Best SLI board for Q6600?

[convo]

Anyone? It's my first build so i need it to be a board easy to work with. I was planning on getting this board http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131219 but decided not to b/c I was going with an 8800GT. I kinda figured it would be better to just stick with SLI builds. Any info greatly appreciated.

 

[aevm]

I'd say P5N32-E SLI. It's very similar to Asus Striker Extreme and cheaper.

Also look at the new 780i boards. 780i will allow Triple-SLI but I guess that's not useful to you because only 8800GTX and Ultra support that, not the 8800GT.

If you want, you could get the P5E you liked, with an HD 3870, and do Crossfire later. One HD 3870 will be a bit slower than one 8800GT, but not really noticeable IMO. The HD 3870 Crossfire is some times faster than the 8800GT SLI, so in the end you're ahead. The HD 3870 is also quieter.

What sort of PSu are you planning to get for your build? It better be something powerful, if you want to add a second video card later.

 

[convo]

Thx for the info so far. I was thinking about going ATI but the 8800GT seems like such a good deal. The prices are almost equal if I want sli with 8800gt than X38 with 3870 b/c the difference in the mobo. I guess a question I should be asking is what's better for the future? It does seem like the x38 has less problems tho. I have a http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817703005 with a Coolmaster Stacker case. I already bought those two items.

 

[jjblanche]

If this is your first build, are you really sure you want to go SLI? I ran an SLI setup for about 2 years and hated it. For starters, you get no where near double the performance. On top of that, drivers and support sucks. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure there are a lot of people that are satisfied with it, but I certainly wasn't.

 

[convo]

I'm not sure I want to go that route. I just figured I should leave the option open.

 

[jjblanche]

SLI is a PITA in my opinion. FYI, I just built a really nice machine. I'll pass the specs on to give you something to mill over:

Antec 900 Case (with the two optional fans, and a PCI slot cooler)
Zalman 9700 NT (with arctic silver 5)
Q6600 @ 3.6 GHz, 66*C hottest core under full load
EVGA 512 8800 GTS G92
4 Gig G.Skill
Gigabyte GA-X38-DS4
150 Gig Raptor 10K RPM
PC Power and Cooling 750 watt PSU (overkill for this setup, but I wanted the stability/reliability)

This rig is realistically the fastest one can get their hands on, short of SLI or Crossfire, both of which I avoid. Plus, with the 9800 dual GPU coming out in Feb, I could care less about dual/triple/octo card setups.

 

[convo]

Awesome! Here is what I planned on building. I already have Case and PS

COOLER MASTER Stacker 830 Evolution RC-830
Zalman 9700 NT
Intel Q6600
Evga 8800gt
4gb Crucial Ballistix
500gb Seagate Barracuda 16mb cache
Pc Power and Cooling 610 Watt PSU

Now another question if I bought the x38 crossfire mobo would i be bale to run the 9800 coming out in Feb?

 

[atomicWAR]

first ask your self four questions:

1. do u have money to burn? (if yes move to question 2)

2. what resolution u game at? (if 1600x1200 or greater move to question three)

3. what OS do you run? (applies quad crossfire or triple sli)

i agree with jjblanche about sli being trouble but on the opposite note if you game at res's equal to or higher than 1600x1200or1080p sli can be handy in smoothing up and stablizing the frame rate if u tend to like to turn all the goodies on with 4aa 4 ani than i recommend it sli/crossfire with two cards....only reason to consider running three is if your at 2560x1600 under windows vista..otherwise its a waste of money. the scaling on sli and especially crossfire as of recent has gotten better. under vista, i also understand it scales better since the directx 10 is not limited like dx9 to only allow frames to be prerendered 3 in advance (ie swap frame rendering is not bottle necked by the graphix subsystem...one reason quad sli took a dump when it first came out, having four gpus is great but if ur os only supports 3 what (insert foul language here) good is it? ...short story long. sli/crossfire is more stable and more likely to increase frame rates than they were 3 years ago when launched. granted there are still titles the either so poorly utlize the tech or don't use it all together its hardly worth the extra cash in a lot of peoples minds but (and there always is one) if u enjoy FPS or other games that demand a lot from your gpu, i would not ever rule out a multigpu system when running high resolutions.

 

[convo]

Heh I am a noob to all this. I don't mess with the setting on my LCD. Not even sure what I run at. I can tell you I have a Radeon 9600 128mb! I know why bother with a 8800Gt when you have that monster? I plan on using Vista 64 bit. I actually am building for a game. Age of Conan. I don't have money to blow. The reason I made this post was b/c I was about to buy a 8800gt with a crossfire mb. I just wanted thoughts on what i should do. SLI is an option on the future I guess. For right now I guess I am wondering what would be better the 680I with 8800gt or the P5E x38 with that card? Could someone please let me know if the 9800 cards will play on p5e?

 

[jjblanche]

x38 all the way. I'm not big on nVidia chipsets. I'm running a gigabyte GA-X38-DS4, which is a fantastic board, and uses DDR2. Unless you have a few hundred dollars to burn, make sure the x38 board you're buying runs DDR2.

Vista Ultimate x64 is a pretty nice OS, by the way. Granted, I can't stand using a microsoft OS for anything other than gaming, but it seems like a nice step up in a number of ways.

 

[convo]

Thx man,

There are the two Mobo's I was looking at

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131219

Or

http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16813131073

I still need to know if the X38 will run the new 9800 cards. From the little i know they are basically 2 cards glued together? Would that make them limited to SLI boards only?

