PEASE HELP!

[tyler387]

Ok so i am planning on buying a e5300 for 58$ new

The problem is...the motherboard and ram....

What is the best motherboard to take this chip to 4.0ghz 24/7 with artic cooler freezer 7 PRO?

i have only come up with asus p5q pro and the Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3P, but i am not sure if there is something better out there.

Budget is $120 or below. I have heard of boards that can do this too in the $60 range. This would be nice.


With ram, i am not sure. should i get ddr2-800 or ddr2-1066? 800 has timings of 4-4-4-12 while 1066 has 5-5-5-15.
is 1066 worth it with this e5300 running at 4.0ghz? can the 800 handle the e5300 going to 4.0ghz?

also, does it matter the volts on the ram, say the 800 runs at 2.0v and the 1066 runs at 2.2v. does it even matter if the board can support the voltage?


Thank you guys!

 

[4745454b]

I would think any of the P43/45 chipset boards from Asus, Gigabyte, MSI, etc would be able to do this. The ram question is easy. The e5300 is a 2.6GHz CPU sitting on a 200MHz FSB. This gives it a 13x CPU multiplier. 4.0GHz / 13x = 308MHz FSB. This means you need at least 616MHz DDR2 ram. DDR2-800 will work just fine. I personally would just set the FSB to 400MHz, lock the FSB:RAM ratio to 1:1 (giving you DDR2-800), and lowering the CPU multiplier to 10. This will also give you a 4GHz overclock.

 

[blaze15301]

based on what ive had id stay away from asus some of there boards arent on par with gigabyte and msi . i had 12 asus boards die in the same month ive yet to have a my gigabyte board die on me after 3 power surges a threw down the staris and many other stupid things that shouldnt never happpend and it still runs and looks brand new.

 

[jsc]

Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3L - about $90 from newegg.

I agree with 4745. You do not need anything better than DDR2-800 RAM. With your FSB:RAM ratio locked to 1:1, you will never exceed the capabilities of your RAM.

If you are inexperienced at overclocking, look at these two threads:
HOWTO: Overclock C2Q (Quads) and C2D (Duals) - Guide v1.6.1
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/240001-29-howto-overclock-quads-duals-guide

Shadow's Gigabyte motherboard OC guide:
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/forum/page-245679_11_0.html
It's for an EP35-DS3L but all the Gigabyte Core2 BIOS's are similar.