Best Socket 478 chip

I'm just wondering what the best socket 478 chip is.. for about $250 (so, probably no EEs.) Right now I am using a 3.2e (unfortunately not the right one for extreme overclocking.) The highest the socket 478s go is 3.4 correct?

Your feedback is greatly appreciated.

save your cash. not worth to upgrade to 3.4 from 3.2. in the end, I think you would be dissapointed.

for much less cash (~$50-60) you could get some decent ram and overclock you system to around 3.6GHz.

I have a 3.0 s478 that runs at 4.0 all day long under water. With AIR, it managed 3.6 no problem.

What does the rest of your setup look like?

Maviryk what motherboard, ram, cooling, and power supply are you using. Also, what is the stepping on your chip, is it a C0, D0, or E0. If it is a C0 or D0 then you could have some problems overclocking, but an E0 should shoot right to 4.0ghz if you have other decent parts in your system.

My 3.0e is cooled by an xp-120 and runs at 3900mhz rock stable. The chip runs at 4000mhz fine too I just don't like dividing my ram.

It's a D0, that's why I'm thinking about upgrading. I have two sticks of PDP 1gb ram. They can onlly do 240 FSB at 2.9v stable until I get a new motherboard(looking for a deal on a ASUS P4C800-E Deluse rev2). I have a Swiftech Storm block with the MCP655 Pump and a DHC Rad with with a pair of San Ace Sanyo Denki 120x38mm in push, and five high speed 80mm fans in the back of the case pulling air. PSU is a PC&C 510 DLX. The ram isn't actively cooled, yet. I'm waiting to find a 80mm cpu blower fan to put on top of the heatspreaders.

if you are looking for a new mobo as well, why don't you look at a abit as8 and a 630 instead?

Eeesh.... I'm scared to see how much this is going to cost me... So... what would the best AGP board be? I really would like to keep my video card... any my DDR ram if possible....

that's why i suggested that board. it will take agp and ddr1, and it will run a 630 at 4-4.2ghz no sweat.

a p4c800-e still commands a hefty price. an AS8 at newegg will cost you $79.99, and a 630 is $170.50 equals $250.50.

you'd need a mounting bracket for your waterblock i think, don't know much about that.

but that's a pretty sweet setup for less (likely) than the 3.4e route i would assume... no time to price that stuff out.

^^^

*nods*

And to add another poker to the fire:

An alternative board to the above AS8 would be the Asus P5P800SE, for ~10 bucks more, tho.

It will run 8xx & 9xx dual core if you ever wanted to upgrade. But I would not suggest this board specifically for Dual Core OCing, unless really on a super strict budget.

Just a thought...

+++

BTW, to answer ur question "what is the best AGP board", if you want to keep all ur currrent stuff using an LGA775/i865/i875 "hybrid" mobo, a lot of peeps really liked the DFI 875P-T, but then ur at the ~150 U$D range. I do not know the PCG specs for the DFI.

As to ur other question, "is 3.4 the highest stock 478 speedstep", the answer is yes, as per the Intel Proc Spec Finder

Strat

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Hmmm...the AS8's PCG is 04B, & the P5P800SE's is 05B...so the P5P800SE is rated 15W higher cpu power (130W vs 115W), as per Intel specs...not sure if that means anything of value to you. BTW, non-SE P5P800's have a fair amont of Vcore droop, & a pretty crappy, IMO, 3 phase pwr plant. No idea if this was addressed on the "SE" version.