JJ i sent you a PM btw

 

[ausch30]

If you look at the system in my sig you will see I have a P5N32-E SLI and 2 GT's SLI'ed. First off I would suggest against a 680i board and suggest a 780i instead, like this http://www.asus.com/products.aspx?l1=3&l2=11&l3=610&l4=0&model=1981&modelmenu=1. 780i has PCI-E 2 slots and will support Penryn CPU's where as 680i support of Penryn is still up in the air. The board that I have isn't bad but it took a while to get it running stable at the speed I wanted and I have read about overclocking issues with quad core CPU's.

 

[convo]

I dunno what to do. I don't know much about the 780i. When are the new CPU's due out?

 

[jjblanche]

You do not need an SLI board for the new 9800. I'm stepping up to one when they come out, and I'm on an X38.

 

[atomicWAR]

if u don't know the max res on your pc just right click any where on ur desktop...go to settings and see what the max res possible is and that should be you monitors max output. again same logic friom above applies to crossfire and sli for resolutions...that aside whether or not to get an intel or nvidia based chipset...well u go intel and decide later u want a dual gpu, your stuck with crossfire though word is intel scales better in crossfire then any other chipset availible....u get an nvidia board u can use either sli or crossfire (at least thats my understanding w/ crossfire it works on any chipset)....anyways if ur really in doubt. go with x38 by intel other wise i suggest 780i (680i is ok in u never plan on usung or upgrading to a 45nm cpu) made by preferibly asus (they seem to do well with nvidia chipsets)

 

[convo]

Ok, thx didn't think so but wanted to make sure. I guess the 780i is the best future proof mobo but I was planning to use a 8800gt. Someone posted earlier they can't run 3 of them on that board. Seems I would have to pay even more for the GTS or Ultra models unless that board will run the new 9800's. Newegg don't even carry them. Unless I missed it somehow. \this stuff gets confusing=p

 

[convo]

1280 by 1024 is my max res. No idea where that stands on how good this LCD is. It's kinda old.

 

[convo]

if u don't know the max res on your pc just right click any where on ur desktop...go to settings and see what the max res possible is and that should be you monitors max output. again same logic friom above applies to crossfire and sli for resolutions...that aside whether or not to get an intel or nvidia based chipset...well u go intel and decide later u want a dual gpu, your stuck with crossfire though word is intel scales better in crossfire then any other chipset availible....u get an nvidia board u can use either sli or crossfire (at least thats my understanding w/ crossfire it works on any chipset)....anyways if ur really in doubt. go with x38 by intel other wise i suggest 780i (680i is ok in u never plan on usung or upgrading to a 45nm cpu) made by preferibly asus (they seem to do well with nvidia chipsets)

Just want to make sure I get this. If i went with a Nvidia board I could use SLI or crossfire? So the x38 i linked above could run either or in dual mode? Also the x38 is future proof with the new Penryn?

 

[jjblanche]

X38 is very much future proof. The new 9800 will run in ANY BOARD that has a PCIe slot. nVidia boards apparently run SLI and Crossfire. X38 runs crossfire only, but runs crossfire better than nVidia. If your res is only 1280x1024, you might want to put some money into getting a new monitor. Otherwise, running a dual card setup will make no difference, as that resolution is so low. Plus, it doesn't make much sense spending all this money on a kick-ass computer, only to be seeing it all on an outdated VGA monitor.

 

[convo]

I plan to grab a 22in LCD soon but want to get comp first. I need to just decide on a mobo already SLI is not make or break for me. I don't even need it. It looks like x38 or the 780i is the best bet. The 780I worth the extra $$?

 

[jjblanche]

In a word, no. Like I said before, I much prefer Intel chipsets to nVidia.

 

[atomicWAR]

well then thats something to plan for during the build. if u want to avoid sli and crossfire get a monitor with 1280x1050 techinically the first in the water fall of resolutions that gain from sli...its not fesible in terms to price/performance. maybe a 1.2x increase in frame rate at best...thats a guess but at 1080p (1920x1080) around 1.5 to 1.8 increase in frames. the increase rate falls as the resolution does. point is its a good native resolution if ur avoiding sli however its not much of an increase compared to what you have. if i were you get make sure u can run multi gpu in the future and worry about that after your new monitor comes into play. persoanlly i would go nvidia. i like thier chipsets (for the most part the 680/780 series are not the best examples....but the gforce 2-5 series....all damn solid boards.) and they leave u open to sli, which until ati/amd do something in the high end worth buying, i will continue using sli. in the end its down to preferance. just make sure u can run some sort of multi gpu in the future...just in case. little forward thinking never hurts.

 

[jjblanche]

for the most part the 680/780 series are not the best examples....but the gforce 2-5 series....all damn solid boards.

...okay, but with all due respect we're talking about the 680/780, not geforce 2-5 series.

convo: You've heard from both sides of the fence. If you want the option for SLI, go nVidia. If SLI is not something you're interested in, go X38.

 

[convo]

What nVidia is comparable to this and why? This is the board I am leaning towards now.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131219

Btw I really appreciate all the info guys.

 

[atomicWAR]

no i agree they are some some of nvidia's worst (well the geforce mx take the cake) but once they are up and running stable you get good numbers for fps in games...i was more saying i was worried about ati/amd future in performance. amd is swimming in debt and the hd 2 and 3 series still can't come close to nvidia's top offerings. at best the 3870 narrowed the price performance gap but certainly not overall fps. will the next gen cards be a contest or we gonna be in the same boat we are this time....my faith in amd/ati is dwindling quickly.