[SuperDave1685]

I *just* hoped on the Intel train, but I'm already looking to move forward. I was wondering what the differences are between the 680i chipset and the P35 chipset. I know the 680i's had native 1333FSB support from the get go, but how does each chipset compare in overclockability?

[thideras]

Originally Posted by SuperDave1685

I *just* hoped on the Intel train, but I'm already looking to move forward. I was wondering what the differences are between the 680i chipset and the P35 chipset. I know the 680i's had native 1333FSB support from the get go, but how does each chipset compare in overclockability?

I'm pretty sure the p35 tops anything, I'm at 450fsb (cpu limited) with no voltage increase on the mb at all...

[SuperDave1685]

wow. Thats impressive. Fast reply too Thats what I was leaning towards. I was thinking of looking at the Abit IP35 Pro. I have the QuadGT now, but I have to narrow it down to the board or the CPU thats giving me so much trouble.

[thideras]

Originally Posted by SuperDave1685

wow. Thats impressive. Fast reply too Thats what I was leaning towards. I was thinking of looking at the Abit IP35 Pro. I have the QuadGT now, but I have to narrow it down to the board or the CPU thats giving me so much trouble.

Thats the one I have! I really like it over my AW9D-MAX....much better...and it is still cheaper than it too

[chawks2]

SuperDave, what problems are you having?

[SuperDave1685]

lol ahh.... just getting it to run over 425FSB... not that I need that much, but it'd be nice... It passed Orhtos at 400x6 for almost 4 hours while I was at work, so I don't think its the board... I'm starting to lean on my RAM (its kinda value) or my CPU. Its a L40A, a later week and I've heard that the later weeks don't o/c as well as the older ones. Damnit, this board WILL do what I tell it too lol.


On another note, its not that I'm already boared with P965, its just that I'm thinking of going big and fast with my upcoming Bonus and I was thinking of a Q6600 on a P35 board under phase.... something to last me a while

[chawks2]

I was able to get the board up to 480, with my 6700 on the 7 multi w/PC28500, I settled on 340 x 10, for multiple reasons. It definitely can be done, I never got a chance to test my HK's on that board, but something tells me I would have been able to get over 500 FSB.

[Maverick0984]

I definitely do not agree with P35 "toping anything."

I understand you wanting to be partial to your own board but don't just feed lies to a guy asking questions .

People early on reported the 680i having FSB issues over 400, I've seen many reports of people reaching over 500 Mhz. Imho, the issues of 400 were settled. If you want SLI, it is 680i hands down. Some boards like the MSI P6N Diamond have 4, yes that's right 4, PCIe slots. Not all 4 run at x16, but you can do 2 at x16 and 2 at x8 if you wanted. That means 2 at SLI, and a PhyX card when they get up to speed. Or 1 at x16, and 3 at x8 if you wanted to do it that way.

As much as people say 1 strong graphic's card is "enough". The same can be said for the dual core and everyone wanting quad core. Dual Core and 1 strong card are enough for Today. But Quad and SLI are enough for Tomorrow.

It really depends on what you are going for. The 680i is VERY impressive. Not to mention the nVidia chipsets it has come with lots of goodies.

You want SLI do 680i. You don't, do P35.

The thing is, you are really asking the wrong question in an OC bias forum. Because of the problems 680i had in the beginning some went to the P35 and others were swayed. I've seen first hand, the 680i OC'ing half a dozen CPU's to the CPU's limit, not the mobo's.

I personally went with 680i because I didn't see the P35 benefits outweighing the benefit I wanted/needed with SLI. It was a very easy decision for me.

[Surfrider77]

I've got an Abit IP35 Pro on the way to replace my 680i. I have had FSB issues past 400MHz, like others.

*shrug*

[Maverick0984]

Originally Posted by Surfrider77

I've got an Abit IP35 Pro on the way to replace my 680i. I have had FSB issues past 400MHz, like others.

*shrug*

I would have upgraded to a higher multiplier CPU. That e6600 of yours can't go much past 3.6 Ghz anyway. Are you sure it was the mobo's fault? I've seen EVGA's mobo go well past 400Mhz from other users. I dunno.

I'm sure you'll like your P35, don't mean to crap on your purchase.

Oh, and MSI's P6N Diamond comes with a X-FI sound card onboard which is 10x better than normal onboard sound.

Also, I've heard different rumors, though nothing official. That both will support the new Penryn set of intel chips due out next year. Probably require a bios update, but that's pretty obvious.

[SuperDave1685]

yes, but the onboard X-Fi on the MSI doesn't support EAX fully, so its kinda misleading...

[Maverick0984]

It supports EAX1 through EAX4. The only thing it doesn't support is EAX5. I think that is pretty damn good for what it is. For an onboard sound card, this is still 10x better than anything else any motherboard offers...

