best P55 motherboard?

You are getting different temps because you are a lucky owner of a quad processor. :D

So you are getting the reading of each core (4 total).

If you are looking for one temp then calculate the average (Core1 + Core2 + Core3 +Core4/4 = Average)

First of all you have a very nice rig Congrats! Also nice clock so far but I agree with SonDa5, you need to run a stress test to see if your current clock are stable enough.

Prime95 seems to be the preferred tool because it stresses the CPU to 100%.
 
First post here, though ive been lurking around these forums every now and then, reading threads...

I just ordered Core i5-750 and a MSI P55-CD53 from newegg this weekend. My old rig which was a C2D E6650 @ 2.66GHz (Stock clock, not an overclocker) and a Gigabyte-P35-DS3L. (If i had the extra cash i would of gone for a i5-860 or i7-920)

The only reason i am upgrading is becuase my GB mobo decided to die, if it wasnt for that i would be sticking with my C2D. Anyways i RMA'd it to GB and they sent it back without actually repairing it. :rolleyes: It still had the same problem: would not boot at all, not even to the mobo splash screen or BIOS. i read a thread on this very forums of GB doing that to other people; returning an RMA mobo without actually fixing it.

So anyways, i was at first just gonna buy a s775 mobo but i saw that the i5s were only $189 on Newegg, so i decided to go all out and grab one of those + p55 mobo.

As stated above i ordered a MSI P55-CD53, i was considering grabbing a ASUS P7P55D but the MSI one was cheaper (I never considered a GB mobo after the BS they pulled with my RMA). however I just read TH's article on P55 mobos today and now im having "buyers remorse", that maybe i should of dished out the extra cash for the ASUS mobo.

Again i never OC'd before, but one of the things that drew me to the MSI mobo was the OC Genie thingy, i was considering using that to do low level OC but after reading TH article about the capacitors and what not failing from low OCing, im having second thoughts. after i build it and do some benchmarking ill see if i feel the need to do lite OCing (via OC Genie), if not then im not going to.

anyways heres my full specs on the comp i'll be building this weekend (hopefully this weekend if UPS hurrys the hell up):

Core i5-750 (AC Freezer Pro 7 Rev2)
MSI P55-CD53
CORSAIR XMS3 4GB (2 x 2GB) DDR3
NVIDIA GTX 260 896MB (216)
Creative SB Audigy 2
WD Raptor 150GB, Seagate 320GB, Samsung 750GB
Win 7 RC 64bit

also this maybe a bit off topic, but is 4GB of DDR3 RAM enough for gaming on Win7? Games i play the most are on source engine but i also play some WiC, Empire Total War & BF2
 
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Officer Martinez are you prime95 stable for at least 1 hour?

I'd go by Real temp since it seems to be a standard that many use.

Your machine and performance is very impressive. :cool:

You are getting different temps because you are a lucky owner of a quad processor. :D

So you are getting the reading of each core (4 total).

If you are looking for one temp then calculate the average (Core1 + Core2 + Core3 +Core4/4 = Average)

First of all you have a very nice rig Congrats! Also nice clock so far but I agree with SonDa5, you need to run a stress test to see if your current clock are stable enough.

Prime95 seems to be the preferred tool because it stresses the CPU to 100%.


Thanks xXxDieselxXx and SonDa5.. I'm pretty familiar with overclocking and temp programs. What I'm not familiar with is the latest and greatest temp monitoring programs for the 1156 socket. I had to bump my vcore up a pretty good ways, but I finally managed a rough stable overclock (1 full hour so far). The temps spiked during one segment of testing but overall, they hovered 98% around 78c - 81c degrees. I am still running P95 now, as I type this, for a longer run of atleast 8 hours. But, I'm pretty sure I am on the right path..


p95.jpg
 
is 4GB of DDR3 RAM enough for gaming on Win7? Games i play the most are on source engine but i also play some WiC, Empire Total War & BF2

Hi Jerry,

The consensus is 4GB of RAM is good enough for gaming even on Win-64bit :D

and it better be... because that's what I have :D
 
The temps spiked during one segment of testing but overall, they hovered 98% around 78c - 81c degrees. I am still running P95 now, as I type this, for a longer run of atleast 8 hours. But, I'm pretty sure I am on the right path..

