Will this board work for me?

[MattMayhem]

Hi, I'm on a pretty tight budget, and I wanted to get advice on which MoBo I should put into my build.

I am going to be putting an AMD FX 8320 in my PC, so with that in mind, the MoBo I am currently looking at is the following:

ASRock 970 extreme3 R2.0

I REALLY like this MoBo because it's cheap (only like $75), it has all of the features people usually look for, including USB 3.0, 2 PCIe x16 slots, 4 dual-channel RAM slots.

However, I was wondering if this MoBo will allow overclocking? I am not very experienced with overclocking, and will not be worried about doing it right away, BUT I would at least like to have the ability TO overclock if I ever decide to delve into it?

I don't know much about MoBo's so I have no idea how to tell if it supports Overclocking, and I also do not know if it is good quality for Overclocking, but I hear great things about ASRock, and their boards are cheap & support a lot of the features I want, so I like them.

Anyways, just looking for some opinions on my board, is it good? Will it allow OC'ing?

Thank you

 

[rolli59]

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0AgN1D79Joo7tdE9xMUFlMEVWeFhuckJEVF9aMmtpUFE&chrome=false&gid=2 should do OK with OC.

 

[ingtar33]

the asrock 970 extreme 3 is a 4+1 vrm board. I would not use it to overclock an 8 core FX cpu.

I understand $$ is a concern for you but i suggest you look at two of the best low cost options out there for overclocking an 8 core fx cpu...

Asus m5a99x Evo or a Gigabyte GA-970A-UD3

i know that's $25 more then you were looking to spend, but you can't play games with those 125W cpus.

 

[getochkn]

any 970 board, while having 2 or more pci express slots, in crossfire they only run at 16x/4x. The asrock isn't the best for overclocking as it only has 4+1 power phases

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0AgN1D79Joo7tdE9xMUFlMEVWeFhuckJEVF9aMmtpUFE&chrome=false&gid=2

The best overclocking board I would recommend would be the M5A97 EVO

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0AgN1D79Joo7tdE9xMUFlMEVWeFhuckJEVF9aMmtpUFE&chrome=false&gid=4

or this would be better if you stretch the money http://pcpartpicker.com/part/asus-motherboard-m5a99xevor20 not a bad price from ncix right now. If you want to overclock, you want a good board with good vrm's. look at those two lists and pick one that's 6+2. The asus have the digital controlled feature on their 6+2 phases, not sure if the asrocks do.

 

[MattMayhem]

the asrock 970 extreme 3 is a 4+1 vrm board. I would not use it to overclock an 8 core FX cpu.

I understand $$ is a concern for you but i suggest you look at two of the best low cost options out there for overclocking an 8 core fx cpu...

Asus m5a99x Evo or a Gigabyte GA-970A-UD3

i know that's $25 more then you were looking to spend, but you can't play games with those 125W cpus.

Thank you for the suggestions, I think I might push out the extra $25 if it means more versatility & performance in my build.

Also, I was going to ask what you mean when you said you can't game with the 125w CPU's. Are they bad for gaming? Or do they just require overclocking for good gaming?

As a noob, I would love to learn as much as I can about it, as I intend to do a lot of gaming on this PC.

any 970 board, while having 2 or more pci express slots, in crossfire they only run at 16x/4x. The asrock isn't the best for overclocking as it only has 4+1 power phases

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0AgN1D79Joo...

The best overclocking board I would recommend would be the M5A97 EVO

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0AgN1D79Joo...

or this would be better if you stretch the money http://pcpartpicker.com/part/asus-motherboard-m5a99xevo... not a bad price from ncix right now. If you want to overclock, you want a good board with good vrm's. look at those two lists and pick one that's 6+2. The asus have the digital controlled feature on their 6+2 phases, not sure if the asrocks do.

Thank you, I will look at those & see if I can maybe afford any of them, I will have to go do research on all these suggestions.

Also, @Getochkn I noticed you have an 8320, how do you like it for gaming? My build will be very similar to yours CPU & GPU wise, do you like your build for gaming/does it get decent performance?

I'd like to hear from someone who owns a similar build, as I have not spoken to too many people who own it.

As of right now, I really like the M5A99X Evo, it's only 129.99 right now, as it has a combo-discount with my CPU, so I might try & see if I can afford it.

