lives a long way away. and she probably wouldn't give it back to me anyway

Pighardia · 13 Mar 2011 at 04:49

from what i can tell, the 890x has more oc'ing potential, and bios features. Is that right?

but the 790x had more pci slots

cmndr_andi · 13 Mar 2011 at 04:52

Pighardia said:
do you think that the Raid0 would be more likely to transfer to the ASUS board, as its the same as the one i have now?
I know it's not certain that it will work with any board.
Don't want to downlaod 600gb of steam again.
external hdd, i leant to my sister who lives a long way away. and she probably wouldn't give it back to me anyway

Sorry man, I don't know.

However, I reckon you have got a better chance of successfully transferring the array to the Sapphire 890GX board since it uses the same SB850 southbridge as your current motherboard. The ASUS by contrast is slightly older and uses the SB750 southbridge.

Pighardia · 13 Mar 2011 at 04:56

ok cheers. prob go fro the 890gx then. tbh, for a gaming pc, i'm not completely convinced of the benfits of some of the more powerful processors in real world terms, obviously, i know that sandy bridge etc are best atm, but i'm happy with my cpu, so i prob won't upgrade from my 965 for a good long time