*NEW* 3.0E Prescott

[deathBOB]

Does abit read the on-die temps?

Also: Havnt used my IC7-G onboard sound because I invested in a $99 audigy sound card. IMO, its a good buy it really never becomes out of date like a lot of hardware, good sound will always be good sound. Just bite the bullet and get one and you can user for a number fo years...

 

[hawtrawkr]

The Intel motherbord reads temps 8-10 C below Abit.

its not an intel board but an asus p4c800-e which are as notorious for reading low temps as abit is for reading them a bit high

the 8-10c below abit is correct though.

this is from asus using an external probe to determine the cpu temp and abit basing their cpu temp reading off the calculation done across the cpu itself.

 

[hawtrawkr]

My Northwood 2.4 oc'ed to 3.2 (400fsb oc'd to 533fsb in my sig) is starting to exhibit the Northwood "slow" death syndrome after folding nearly 24x7 since last March.... it's now randomly hanging and rebooting, despite running fairly cool, but with the wire-pin voltage mod to get 3.2Ghz out of it.

I've got a chance to get one of these new 3.0E Prescotts (OEM, socket 478) for a really good price, and of course I'll have to get a new mobo, memory, etc. My existing Thermalright SP-94 heatsink should be ideal for the Prescott chip too, and I hope to still be able to use my existing Antec 400W (not a "TrueXXX" series, but the old fashioned plain 400W PSU). I'm not too concerned with SATA or onboard RAID controllers since I have a pair of 120GB Seagate regular ATA/100 hard drives hosted on a Promise PCI raid card I intend to re-use.

What is the general opinion for the #1 overclocking mobo for these Prescotts these days? I'd like to stick with either ASUS of ABIT since I've had best luck with these two brands over the years.

Seems like the ABIT IC7, IC7-G or IC7-MAX3 and ASUS P4C800-E Deluxe are the most talked about mobos for oc'ing a Prescott. The ASUS is hideously priced... at about $180. The IC7-MAX3 is almost impossible to locate right now, and is also very expensive at the one website I found that has some in stock. The plain IC7 and IC7-G are much more affordable, but many owners are reporting that the onboard audio leaves a lot to be desired. Is the audio on the IC7-G really all that bad? Is the ASUS P4C800-E Deluxe really worth $55 more than an ABIT IC7-G ? I desire to overclock the snot out of the Prescott chip, and use the machine for heavy gaming and folding when I'm not gaming. Audio quality is important to me, but I don't really want to buy an add-in soundcard.

I've also thought somewhat about the 865 chipset mobos, but recently helped a friend build a new machine around an ASUS P4P800-SE mobo, and it was OK and did overclock fairly well, but it didn;t really knock my socks off.

your best bet is to get a system based on the 875p if you dont mind spending a few extra dollars.

if your wanting to get the best results with a prescott you can id recommend the ic7-maxII or the asus p4c800-e. the ic7-max3 doesnt have as robust power circuitry as the maxII or any of the other ic7 flavors available.(funny the most toted board from abit for ocing is actually one of their worst)

the p4c800-e is a great board if you dont mind doing a droop mod and using either tccd ram or doing a vdimm mod at the same time you do the droop.

theres a ton of info on these motherboards (which as you mentioned seem to be the best for ocing the prescott) in the quest for 4ghz thread which makes for a good read if your interested in getting into milked the most out of your prescott.

also if your wanting to get a good oc on a prescott its important to look @ how many amps your 12v line has on it its recommended to have 24a or more to really start pulling a decent clock out of the chip.

 

[Gasoline]

the p4c800-e is a great board if you dont mind doing a droop mod and using either tccd ram or doing a vdimm mod at the same time you do the droop.

theres a ton of info on these motherboards (which as you mentioned seem to be the best for ocing the prescott) in the quest for 4ghz thread which makes for a good read if your interested in getting into milked the most out of your prescott.

Thanks for the info.. the more I read about the P4C800-E Deluxe, the more I think I will prefer it even though it costs $45 more than the IC7G-MAX II at NewEgg today.

Doing the droop and vdimm mods will be no problem for me, since I was an electronics tech for over 20 years in my former career.

I also think perhaps I should get a bigger PSU too. Perhaps something around 550w with an adjustable fan speed control and enough amps to jump-start a car