Looking for a Motherboard

[imrys]

Ok, thank you guys for all the help with my last question, here again because you were so awesome last time.

Looking to get back into Darkfall (a computer game) with my wife, however, she could not play before in sieges and such due to her crap computer. So we are going to upgrade it. Its a game that uses a single core, processor intensive, but not that special graphics. So, her current system is a bit of a lost cause (DDR ram, junk mobo) so looking to salvage the few parts I can.

What I have (that I plan to keep and use in the 'new' one):
8800GT Nvidia Graphics Card
E6550 Core 2 Duo Intel Proc 2.33ghz 1333fsb 4mb cache (looking to OC to around 3.0 or maybe a little higher if possible)
Her current Hard Drive
800W PSU (Should be good there)
Good on all periphials (Monitor, Keyboard, Mouse, Speakers/Headphones etc)

What I am looking for:
a Decent Socket 775 (to put the E6550 in) Motherboard that takes DDR3, lots of Overclocking options
with integrated LAN and Sound
and Room for upgrades

Probably will need a new case (her current one is a Micro ATX so not sure ANYTHING will fit, and not cool at least, very cluttered)

I can find decent DDR3 Ram I am sure, though any thoughts on that are welcome.

Also, should I keep her current HD with WinXP32 installed, or just upgrade her to Win7-64 now?

My budget is around $600 max for everything with little wiggle room.

As much as possible, I am looking to get just enough to make her Proc the bottleneck, and still have enough upgrade room to put another couple hundred dollars into it in a year or 2 and upgrade some more.

We dont play any "current" game, and Darkfall is more resource intensive than anything else we would do on the machine, so just really looking to make that decently playable in large groups.

I have checked out the "$600 siege machine" thread on DF Forums, it was very good, but their board wouldnt fit my Proc.

Thanks for all the input on my last question again, and looking forward to responses on this.

((Edit: Updated a couple parts))

 

[imrys]

To clarify some, mostly I am looking for a motherboard that I can use with my current PSU, CPU and GPU, that uses DDR3 and is a good platform for Overclocking.

Anyone know lots about motherboards that has a suggestion?

 

[saint19]

ASUS P5Q Pro if you can find it, but you won't see a big difference if you only upgrade the RAM. A better option is upgrade CPU, mobo and RAM, in that way you can take more advantage of DDR3 kit.

 

[imrys]

ASUS P5Q Pro if you can find it, but you won't see a big difference if you only upgrade the RAM. A better option is upgrade CPU, mobo and RAM, in that way you can take more advantage of DDR3 kit.

Thanks a ton for the suggestion.

I looked up the ASUS P5Q Pro and it appears to be a DDR2 board. Otherwise it looks right, but that was kinda a big deal.

Her current processor is actually an Athlon 64 X2 3800+ 2.0 GHz and I somehow got this E6550 from somewhere and was hoping to use it.

Keeping in mind the most taxing thing the machine will be running is Darkfall, which only uses one core, and I think I can crank the E6550 to 3.0 or so without too much trouble, with the worst case being that I fry it and then we get a new CPU.

This is the other reason I am looking for a DDR3 board. I know this proc isnt the best, but if we get a 775 socket DDR3 board, than I can upgrade the CPU later, assuming the E6550 is enough and works and I dont fry it.

Basically, I want a board I can slap cheap ~$100 upgrades on here or there for a couple years.

EDIT: Ok, I looked up DDR2 vs 3 on this forum, and found some interesting data, so I am going to compare a bit of prices for DDR2 maybe 4-4-4-14 latency 1066 vs price of DDR3 1666 or so, and see what I'm looking at. I have to buy RAM either way since she is currently using a DDR board.

Thanks again!

 

[saint19]

Basically if you get a 775 mobo socket that support DDR3 you only can upgrade your CPU to another 775 CPU socket, so, forget socket 1156, 1366 and Sandy.

 

[imrys]

an excellent point, so maybe just getting a "cheap" board like the P5Q thats "only" ddr2 makes more sense since getting a socket 775 DDR3 board really has no room for "upgrade" due to the limited cpu capability.

Am I getting this right?

If so, then I found these

G.Skill Pi-Black PC2-6400 4GB - 800MHz DDR2 (1.8V) 4-4-4-12
for $79

 

[imrys]

when it says that the p5q is a Crossfire board, does that mean it has to use ATI cards and cannot use nVidia?

I ask because she has an 8800gtx that works fine for what we need, so would prefer an nVidia compatible. Also Darkfall apparently has some sort of issues with ATI stuff.

 

[saint19]

Yeas and no.

Officially the mobo only support ATI, ATI Crossfire or nVidia single GPU, but you can hack the mobo and use SLI in any mobo.

 

[imrys]

Yeas and no.

Officially the mobo only support ATI, ATI Crossfire or nVidia single GPU, but you can hack the mobo and use SLI in any mobo.

I did not know that. I dont know how to do it, but I am sure there is a lot of info on "how to" out there should I get to that point (meaning I buy a second card), especially since I am sure if it came to that I would just buy a 200 or later series anyway, and just use the one new one.

Ok, so I am going to do a bit more research on the P5Q Pro.

Thanks again!

 

[saint19]

You can find all the info that you need about hack sli here:

http://xdevs.com/e107_plugins/content/content.php?content.30

 

[imrys]

Best answer selected by imrys.