Looking good buddy... However I personally feel the temps are a little to high for my personal liking. That's just me.

Have you tried taking the multiplier to 21 instead of 20 and see if you can lower the voltage a little bit ? It might give you better temps. ;)
 
Looking good buddy... However I personally feel the temps are a little to high for my personal liking. That's just me.

Have you tried taking the multiplier to 21 instead of 20 and see if you can lower the voltage a little bit ? It might give you better temps. ;)

Yeah, I tried the 21 multiplier but I noticed two things.. First and foremost, this board didn't post on anything past 21 x 185 (3.885ghz). I threw some crazy vcore at it but it didn't seem to help. When I lowered it to the 20x multiplier, it posted without any issues. Secondly, I noticed that I wasn't squeezing the full potential of my ram. As it stands now at 4ghz, I am dead on with my rated ram specs (1.65vdimm - DDR3 2000 @ 1000mhz 9-9-9-27)! So, I am pretty happy about that. The higher temps don't bother me sooo much because I can't think of a time when I am going to load my processor with 8 threads running maxed out at 100% for hours on end. I feel extremely confident gaming with at my current settings.

Since this is my first P55 board, I must say, I am pretty impressed with the Lynnfield architecture. For me, with NO O/C'ing experience on the 1156 socket, I was able to hit 4ghz right off the bat. I'm not sure if that's the "norm" for the i7 860 / P55 crowd but I do know I am content with my purchase. I've only built one i7 920 setup. I was pretty happy with it. It was fast but I had only one complaint. Idle temps were fine but fully loaded temps were crazy high (had a Xigmatek S1284, 4 heat pipe model). I could O/C the 920 to 4ghz but only for benching purposes. The P55 setup seems to be quite content at 4ghz, for 24/7 use.

I did notice that on my Gigabyte P55 UD4P board, with the load line calibration ENABLED, when I started Prime 95, my vcore shot up from 1.35v to 1.376v. If I DISABLED my load line calibration, my vcore drooped from 1.35v to 1.325v. Maybe someone will figure out a "pencil mod" to help reduce the vdroop. Anyways, I am satisfied with the 4ghz setting but I am sure my setup is capable of 4.2ghz on air (only for benchmarking purposes). I would love to see others post here with their P55 results.
 
Hey Officermartinez,

I followed your advice and went ahead and bumped up for more juice :D I have the voltage to 1.35 but it shows 1.38

Now I'm stable at 4GHZ. Settings look pretty close to yours :D

4x20v135.jpg
 
I recently bought a Gigabyte P55-UD5 and I'm waiting for some 1156 socket coolers or bolt thrus to appear on the market in the uk so am using the stock cooler. In the meantime I am trying to flash the bios from the F3 which it came with to the new F5f bios. Any idea how you get this thing to flash? I stuck the bios on a usb stick but in the qflash utility the usb doesnt appear in the list of available drives. Only the Floppy A.... which I dont have!

Thanks in advance. Hope i can get to 4GHz on air when i get an aftermarket, loving the board so far
 
Thermalright kit is arriving to Slovakia next monday, so it will be probably in UK soon too. Noctua is already selling them for a month or so, Prolimatech started selling them last week. Try to look around, maybe they are already available in UK too.
 
I am considering a TRUE or the Megahalems provided they will fit in my P193. Quick hunt around doesn't show any bolt thru's in the uk yet, but the Scythe Ninja II supports 1156 I see. Anyone using one?
 
Yup I agree. I have the original Scythe Ninja revb on the wifes Q6600 box and i am never shure the bloody things are engaded correctly. Besides... seems a lot of weight hanging off the board.

Has anyone flashed one of the new P55 Gigabyte boards by usb key?
 
