Taking Conroe plunge... But about that Mobo....

[ranger90]

I'm pretty much ready to start a Conroe build. I've targeted the E6400.

But are the chipsets/mobos really ready for it?

I'm thinking about a mobo w/ a 965 chipset. (Intel, or Asus are my favs.)

But if memory serves I'm hearing about issues/concerns with the chipset... ??

Is this true?? Should I hold off on the mobo for a future chipset?

Are there new products in the near future I should be really waiting for?

I'm not in a immediate hurry for this.. Probably start buying parts next month or so... I'm not an OCer...


Thanks in advance..

 

[SidVicious]

At this point in time, C2D ready mobos are relatively available but a wee bit expensive, AFAIK, no unresolved crippling issues have popped up.

I'm curious to know the specs on your current computer, some parts may be worth migrating over to a new build.

 

[NMDante]

Not really sure what concerns you've heard about the 965 chipsets. I know there was rumor about the quality of the integrated video in the G965s, but I really don't know anyone who uses the IGP for gaming, and the ones that do don't push the envelope of computing.

And as SidVicious mentioned, knowing what hardware you are using now could help with the build, as you can move old stuff to your new build.

Other than that, I have a G965 board, but no C2D yet. I am not worried about any issues with my board.

 

[ranger90]

More info:

This is going to be an all new build. My old "gamer" is:

P4, 2.8GHz.
2 GB Mem,
Nvidia 6600 GT AGP card.

The reason I'm looking to replace it is I want to use the old hardware for another less important task.

The old hardware is handling the gaming I do without issue.

So I don't see much that I'd be interested in moving to new box.

This is also why I'm not in a rush to replace it...

If new chipsets are on the way.. Say in the next couple months, I'd be thinking about waiting....

 

[NMDante]

There will be newer motherboards in the next few months, I am assuming, inlcuding nVidia's 590 SLI boards.

Also, if you do wait until late Fall, then when Kenstfield (Intel's QuadCore) arrives, it might drop the prices of C2D units a bit, but I don't think it will drop as much as some assume, since the release of Kentsfield is slated to be an "Extreme Edition" release (X6900?).

The biggest issue will be memory. Memory prices are slowly going up, and with the release of Vista, and it's huge requirements (as rumored), memory might be hard to find, especially since AM2 boards now support DDR2. In fact, the memory I was planning to buy for my build just went up some $15USD in the last week.

Other than that, if your system meets your needs, I would just sit back and watch the chip price slashing wars. It might not ever be this good again.

 

[SidVicious]

If that "less important task" does not require a capable video card and lots of memory, you may want to consider the Asrock 775Dual-VSTA, it supports DDR, DDR2, AGP and PCIe, allowing you to migrate your 6600 and memory (worth it since 2GB is nothing to sneeze at, especially if it is PC-3200), therfore lowering the cost of that upgrade.

 

[NMDante]

If that "less important task" does not require a capable video card and lots of memory, you may want to consider the Asrock 775Dual-VSTA, it supports DDR, DDR2, AGP and PCIe, allowing you to migrate your 6600 and memory (worth it since 2GB is nothing to sneeze at, especially if it is PC-3200), therfore lowering the cost of that upgrade.

You know, I keep forgetting about that ASRock board. LOL.

It's a decent board if you want to get a C2D started, and keep all your old hardware, as SidVicious mentioned.

I think Anandtech did a review on it: AsRock pt. 1 and AsRock pt. 2.

*edit*

Whoops. Missed this article: AsRock AGP/PCI review.

 

[SidVicious]

AGP and DDR support is exactly why I keep recommending that gem of a motherboard, I'm almost tempted to get one myself along with an entry-level C2D but the disapointingly limited overclocking options would leave me hungry for more...

 

[thetanman]

I'm wanting to do the Asrock VSTA setup with an E6600 and migrate my AGP 6800 GS.
BUT
All I have right now is 1 Gig DDR PC2100 in my old Dell Dimension 4500... will this ram work for a little while? I'm planning a 2 gig purchase shortly after I get it runnning. Here's my proposed setup:

Asrock 775 Dual-VSTA
Core 2 Duo E6600
2x512 pc2100 ram (current)
Antec NSK4400 (380W powersource included)
Hard Drive Seagate Ultra 100 ATA 200G (current)
PNY Verto Geforce 6800 GS AGP (current)

I would also like to get a new 7200rpm hard drive with 16mb buffer and pull off the jumper to run 3Gb/s transfer rate. What adapter do I need for motherboard to support this? Is it possible?

Thanks.

 

[NMDante]

AGP and DDR support is exactly why I keep recommending that gem of a motherboard, I'm almost tempted to get one myself along with an entry-level C2D but the disapointingly limited overclocking options would leave me hungry for more...

Actually, that board might make me dust off my old AIW9800Pro AGP, and make a cheapie E6300 HTPC. I think I still have 1GB of DDR RAM somewhere too.

Hmm....

 

[NMDante]

I'm wanting to do the Asrock VSTA setup with an E6600 and migrate my AGP 6800 GS.
BUT
All I have right now is 1 Gig DDR PC2100 in my old Dell Dimension 4500... will this ram work for a little while? I'm planning a 2 gig purchase shortly after I get it runnning. Here's my proposed setup:

Asrock 775 Dual-VSTA
Core 2 Duo E6600
2x512 pc2100 ram (current)
Antec NSK4400 (380W powersource included)
Hard Drive Seagate Ultra 100 ATA 200G (current)
PNY Verto Geforce 6800 GS AGP (current)

I would also like to get a new 7200rpm hard drive with 16mb buffer and pull off the jumper to run 3Gb/s transfer rate. What adapter do I need for motherboard to support this? Is it possible?

Thanks.

The first link I had showed the AsRock board chart with DDR 266 (PC2100) memory, but:

Due to performance reasons we did not test the DDR266 setting as we believe most people will not need this setting.

As for the HD...beats me what adapter is needed.

 

[SidVicious]

According to Asrock the 775Dual-VSTA does support PC-2100, just don't expect stellar performance out of that obsolescent memory but it'll work nonetheless.

The on-board SATA controller is limited to 1.5Gb/s, if you compare it to 3Gb/s as far as real world performances are concerned, you're not missing out much...

 

[ranger90]

I spent some time on Intel's website, and I couldn't find any roadmap for future chipsets.

Does anybody know what chipsets are coming down the line?

I'd really like to find a mobo that has true onboard RAID capability. It looks like older boards look to only enable software RAID.

I'd like to find a board that takes care of all the RAIDing at the hardware level, and present to the OS, what looks like one regular ol' JBOD.