First Intel build help plz

[sheepsnowadays]

Hey guys I'm building a rig for my friend and this is my first time going intel so have a few questions. I know the 3570K is the *** so thats the cpu i'm getting but don't know what mobo to get. He wants to spend $100 - $200 on one and it has to be able to use an AMD graphics card. I don't know anything about the chipsets either do I want a Z77? if you can't suggest some mobos I would really appreciate it. Thanks in advance

 

[geekapproved]

If your overclocking and/or using multiple graphics cards you want the Z77.

If your not overclocking and/or using a single graphics card you want a H77.

 

[sheepsnowadays]

Ah yes forgot to mention that I would like the possibility of corssfire and overclocking so that means I would go with a Z77 I guess? But is there anything specific I need to look for to run AMD crossfire with Intel mobo? And If you were to buy a mobo for $200 or less what one would you get/reccomend?

 

[subasteve5800]

Asus is the premium name for motherboards (with prices to match). Gigabyte, ASRock, MSI, and EVGA all make good boards as well. Check out Newegg and find a Z77 board that meets all your requirements.

 

[sheepsnowadays]

Ok so ANY Z77 with 2 PCI E x16 slots will run crossfire? It doesn't have to say crossfire x ready or anything?

 

[subasteve5800]

You want a board that has PCI-e slots that do 16x/0x and 8x/8x. That means when one GPU is in, it will get 16 pci-e lanes and the other (empty) socket will get zero. If both sockets are full, each will get 8 pci-e lanes.

Some cheaper boards limit their 2nd slot to 4x which generally isn't enough for SLI/Crossfire.

Something like this would work. Although there are cheaper options.

 

[sheepsnowadays]

I thought if i plugged 2 cards into 2 PCI-e x16 slots then they would both run at 16x? And if I were to use a 16x and 8x then they would both run at 8x right? What your saying is the two 16x lanes would run at 8x when corssfired?

 

[subasteve5800]

The two 16x slots share a total of 16 lanes. If you have two GPUs in, a good motherboard will detect that and split the lanes 8x/8x. Some cheaper motherboards will run the first slot at 16x and then the other slot will only get 4x. Since when you run SLI/Crossfire you are limited by your weakest GPU, the card getting only 4x will slow the whole system down because of a bandwidth bottleneck.

 

[sheepsnowadays]

Ok thanks for clearing that up subasteve. So there is nothing that limits an Intel mobo from supporting crossfire other than the number of PCI-e slots?

 

[subasteve5800]

Right, no problems with AMD GPU on an Intel board.

 

[sheepsnowadays]

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