P4T-E or TH7-II ?

[pacino]

Need your help here, despiting the fact of raid option etc, Which mobo is more overclockable and gives outstanding results? I'm about to get a new S-478 chip and needed help :)

[Yodums]

I've heard great things about the Asus P4T-E...

But Abit BD7 sounds sweet.

[donny_paycheck]

Originally posted by Yodums
I've heard great things about the Asus P4T-E...

But Abit BD7 sounds sweet.

BD7! Sure I don't have a P4.....<ahem> YET. The BD7 has some awesome features like an Epox-style 2 digit LED POST code display and onboard surface-mount switches for both power and reset. Supposedly the difference between PC2100 DDR and PC800 RAMBUS isn't noticable although I have heard that RAMBUS oc's better....but I have 3 DDR socket-A systems oc'd pretty well with DDR too, so I don't think it's a noteworthy difference. I say go with the BD7-RAID and make the TH7-II RAID your secondary alternate.

[Yodums]

Originally posted by donny_paycheck


BD7! Sure I don't have a P4.....<ahem> YET. The BD7 has some awesome features like an Epox-style 2 digit LED POST code display and onboard surface-mount switches for both power and reset. Supposedly the difference between PC2100 DDR and PC800 RAMBUS isn't noticable although I have heard that RAMBUS oc's better....but I have 3 DDR socket-A systems oc'd pretty well with DDR too, so I don't think it's a noteworthy difference. I say go with the BD7-RAID and make the TH7-II RAID your secondary alternate.

I don't think you can go wrong with either Rambus or DDR.

[Turbo]

And I think you can't really go wrong with either an Asus or Abit board. At the moment DDR boards seem to overclock the Northwoods better (higher) as for some reason you can't increase the Vcore very much with a Northwood on either the Asus P4T-E nor the Abit TH7-II. For now the Abit BD7 (Raid) or the Asus P4B266 seem like very good choices. As for me, I'm very happy with my TH7-II Raid, it overclocks really well, and is (of course) absolutely stable. I plan on getting a Northwood later this year (maybe as soon as next month) but if I have to, I will just mod the voltage regulator on the motherboard to get the Norhwood up to 133 Mhz fsb. They're not gonna stop me :D Besides my Swiftech MCX478 should finally be here next week, I hope...

[TC]

I'm not so sure what to think of the TH7II. I started out with an Asus P4T and it was great except for having to use the pin wrap technique to raise the voltage. Then I got a P4TE and a 1.7gig 478. I had that for about two months and it was rock solid at 2100. I heard about the "Abit engineering" on the TH7II and figured it might do a little better than the P4TE. I picked one up and moved all of my equipment from the p4te rig to the abit. After a lot of frustration I ended up running it 100MHz slower. I just got an Asus P4B333 and I want to give that a try as soon as my pc2700 ram arrives. I'm also going to get a northwood as soon as the price comes down to around $500.

[batboy]

Boys and girls, I think Abit and Asus are the best socket 478 mobos on the market right now, but I also think they both have some teething problems and a few bugs. I think that's the price we have to pay for being pioneers with these new P-4s and mobos.

I almost went with the Abit BD7, it was a close decision. I'll be interested on hearing some personal experience from them soon. My Dad is wanting me to build him a P-4 system in a couple months, so if my Abit TH7-II that's currently being shipped don't work out very well for me... guess who's getting it? (hehehe)

TC, I'd like to know more about pin wrapping the P-4's, send me a PM if you don't mind. Turbo, do you have any documentation or links on how to do that voltage regulator mod on the TH7-II like you mentioned? By the way, I have one of those Swifty's on the way too.

[Turbo]

Originally posted by batboy
Turbo, do you have any documentation or links on how to do that voltage regulator mod on the TH7-II like you mentioned? By the way, I have one of those Swifty's on the way too.

Not one the TH7-II specifically, no. But the voltageregulator is the same as on the Abit KG7 and KR7 boards, namely the HIP6301CB. I'm not exactly an expert on these matters, but I gather if the chip is the same, the mod should be the same? And please do tell me if I'm wrong on this :D Here are a few links http://www.ocinside.de/index_e.html?/html/workshop/workshop.html and an "in-house" http://www.overclockers.com/tips704/ At the bottom of the latest page, there's a link for the datasheet for the voltage regulator. I'm planning to put in a small pot, like in the Shuttle mod, and maybe add up to 0.3V for the Northwood. This should max. the Vcore around 1.9V and that should be plenty. I'm getting the parts tomorrow, and I'll even try to get some of those small "grabbers", so I won't have to solder anything just yet. :D I would rather wait to solder on the MB until my warranty is already void (expired that is). Can't wait to get the Swiftech either. I'm going to do the mod, when I install the Swiftech, as I'll have to take out the MB anyway. Wish me luck. ;)

[batboy]

Wow, good luck and let us know how it works out. I'm going to bookmark those links now and study them later.

[pacino]

aaah, got all mixed up now, ok, here's another issue, northwood 2.2 with p4s333 using ddr pc2700 would make another good bundle to play with? .. see, the cost is not the issue, is just that I need something kicks ass in overclocking.. from what I read here so far, Northwoods won't be good overclockers?... the reason why I posted this issue, I'm getting Northwood 2.2 for sure now, but what I'm not sure about, shall I keep my RIMMS with either P4T-E or TH7-II OR get pc2700 DDR with P4S333 ? .. I pretty much know how this sound, comparing new untested, unplayed with mobo & memory with something that has been proven stable and overclockable... grrrrrr!

[Yodums]

Originally posted by pacino
aaah, got all mixed up now, ok, here's another issue, northwood 2.2 with p4s333 using ddr pc2700 would make another good bundle to play with? .. see, the cost is not the issue, is just that I need something kicks ass in overclocking.. from what I read here so far, Northwoods won't be good overclockers?... the reason why I posted this issue, I'm getting Northwood 2.2 for sure now, but what I'm not sure about, shall I keep my RIMMS with either P4T-E or TH7-II OR get pc2700 DDR with P4S333 ? .. I pretty much know how this sound, comparing new untested, unplayed with mobo & memory with something that has been proven stable and overclockable... grrrrrr!

The Northwood is an excellent overclocking chip.
2.0 Northwood have been overclocked to 2.5gig..
2.2 Northwoods have been oveclocked to 2.6-3.0gig

I'd keep the Rambus for now as the ram prices are still going up and your ram together would cost the amount of your motherboard :eek:

I'd get the Asus P4T-E and keeping the rambus since you do have alot of it.

To get the overclock get water cooling you'll be able to get good overclocking with that then!

Yodums

[pacino]

Sounds good, I will order the chip today, I got the mobo.. I'll give it a shot with Rimms and see what I can come up with, I will post the results here once I have it up and runnin' :) .. If rimms dissapoint me, I'll have to go with P4S333 & PC2700 DDR's..