The Creative X-Fi Extreme Audio chip onboard does not support the latest EAX 5.0 (since only audio cards with dedicated memory buffer do), but features 24-Bit/96kHz 7.1-channel audio, DTS Surround and Dolby Digital EX. Clearly, the Extreme Audio is aimed at multimedia rather than gaming, but since a lot of people know how advanced the top-of-the-range Creative X-Fi audio cards are, MSI P6N Diamond will receive a lot of attention.

Source http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/edi...t2007-3_6.html

[thideras]

Originally Posted by Maverick0984

I definitely do not agree with P35 "toping anything."

I understand you wanting to be partial to your own board but don't just feed lies to a guy asking questions .

People early on reported the 680i having FSB issues over 400, I've seen many reports of people reaching over 500 Mhz. Imho, the issues of 400 were settled. If you want SLI, it is 680i hands down. Some boards like the MSI P6N Diamond have 4, yes that's right 4, PCIe slots. Not all 4 run at x16, but you can do 2 at x16 and 2 at x8 if you wanted. That means 2 at SLI, and a PhyX card when they get up to speed. Or 1 at x16, and 3 at x8 if you wanted to do it that way.

As much as people say 1 strong graphic's card is "enough". The same can be said for the dual core and everyone wanting quad core. Dual Core and 1 strong card are enough for Today. But Quad and SLI are enough for Tomorrow.

It really depends on what you are going for. The 680i is VERY impressive. Not to mention the nVidia chipsets it has come with lots of goodies.

You want SLI do 680i. You don't, do P35.

The thing is, you are really asking the wrong question in an OC bias forum. Because of the problems 680i had in the beginning some went to the P35 and others were swayed. I've seen first hand, the 680i OC'ing half a dozen CPU's to the CPU's limit, not the mobo's.

I personally went with 680i because I didn't see the P35 benefits outweighing the benefit I wanted/needed with SLI. It was a very easy decision for me.

*ahem*

Ok, yes I exaggerated a little, bite me...

I am partial to my board not because I have it and I THINK it is one of the best boards out there...no, I have it/tested/benched it and found out that it is one of the best boards out there. Also, I was comparing it to the ABIT AW9D-MAX, which the OP and myself have...and it beats it hands down.

Also, I've seen some thread where people are getting 530-550 on this board, someone even said someone got 600, but I'll believe that when I see a SS

Also, SLi is not "disabled" on the intel chipsets, you have to use "different" drivers to get it to work...so you CAN do SLi on these boards

Also, what about supporting 45nm technology like Penryn? What about Matrix RAID? What about the increased memory bandwidth? What about DDR3? Your 680i doesn't do those...hmm....

This list goes on my friend...

[Maverick0984]

Originally Posted by thideras

*ahem*

Ok, yes I exaggerated a little, bite me...

I am partial to my board not because I have it and I THINK it is one of the best boards out there...no, I have it/tested/benched it and found out that it is one of the best boards out there. Also, I was comparing it to the ABIT AW9D-MAX, which the OP and myself have...and it beats it hands down.

Also, I've seen some thread where people are getting 530-550 on this board, someone even said someone got 600, but I'll believe that when I see a SS

Also, SLi is not "disabled" on the intel chipsets, you have to use "different" drivers to get it to work...so you CAN do SLi on these boards

Also, what about supporting 45nm technology like Penryn? What about Matrix RAID? What about the increased memory bandwidth? What about DDR3? Your 680i doesn't do those...hmm....

This list goes on my friend...

1. DDR3 is well known to be pretty much overpriced and pointless right now. Since it offers very little gain for a much heaftier price tag.

2. 680i will support Penryn...already said that.

3. Mem Bandwidth? The 680i is unlinked, the P35 is not. I think you are pulling this outta nowhere...
Unlinked > Linked

4. As for Matrix Raid, no, it doesn't, but it has software and hardware RAID supported out of the box with any configuration you might need. I really don't see matrix RAID as a boost. If you want to get nitpicky about features with very little gain then go ahead. I could talk about 680i's superior networking capabilities but I don't see it has a huge deal.

I think SLI is a very important MAJOR feature that the P35 lacks...you haven't listed a single thing that I wish my board had.

And, no, the P35 can NOT support SLI, it can do ATI's crappy Crossfire but not the superior SLI. Nvidia did not license it for them. I never said it was "disabled." It simply is not supported.

SLI != Crossfire, just an fyi.

If you wanted to wait till the X38, that *will* have SLI and DDR3 for the best of both worlds.

[thideras]

Originally Posted by Maverick0984

And, no, the P35 can NOT support SLI, it can do ATI's crappy Crossfire but not the superior SLI. Nvidia did not license it for them. I never said it was "disabled." It simply is not supported.

SLI != Crossfire, just an fyi.

Ok, then you need to look around, while it doesn't "support" nVidia...you can still do it.

Originally Posted by Maverick0984

3. Mem Bandwidth? The 680i is unlinked, the P35 is not. I think you are pulling this outta nowhere...
Unlinked > Linked

...I don't understand how unlinked is better than linked...instead of running my RAM at stock, I am forcing it to overclock with my 450fsb...how much bandwidth do you get at 450fsb? 5.8gigs a second here...last board didn't even come close to touching that.