 

[getochkn]

I haven't done a huge amount of gaming yet. Battlefield play for free run's at like over 100FPS. BF3 on Ultra preset with AA set to whatever ultra is, 1080p, I get 40-70fps playing depending on the scene. CPU usage is only like 50-60% across the cores, overclocked easily to 4.56ghz with my Seidon liquid cooler and some good case fans and keeping the cables out of the way, etc. Playing BF3, my core temp is like 38C after 3 hours. GPU is only at 64C and it's been overclocked by 100ghz as well. I have no issues with the system, the chip, or the GPU. The 7970 probably won't do BF4 on ultra but a mix of high and ultra or high shouldn't be a problem. I just can't bring myself to spend $70 for BF4 yet or $120 for the deluxe bundle. lol.

 

[MattMayhem]

I haven't done a huge amount of gaming yet. Battlefield play for free run's at like over 100FPS. BF3 on Ultra preset with AA set to whatever ultra is, 1080p, I get 40-70fps playing depending on the scene. CPU usage is only like 50-60% across the cores, overclocked easily to 4.56ghz with my Seidon liquid cooler and some good case fans and keeping the cables out of the way, etc. Playing BF3, my core temp is like 38C after 3 hours. GPU is only at 64C and it's been overclocked by 100ghz as well. I have no issues with the system, the chip, or the GPU. The 7970 probably won't do BF4 on ultra but a mix of high and ultra or high shouldn't be a problem. I just can't bring myself to spend $70 for BF4 yet or $120 for the deluxe bundle. lol.

Alright thank you for the insight. That's very decent performance in my book. The only thing I expect out of my PC is to play games on pretty high settings with an FPS above 30 FPS.

Is your GPU & CPU always overclocked when you game? Or have you gamed on it with lower (or even stock) speeds?

The reason I ask is because I have never overclocked, and I'm not sure I wanna jump right into overclocking.

Plus I can't afford liquid cooling right now either, so I don't wanna do too much overclocking with nothing but fans to cool it. So I might be running things on stock speeds until then.

I just worry about stock speeds because I don't want the performance to be crappy, because the entire reason I'm building this PC is for gaming.

 

[getochkn]

You'll be fine even not overclocked. The 8320 is a 3.5ghz chip, with turbo boost that will boost itself to 3.7ghz when 2 or more cores are loaded and then to 4.0ghz when it meets some other criteria, so there is already built in overclock that will happen regardless and will kick in if needed.

 

[ingtar33]

i know that's $25 more then you were looking to spend, but you can't play games with those 125W cpus.

Thank you for the suggestions, I think I might push out the extra $25 if it means more versatility & performance in my build.

Also, I was going to ask what you mean when you said you can't game with the 125w CPU's. Are they bad for gaming? Or do they just require overclocking for good gaming?

As a noob, I would love to learn as much as I can about it, as I intend to do a lot of gaming on this PC.

no... what i meant is it's a seriously power hungry monster of a cpu and "you shouldn't play games" with that beast (or in other word, don't underestimate the strain it will put on your board). Feeding it a wimpy motherboard is asking for it to break that motherboard.

that 8320 is a great cpu... you get a LOT of power for a small amount of cash. I know if i were to get a cpu to put into my system to replace this PhII x4 965be, it would be a 8320 i'd get.

 

[MattMayhem]

Thank you guys so much, you have helped me a LOT!

@getochkn that is awesome, and I did not know that about my CPU, that will work just fine

@ingtar33, I chose you as the best answer, because your wise words about a cheapy motherboard being strained by the FX inspired me. I purchased my PC, and I went ahead and bought myself the Asus M5A99x EVO MoBo to feed my beast of a CPU lol.

 

[ingtar33]

Thank you guys so much, you have helped me a LOT!

@getochkn that is awesome, and I did not know that about my CPU, that will work just fine

@ingtar33, I chose you as the best answer, because your wise words about a cheapy motherboard being strained by the FX inspired me. I purchased my PC, and I went ahead and bought myself the Asus M5A99x EVO MoBo to feed my beast of a CPU lol.

congratz!

I got that motherboard myself, love it. Since it looks like steamroller isn't going to get an AM3+ chip, i might just bite the bullet this xmas season and get an 8320/8350 to put into it.

 

[getochkn]

Ya I love the board too. I'm at 4.7ghz solid now, haven't tried for move. That speed maxes anything I need it to and not push too much heat or voltage through it.