Help Choose New MB...

striker

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I have been looking at Asus, Abit, MSI, and others. I had finally decided to go with the MSI board but had some questions so I emailed OCZ to get some info about matching their ram and this is the response I got...

The MSI 865PE neo 2 motherboard does not save the manual timings. It uses performance mode to set the timings regardless what timings you set manually. It does not matter how good the memory is. So I don't recommend that motherboard. If you need other information from us, please let us know. We are here to help you.

I have therefore decided to start considering the Asus P4P800 865 chipset, but I can't find if I will have the same issue or what other boards I should at least be considering... Please help...
 

YYZ_Slayer

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You should consider the Asus P4C800 Deluxe. Canterwood chipset, very nice board.

Anyone who clames they can tell the difference between 450 and 500 FPS in Quake 3 should be severly beaten in the head with a rock. :eek:
 

striker

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I have been to the Asus website and this is one possible board, but again it doesn't mention whether it will accept manual timings and keep them. Do you know?
 

siranthony

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I can't imagine why it would not. It seems funny to me that the MSI does this. The only reason I can think of is the MSI has dynamic overclocking. Meaning it automatically overclocks itself to give better performance and a lead in benchmarks. Maybe they auto detect timings to make sure the board is stable even when The dynamic overclock kicks in. It is just stupid to not be able to save settings in the bios. I really doubt ASUS would do that. I have a P4P on the way right now.
 

striker

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I am going to purchase the P4P800 deluxe by Friday unless anyone can tell me a downside. I am planning to match it with a 2.4C. I am also deciding whether to pair it with Corsair or OCZ ram. I'm a little confused about the difference in quality between the two companies; is there any? Also what differences in performance are there between PC3200 up to PC4000 worth the extra bucks or if its just smoke and mirrors.

<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by striker on 07/28/03 03:07 PM.</EM></FONT></P>
 

striker

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I just received a message back from OCZ regarding the P4P800. They say...

As far as I know, the Asus board only does CAS 2.5 with most of PC3200, PC3500 and PC3700 modules, including OCZ's. If you don't mind slower timings, it is ok to use.

Is this true?
 

pIII_Man

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go to intel.com select a mobo of theirs that uses the chiset you desire...sounds like the 865 and then go to the link that says the tested memory...

<A HREF="http://www.intel.com/design/motherbd/rl/rl_internalmem.htm" target="_new">http://www.intel.com/design/motherbd/rl/rl_internalmem.htm</A>
this is for their 865 based board

So easy to fry yet tastes so good...
Silicon: The other, other, other white meat :evil:
 

siranthony

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Om Anandtech review they said the P4P800 and P4C800 worked the best with all the memory they tried. Cass 2-2-2-5 worked on all the pc3200. They also said The P4P800 was the best front side bus overclocker. I'm hoping he is right as my MB should be here tomorrow. I do find that reading reviews can be very contradictory. Everyone seems to have a slightly different experience. I guess it comes down to if you get lucky or not. The PC3700 issue is hard to figure out also. Some say corsair and some say OCZ. There doesn't seem to be alot of reviews of other memory like Giel or generic winbond chips. Frustrating.
 

striker

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I tried calling Asus directly and asking them what the specifications for the P4P800 were and I must have confused them something terrible. I had a whole group of techs argueing over the answer. In the end I never did get a clear yes no as to CAS 2 capabilities of the board.But they assured me that it was capable of CAS 2.5. Ya, that's great. Like I didn't know that before the long distance call I had to pay for (ha). So I am still wondering whether the P4P800 can support CAS 2 or not.
 

steviemo03

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you should by an chaintech zenith what a great board so good for overclocking and £116 not bad value, i used to have an asus a7v33 <i think> good board but i got a bad one.
chaintech zenith great board.
 

striker

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Alright, I finally got a response from Asus from someone with some guru mojo. Yes the P4P800 does support CL2 memory, and that wraps up my search I think. Tomorrow I order my board. Thanks for the help.
 

siranthony

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I have the P4P and Mushkin ram. It worked fine at cass 2 at 200 FSB. Didn't overclock very far at cass2. But it did overclock well at cass 2.5. Which is to be expected. Stay away from the Carsair twinx memory with this board. Take my word for it.
 

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