Nvidia nForce 650i vs 680i

[harty23690]

Well....

Whats the difference....apart from $150

 

[grifter33]

The 680i runs full pciex16x2 sli. The 650i only runs 8x8.

There may be more differences in regard to overclocking, but I'm not sure.

 

[harty23690]

OK. Thanks for that.

Anyone else know of anything else.

Also is it worth getting the 650 or is it better to futureproof with the dual PCI-E x16

 

[MikeGR7]

Well i had the chance to see the difference between 4X and 8X PCIE. I did it with a previous X1800XT. Trust me it was HUGE. Considering the strength a modern 8800GTX or any future DX10 card has over X1800XT, i'm sure that the extra 8X bandwidth from 8 to 16 will worth it.

 

[grifter33]

I'm not sure how future proof either of them will be. PCIe 2.0 compliant boards should be hitting the market in the next few weeks/months.

Supposedly everything is going to be backwards compatible, which is fine right now, but depending on how often you upgrade, by the time you are ready for an upgrade you might be crippling your new card by running on an old PCIe slot. I know current cards don't even use the full speed of current pcie slots, much less what pcie 2.0 offers, but alot can change in a short time. I wouldnt' be surprised if a year from now, high end cards are running at faster speeds than regular pcie offers, not to mention the power they might need.

You might want to consider waiting a little while longer and get a board with Pcie 2.0 if you want it to last you awhile.

 

[PCAnalyst]

680i has an additional SATA for a total of 6.

It also has Azalia Audio vs Realtek audio on the 650i board.

Some people prefer the Azalia... some don't

 

[BUFF]

It also has Azalia Audio vs Realtek audio on the 650i board.

they both have HD (azalia) audio

for a quick rundown
http://www.nvidia.com/page/nforce_600i_tech_specs.html

 

[merc14]

I've been looking at this too and here is what I have come up with. The 680i is obviously the high end and very high priced chip. The 650i seems to be going to the stripped down boards:

1. 680i has 32 lanes dedicated to PCIe for graphics whereas 650i only has 16. If you're running one vid card it gets all 16 lanes. WHen you go SLI the chipset splits the 16 between the cards. Is this a big deal? Well as far as my research has shown, no, it isn't. Two 8800GTS cards run just as fast on the 650i as they do on the 680. Two 8800GTX seem to suffer a little but not appreciably so. You will see it in benchmarls but noy in a game.
2. 680i has more PCIe lanes overall, 46 compared to 18 for the 650. The breakout is 16, 16, 8, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1 for 680 and 16 (or 8, 8) 1, 1 for the 650. This means you don't have a lot of expansion on the 650i and there is no dedicated 8x lane for a PHYSx card. That 16 (or 8, 8) is dedicated to graphics and phys x won't work.

The good news is the 650 seems to clock as high as the 680. The three reviews I read achieved 500MHz FSB. This was on an Asus board that goes for $149. It has only one LAN and only 4 SATA ports. $400 you get the Striker with all the bells and whistle. Evga has a 680i board for $250 that seems very good.

As said above there are a whole lot of changes coming over the next year. Significantly, AMD is releasing there new CPU. Whether it is any good or not is unknown at this time. That begs the question "What should I do now to capture all that Core 2 Duo goodness without breaking the bank?"

Here is my plan: Personally I am mainly interested in overclocking and don't need two LAN ports or more than 4 SATA ports at this time. Neither will I be needing more than one 8800GTS for awhile. So for me the 650i chipset seems perfect. The 8800GTS gets all 16 lanes and the thing hits 500MHz FSB. The 4 phase power sucks but it seems stable. The chipsets get very hot and are poorly cooled but I use watercooling so would've removed any heatsinks regardless. Couple that board with a Core 2 Duo 4300, due to be released in a month or two, and you have a Core 2 system capable of at least 3.6GHz (see anandtech) for $300. The big money goes to RAM and 8800GTS but both are reusable if I decide to move back to AMD at the end of this year or beginning of next.

Hope this helps a little. I really like the idea of a $300 CPU mobo combo. We'll see if it works out.