nForce 680i or 750i?

[Scrion]

I've decided to rebuild my current machine after SLI issues, I've decided to switch to an Intel processor, in specific an E8400. However, I can't seem to find many SLI Intel boards that are in my price range, let alone have the peripherals and everything I'll be using on an everyday basis. After searching through Newegg for a while I believe I've narrowed my search down to 2 motherboards ( EVGA 122-CK-NF68-T1 LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 680i / http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813188012 ) or ( ASUS P5N-D LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 750i / http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131232 ). My deciding factor between the two is the chipset. From what I've been seeing and hearing the 700 series nforce chipset is nothing but issues, video corruption mostly, however I've had no problems so far with Asus boards. My other choice, the EVGA board is running a 680i chipset, which I can't seem to find problems with, however I've never used an EVGA board before, and heard random rumors about poor quality products from them. On one hand I want to believe that the 700 series problem just affects Vista users, because it seems that most of the problems are occurring on Vista and since I run XP, I'm not so worried. On the other hand, I could purchase it and be stuck. And then there's the EVGA board, which I'm very iffy about, since all I've ever owned is their video cards, which have treated me well. Any input would be greatly appreciated, not to mention I have to come to a decision within the week

 

[Andrius]

I'd go with 750i. If not for anything else then for the $30 it's cheaper.
It has 2 8x PCI-E v2.0 and the 680i has 2 16x PCI-E v1.x so that makes them about even for performance.

 

[Scrion]

I'm just quite standoffish at the fact that a lot of people were having issues with the 780i chipset. I watch quite a lot of movies, etc on my machine. Video corruption would be awful.

 

[Andrius]

With NVIDIA there's always some kind of corruption.
I stand corrected. The 750i has 2 16x PCI-E v2.0 slots.
The 680i is obsolete and would severly limit your E8400 overclocks.

If you want flawless performance switch to P35/P45/X38/X48.
It's as simple as that.

 

[Scrion]

Since I'm dead set on SLI I guess I'd have to settle for the 780i chipset. If there's any other reccomendtations you have they'd be greatly appreciated. Between the 100 - 200$ range. As long as it's SLI capable.

 

[Andrius]

Aside from the P5N-D there is this:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813188026
and this :
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130159
with just about the same features.

And for $220-$240 you could get the 780i if you don't mind the MIRs
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&DEPA=0&Description=780i&x=0&y=0

 

[Scrion]

Ah, I had looked into that MSI board previously, the lack of Pcie X1 slots drove me away from it.

 

[Andrius]

It's been 3.5 years since I've bought my first PCIE board.
To this day I still haven't bought a single PCIEx1 card. Everything is still good old PCI. ASUS WIFI card, tv tuners, most quality soundcards. I've looked into a hardware XOR engine and SATA card but they are mostly PCI-X or PCIEx8.

While I understand the general idea behind your decision I just wanted to point out that unless you want the (probably crappy old audigy) new X-Fi cards on PCIE there's still no real use for them today. I'm not trying to change your mind in any way.

 

[Scrion]

Heh, I have a Raid controller that's PCIEx1. And I nabbed an X-fi Fatality Gundam super special professional card a few weeks back. And I've actually never used MSI either, I'm more confident with Asus. Just hoping I'm not an unlucky customer with video corruption, even though that seems to be affecting Vista machines (Ick).

 

[Andrius]

^I like ASUS over MSI too.

The PCIEx1 RAID card is pointless for me as it likely doesn't have a hardware XOR engine (like onboard RAID sollutions).
I also despise the Fatal1ty branding. I've had my checkbox on a X-Fi Xtreme Music but they stopped making it.

Good luck with the image corruption issues.

 

[Scrion]

My X-fi Xtreme Music went bad, the only replacement they had was a Fatal1ty. Same card, just has irritating LEDs and different drivers. And the Nvraid drivers were bugging out on my current board, which is why I was forced to buy a different card.

 

[Mousemonkey]

The ABIT IN9 32X-MAX is one of the fastest 680i boards around but is no longer available on your egg, worth looking around for though IMHO.

 

[Scrion]

If the 680i will drastically reduce my ability to overclock then that might not be the best choice, since I'm buying an E8400

 

[Andrius]

I'd say the 750i is a safer bet with a 45nm chip. 400-450MHz FSB should be attainable on the 750i depending on RAM.

 

[Guest]

The EVGA 750i does 2X16 SLI.


The nVidia 750i reference only does 2X8 SLI but EVGA tech support confirmed their board is not reference and BOTH slots are fully 2.0 compatible and will operate at 2X16 SLI.

A couple different reviews essentially support this by showing no difference between the 750i and 780i with respect to GPU performance and bandwidth. One was with 9800GX2's in SLI, showing very minimal difference and they were definitely not hitting any bottlenecks.