Would I see much difference

[grarcher]

I am considering the GA-EP45-UD3LR or GA X38 or 48-Dq6 motherboard for a new build and was wondering if anyone has any knowledge of these and would I notice any difference. I do not do gaming or use Video the in chip sound & video is plenty good enough for me. (Office applications and netwrok usae only)

Might be using Q9400 as a Cpu. it seems best fir cost to performance but motherboard is a puzzle.

 

[saaiello]

I would not recommend building a socket 775 system unless you already have one. You can get much better performance out of an I5 or an I3 system for about the same price maybe even cheaper.

 

[violentlyhappy91]

Ditch the idea of using LGA775, go to LGA1156. LGA1156 is newer, faster, supports DDR3 and well, it's only around the same price. Using it for only office and network use, you can easily use the Core i3 without a problem, and if you're still worried about performance, go the i5.

 

[grarcher]

Why would the i3 or i5 be faster than teh Quad core Q9400.
As I understan teh i3 & i5 are dual core or am I missing something which could easily be the case.

 

[bilbat]

Biggest difference is PCIe 'lanes'; the P45 boards will limit you to one x16 slot for graphics, the X38 and 48 have two x 16, in case you want twin graphics cards (an X48 is just a faster 'speed-binned' X38); if you never intend to game, or have more than two monitors, it'll never matter - get what's available least expensively - if you do think about the DQ6, you might want to look at the DS5 - little cheaper, little less cooling hardware...

 

[grarcher]

I like the idea billbat
I will not be adding pci cards for my use does that make any difference?

 

[bilbat]

i3's are duals, i5s are quad cores... i7 hex cores hit the channel tomorrow! [:bilbat:5]

Listen to the 'techno-babblers, if you want, but GB makes exactly one 'second-gen' i7 board that I'd be bothered to put a CPU on (GA-EX58-UD3R rev. 1.7); and exactly zero 1156's; they never got a firm handle on the technology, before dancing off over the horizon with more new tech (USB3/SATA3), that will entail another round of "driver/BIOS of the week club!" If you want to know when SATA3/USB3 are ready for 'prime-time', it'll be when you see an Intel chipset that supports them - Intel doesn't believe (too often, anyway) in shooting themselves in the foot in a scrabble over market-share [:bilbat:3]

I've completely given up hope of GB getting their 1156/1366 act together in the foreseeable future, and am looking at server boards for my 'plunge' into i7 - they can't afford 'risky behavior'!!

 

[violentlyhappy91]

The i3s, i5s and i7s all have hyperthreading too. Asus seems to be the way to go when you're looking at the 1156 and 1366 boards, then again, they've been the way to go with 478 and LGA775 too. I've had problems with Gigabyte since the begining, but somehow always manage to buy more of their boards.

 

[bilbat]

I'm actually looking at Tyan - Asus and SuperMicro both make a passable board, but Asus uses to much proprietery tech on theirs, and SuperMicro's is about the size of a carrier landing deck! Looking at the Tyan 7025's - eATX (will fit in my Cosmos) with a pair of 5520 IOH's - 72 lanes of PCIe, not counting the ICH...

 

[grarcher]

i3's are duals, i5s are quad cores... i7 hex cores hit the channel tomorrow! [:bilbat:5]

Listen to the 'techno-babblers, if you want, but GB makes exactly one 'second-gen' i7 board that I'd be bothered to put a CPU on (GA-EX58-UD3R rev. 1.7); and exactly zero 1156's; they never got a firm handle on the technology, before dancing off over the horizon with more new tech (USB3/SATA3), that will entail another round of "driver/BIOS of the week club!" If you want to know when SATA3/USB3 are ready for 'prime-time', it'll be when you see an Intel chipset that supports them - Intel doesn't believe (too often, anyway) in shooting themselves in the foot in a scrabble over market-share [:bilbat:3]

I've completely given up hope of GB getting their 1156/1366 act together in the foreseeable future, and am looking at server boards for my 'plunge' into i7 - they can't afford 'risky behavior'!!

I3's are dual core, I5's up to I5-750 are dual. I5-750 and above are quad core.
It seems that the quad core I5's do not have hyperthreading so its either the dual core with hyperthreading giving 4 threads or a quad core which brings it back to price with Q9400 being just £10 cheaper. Both are same speed.
So why would the I5 be quicker?

 

[bilbat]

on-chip memory controllers...

Thanks for the tip; not being interested much in the i5, due to the relative 'paucity' of PCIe lanes, I wasn't aware it was made in a dual! Probably make tolerable HTPCs though