Latest chipset and motherboard stability opinions

[Cromcruaich]

k, nearly at the point of taking the dive and doing a new build.

Intel ofc.

Done the usual internet searching and general opinions seems to be that the 650i/680i/750i/780i nvidia chipsets can be a bit more prone to being unstable that the intel based ones (P35,X38,X48) - with asus tending to get a battering (but then getting solid reviews). But its really difficult getting any sort of balanced opinion - problems are self selecting when searching and asus being about the biggest board manufacturer with OC friendly boards gets more problems reported.

What are people real world experiences using the new(ish) chipsets and anyone got any specific motherboards they recommend?

Stability under low/mid range overclocks a key consideration.


cheers

 

[Kryten]

You've already split it up nicely - indeed the nVidia chipsets don't offer the same level of stability however do offer full SLI compatibility.

The P35 chipset is still the weapon of choice for price/performance, as you may have seen from other threads, the 3 popular choices are the Gigabyte P35-DS3, Asus P5K series and Abit iP35.
Otherwise the X38 and X48 boards are a fair amount more expensive - the biggest real improvement you get with those is higher FSB (1666mhz on the 48 iirc and 1333mhz otherwise) but then you really need the RAM to match and capitalise on the speed.

Stability is excellent - I'm personally on an Asus P5K-E WiFi/AP which I haven't had a single issue with other than the crap onboard Wireless. Same applies on the several machines I've built on the Gigabyte board.
Stick with those 3 and you can't really go too far wrong. And yes, Asus will be picked out a bit more in "I've got a problem" threads as they are indeed more popular, and most of the people are in fact having problems with overclocking to silly levels on a stock cooling system

 

[Jonty]

Hi Cromcruaich

I think Kryten's spot on. I've not had a desktop for quite a while, but I believe Intel's chipsets are quite popular among enthusiasts, although they lack nVidia SLI support on all but the Skulltrail platform (which no-one can afford ^^). I've also heard of the Intel chipsets being overclocked to 1600Mhz and even 2000Mhz, so the X48 doesn't seem worth the premium right now (The Tech Report et al. have all reviews of the X48).

Kind regards

Jonty

P.S. Being a laptop owner really hurts The following two systems are roughly the same price (the notebook is slightly more expensive) but I know which one will perform better I guess that's the price you pay for mobility.

Desktop: Core 2 Q9450 (2.66Ghz, 12MB cache, 1,333Mhz Quad Core, 45nm); 8GM RAM (DDR2/3); GeForce 9800 GTX (512MB); 1TB HDD (7,200rpm SATA2); Blu-Ray Drive.

Notebook: Core 2 T9300 (2.50GHz, 6MB cache, 800Mhz Dual Core, 45nm); 8GB RAM (DDR2); GeForce 8800 GTS (512MB); 500GB HDD (7,200rpm SATA); Blu-Ray Drive.

 

[Kryten]

Saying that, I don't think I'd say no to either

 

[Jonty]

Saying that, I don't think I'd say no to either

hehe, true, I'll be back to bread and jam for a while Edit ~ Nothing stays up-to-date for long

Kind regards

Jonty

P.S. Cromcruaich, didn't you already buy your system?

 

[Cromcruaich]

Ta.

General impression I seem to be getting is that the current crop of chipsets are more picky about what RAM you use - with people even having trouble with incorrectly determined default voltages on ram that is marked as compatible on the mobo manufacturers website.

Guess i'll troll through and look at positive overclocking experiences and look what ram they are using stabley, rather than looking for people who have problems - where you cant tell if its the old powersupply chestnut, that they have been too optimistic on the OC, got cooling issues or whatever.

I started off thinking ive had enough of overclocking and self builds - but as soon as i start reading up on it I cant resist.

 

[Cyradix]

I've been using ASUS for years now and never had a problem.

I have the Asus Maximus Formula mobo right now (x38 chipset) and it's an overclockers dream.
It has build in profiles you can select for easy overclocking. The only thing you might have to do yourself is set the RAM voltage.

 

[Kryten]

Agreed. RE RAM and picky boards - they're not really any more picky than before, just stick with the better brands. Corsair and OCZ throughout their ranges are pretty much guaranteed to work.