What would be the best mobo for PII 965 plz

[Goucho]

Hi there i have decided to go for AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 965 Black Edition 3.4GHz (Socket AM3) so need the best board for it. I am not bothered about sound plus will probs only be running one gpu

 

[MadInsane]

Hi there i have decided to go for AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 965 Black Edition 3.4GHz (Socket AM3) so need the best board for it. I am not bothered about sound plus will probs only be running one gpu

Right now you have TWO options, IMO:

MSI 790FX-GD70 or (supports ddr3-2000)
ASUS M4A79XTD 790X (supports ddr3-1800)

The MSI supports 4 way crossfire, uses Realtek 889A Audio chip
The ASUS supports 2 way crossfire, uses VIA audio chip VT1708S

I got my Asus for $102 shipped, compared to the MSI which would have been like $180 shipped.... By the time i need 4 way crossfire, there will be chipsets light years ahead of this generation! And motherboards will support true bitstream for blu ray rips! My $0.02

 

[MonkeyMhz]

+1 for MSI 790FX GD70

 

[Marshmallow64]

Go with the gigabyte/asus/msi fx chipset. Those are better for overclocking. I have the MSI 790FX-GD70 myself and I am very satisfied with it.

 

[Goucho]

The ram is confusing me ....... ddr3 but dual channel???

Plus i see some mobos take only upto 1600 OC ??

What is do the two standars mean like pc**** and 1600

 

[mxthunder]

MSI GD70 ; ) love this board.

 

[Porvalsh]

The ram is confusing me ....... ddr3 but dual channel???

Plus i see some mobos take only upto 1600 OC ??

What is do the two standars mean like pc**** and 1600

Its kinda confusing. DDR stand for double data rate. DDR3 SDRAM = double data rate 3 synchronous dynamic random access memory. Mouth full.

DDR3 is able to run faster but has slower latency right now. For a while, many people didn't switch to DDR3 when it came out because of the slower latency. I think we're at a point now where it is beneficial to switch to DDR3. Latencies are coming down and you can find DDR3 1600 chips at CAS7 now. DDR3 has much more bandwidth than a DDR2 module too, despite a slower latency.

The PC number, corresponds to the peak transfer rate. PC3-12800 is the peak transfer rate of a DDR3 1600 module. PC3-15000 is the peak transfer rate of DDR3 1866 which runs at 933mhz x2.

On the MSI board is supports up to DDR3 2000, which means your memory clock speed can be set all the way up to 1000, assuming your ram supports it. Whether DDR3-2000 is better than DDR3-1600 at lower latencies is a toss up, but if you're overclocking with a really high clock, you may have to use the higher memory to get the right ratios.

 

[wesleys_dad]

the asus crosshair 3 is as good as any board out there...its pricey tho..
the new asus 790x board is also a great board..its like it comes down to what you can afford and want to spend...

 

[vtec96]

I am also looking into a new board for this same CPU. I am leaning towards the Gigabyte due to its Japanese Solid Capacitors. The MSI 790FX-GD70 is my second choice and has "all solid" capacitors but not sure how they compare to the ones Gigabyte uses? Other than that they are pretty similar unless you need 4-way crossfire, then yes the MSI will be the board to get. Any suggestions on the capacitor differences between these 2 boards?

GA-MA790FXT-UD5P vs MSI 790FX-GD70

 

[SuperDave1685]

As for the capacitors used, there really isn't a difference.

 

[bassnut]

I have my board .... MSI 790fx GD70 ..... ordered and should be in soon. SInce this seems to be the choice of the users in this thread I was just curiouse what RAM you all are using. Seems there is more DDR3 Ram meant for the Intel boards. I did a little digging last night and found 2 by Kingston HYPERX

HYPERX 1GB and 2GB IN CL7

and a handfull by Corsair.

DOMINATOR GT IN CL6
DOMINATOR IN CL8 AND CL9

Any Sugestions?

 

[Marshmallow64]

get the gt in cl 6 if you can afford it. better timings, faster ram. also make sure you only use dual slots not all 3.