[JamesXP]

But i'm pretty sure its still only 16 and 8x

[dudleycpa]

IIRC the P35 is 16x and 4x.

Not that you would want to run in crossfire.

[GTengineer]

Originally Posted by Maverick0984

1. DDR3 is well known to be pretty much overpriced and pointless right now. Since it offers very little gain for a much heaftier price tag.

2. 680i will support Penryn...already said that.

3. Mem Bandwidth? The 680i is unlinked, the P35 is not. I think you are pulling this outta nowhere...
Unlinked > Linked

4. As for Matrix Raid, no, it doesn't, but it has software and hardware RAID supported out of the box with any configuration you might need. I really don't see matrix RAID as a boost. If you want to get nitpicky about features with very little gain then go ahead. I could talk about 680i's superior networking capabilities but I don't see it has a huge deal.

I think SLI is a very important MAJOR feature that the P35 lacks...you haven't listed a single thing that I wish my board had.

And, no, the P35 can NOT support SLI, it can do ATI's crappy Crossfire but not the superior SLI. Nvidia did not license it for them. I never said it was "disabled." It simply is not supported.

SLI != Crossfire, just an fyi.

If you wanted to wait till the X38, that *will* have SLI and DDR3 for the best of both worlds.

Are you actually saying a 680i is better than a P35?? LOL

Unlinked ram is about as useless as it gets, I know I had one. About as useless as overclocking the wazoo out of RAM unless you are in the process of OCing your CPU. The advantages of 600 series are really SLI and command rate (1T) selection. So it is really simple if you want SLI get 680i otherwise P35 is the only way to go right now.

Furthermore people are getting better OCs out of Quads with P35 than 680i at xtremesystems. www.bit-tech.com also did a review where they achieved much better stability with a P35 then with the 680i. I will post the link when I can find it.

EDIT: http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/200...2_quad_q6600/1

Our overclocking experiences with XFX’s nForce 680i SLI motherboard weren’t quite as fruitful as the experiences we had with the Asus P5K Deluxe, but that’s a trend we’ve seen in the past, especially with quad-core processors. However, the board's overclocking performance was hardly anything to really sniff at.

We didn’t encounter any problems with stability holes on XFX’s nForce 680i SLI motherboard, but we found that the board was very quick to become unstable.

For example, with the Asus P5K Deluxe, we could run just about every task except Prime 95 at 3400MHz, but the chip wasn’t fully stable until we got down to around 3350MHz.

With XFX’s nForce 680i SLI motherboard, we encountered stability issues when accessing the network at 3310MHz. It wasn’t until we dropped to around 3285MHz that we could run our full suite of benchmarks.

Cliffnotes: 680i not bad but not as good as P35

[Maverick0984]

Originally Posted by GTengineer

The advantages of 600 series are really SLI and command rate (1T) selection. So it is really simple if you want SLI get 680i otherwise P35 is the only way to go right now.

Originally Posted by Maverick0984

You want SLI do 680i. You don't, do P35.

That is exactly what I said....

and in this case...YES 680i is *much much* better for those who want SLI. It is just like anything else, you buy what is of use to your personal preference. What is so hard to understand here? My CPU has overclocked to as much as I possibly could and is limited by temperature. I wouldn't be able to use anything a P35 got me, and I'd be losing my SLI capability. The choice is very clear for my use. I've already made mention that this is an OC forum so there is a strong bias and few here go with SLI. If I went to an SLI forum this topic would be flip flopped. Just as to be expected.

Also, I'm not sure how "more stable" my P6N Diamond could possibly be, it's stable as a rock...I've got an e6700 OC'd to 3.45 Ghz and can run 2xPrime95/Orthos for the 10 hours I'm at work all day and decide it's time to come home and play with my toy. I could easily go higher and have, but my temps get too high for my liking. I'm upgrading to a Ultra 120 Extreme in less than a week, hope to push it more.

Originally Posted by thideras

Ok, then you need to look around, while it doesn't "support" nVidia...you can still do it.

Source? You find me a P35 that is doing x16/x16/x8 for SLI+PhysX or even x16/x16 to make it easier with the stability the 680i does and fine you win. However, I know you will not.

[ancalime]

IMHO it makes absolutely no sense to get a 680i board, never mind SLI.

First and foremost, there are P35 boards like the IP35 and Biostar that are or are approaching a sub $xxx price point. Most decent 680i boards are approaching or are exceeding $200 USD. It does not make sense to pay this premium for, most likely, a more crippled overclocking board.

So should one pay possibility 2x the cost over a P35 board for SLI? Heck no I say! Sure it could be nice to have an option to do SLI but I don't see how SLI pays off. SLI isn't tomorrow, G90 is. Get a single 8800GTS 640MB and you are covered in the video department, ultra settings Crysis here you come. Plus, I believe P35 boards with 2 PCI16 slots can handle SLI with custom drivers.

P35 all the way for me.