Thoughts on Intel 975Xbx2

I'm looking at building a new E4300 system.

Potential components also include:
Corsair Dominator 800 MHz RAM
7900 GT video card
Water cooled

It's been a few years since I've built a system so I'm having to re-learn everything. Opinions?

Well, the max unmodded front side bus is about 425 on the XBX2, so it should be good for a E4300 build...

The memory voltage selections on it are outstanding as well, so getting the most out of your Dominators should be easy...

It is a great board, you wont be disappointed.

I just built mine & it was smooooooooooth! No a single hiccup. I've been so busy installing & test riding different OS's, that I haven't started to OC yet.

(I'm using 2 ide optical drives & 3 SATA on the Intel ICH7R. I haven't used the Marvell connectors yet.)

willow said:

I just built mine & it was smooooooooooth! No a single hiccup. I've been so busy installing & test riding different OS's, that I haven't started to OC yet.

(I'm using 2 ide optical drives & 3 SATA on the Intel ICH7R. I haven't used the Marvell connectors yet.)

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I just built my E6600 system this morning and so far everyrthing is going well. Nicely built board and easy to set up. After buying mine I realized that TigerDirect and other places apparently have these for under $200, so shop around and don't overpay for it like I did.

The one thing I'm finding very frustrating is my fan speed control. I moved from an ASUS P4 MB where SpeedFan handled everything brilliantly. It kept the fans quiet and will automatically speed them up if the temp increased, per my settings. I can't get it to recognize the fan controllers on the Bad Axe II, and the "auto" setting in the bios doesn't seem to do much. My CPU fan is running fairly slowly, but the rear case fan is at full speed.

I just assumed that a modern board would have fan control as good or better than an 4 year old board. I'm running Intel Desktop Utilities, but unless I'm missing something it doesn't have any control options. Is there a s/w controller that will work with this board?

btw, figured out my fan issue. The documentation that came with the board read (to me) like the 4-pin molex connector at the back of the board was an alternate fan connector. It's not - it's an alternate PCIe power connector. So that mystery is solved.

I wouldn't recomend that motherboard for the CPU

or paying that much for promo IC's for the ram

what cpu WOULD you recommend for that motherboard? An e6600 maybe?

I've gotten suggestions for the Asus P5B, which is a 965 based board. What would I be giving up by going with it?

you would be gaining a little storage and I/O performance (ICH7R to ICH8R)

and lousing a little ram/fsb performance around the 400FSB point and beyond (the 965P seems to defalt to the 1333 strap at that point) this is most visible in superpi.

Yes i defiantly wouldn't recommend a 975x for a 4300.

Since the FSB dosent go as high, yeah it might get to say 430 but it might take a little work to get that high of FSB on them 975x boards.

Go for the newer Chipset boards 965, their max is around 500FSB so you can easily hit 450 with one of them boards.

The ASUS P5B-Deluxe is a great board. have a look at it.

baa.. I thought the CPU in the OP was a E6300.. nevermind the BX2 would be fine.. but the DDR2-800 Dominators are overpriced for the IC's.

stickroad said:

Yes i defiantly wouldn't recommend a 975x for a 4300.

Since the FSB dosent go as high, yeah it might get to say 430 but it might take a little work to get that high of FSB on them 975x boards.

Go for the newer Chipset boards 965, their max is around 500FSB so you can easily hit 450 with one of them boards.

The ASUS P5B-Deluxe is a great board. have a look at it.

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I thought (could be wrong) the the 4300 maxed out around 3 to 3.2ghz thats only 355X9, why would you need a board that does 500fsb.
I'd go with the faster chip set 975x, unless Ive got something wrong in my workings.