Hey Officermartinez,

I followed your advice and went ahead and bumped up for more juice :D I have the voltage to 1.35 but it shows 1.38

Now I'm stable at 4GHZ. Settings look pretty close to yours :D


That's awesome! I don't have the screen shot uploaded yet, but at my current voltage settings, I went into my bios and simply changed my settings 20 x 200 (4ghz) to 20 x 214 (4.28ghz). It booted up and loaded windows. I took the screen shot and felt comfortable trying my hand at 4.3ghz (20 x 215). It was a no-go. It loaded windows and as soon as it went to my desktop, I BSOD'd. Sigh.. I'm sure I could super fine tune my settings and voltages and manage a 4.4ghz screen shot (although I am VERY sure it wouldn't be stable).

Back to the 4ghz club.. I'm glad to see you make the very small bump in vcore to stabilize your 4ghz overclock. I've been doing some browsing around and I have found a few threads where a few motivated peeps have overclocked their P55 / i7 860 combos around 4.2ghz but they have exceeded the Intel recommeded max 1.4vcore limit.
 
That's awesome! I don't have the screen shot uploaded yet, but at my current voltage settings, I went into my bios and simply changed my settings 20 x 200 (4ghz) to 20 x 214 (4.28ghz). It booted up and loaded windows. I took the screen shot and felt comfortable trying my hand at 4.3ghz (20 x 215). It was a no-go. It loaded windows and as soon as it went to my desktop, I BSOD'd. Sigh.. I'm sure I could super fine tune my settings and voltages and manage a 4.4ghz screen shot (although I am VERY sure it wouldn't be stable).

Back to the 4ghz club.. I'm glad to see you make the very small bump in vcore to stabilize your 4ghz overclock. I've been doing some browsing around and I have found a few threads where a few motivated peeps have overclocked their P55 / i7 860 combos around 4.2ghz but they have exceeded the Intel recommeded max 1.4vcore limit.

I do feel these babies can go further but pushing over 1.4vcore will be gambling with your money :D
 
I'm not overly happy with my EVGA P55 FTW. This is mostly due to the long POST time (30+ seconds w/ one harddrive and one USB device). I basically turns on, then off, then on again and that wastes a lot of time. EVGA support has said this is by design. I don't think that is an acceptable boot time for a $230 MSRP premium mainboard.

On the other hand, it took two minutes to go into the BIOS, set voltage to 1.3V, set DIMM voltage to 1.65V, and the core i5-750 runs P95 stable at 3.78 GHz. I don't have much experience overclocking, so that's a pretty good result for me. The RAM is 2x2 GB Kingston Hyper-X DDR3-2000.
 
I'm not overly happy with my EVGA P55 FTW. This is mostly due to the long POST time (30+ seconds w/ one harddrive and one USB device). I basically turns on, then off, then on again and that wastes a lot of time. EVGA support has said this is by design. I don't think that is an acceptable boot time for a $230 MSRP premium mainboard.

On the other hand, it took two minutes to go into the BIOS, set voltage to 1.3V, set DIMM voltage to 1.65V, and the core i5-750 runs P95 stable at 3.78 GHz. I don't have much experience overclocking, so that's a pretty good result for me. The RAM is 2x2 GB Kingston Hyper-X DDR3-2000.

What HSF are you using? I have pretty much the same setup but I am on the stock cooler. I ended up picking up the i5-750 + P55 FTW at Fry's for $300 and there is even a $15 rebate. I also have the same memory. Did you turn off turbo mode when you overclocked?
 
Duster - I have a Kingwin XT-1264 (s775) currently (was $10 AR at Frys). However I would not recommend it for this mb - it blocks DIMM slot 4, so I can't use the other 4GB I have. Also it uses the intel push pin design. I can literally lower the load temp by 10C by applying pressure on the heatsink with my hand.

I have a CM 212 plus on order. It's a S1156 cooler with a backplate, and it was $25 shipped from provantage.
 
I'm not overly happy with my EVGA P55 FTW. This is mostly due to the long POST time (30+ seconds w/ one harddrive and one USB device). I basically turns on, then off, then on again and that wastes a lot of time. EVGA support has said this is by design. I don't think that is an acceptable boot time for a $230 MSRP premium mainboard.

What do you do turn in off an on every 10 minutes. :rolleyes:
 
There is difference between OC and extreme OC - the thing you have in that linked article happens with 1.6V+ CPU voltage. Show me any sane person doing that to 45nm CPU (except extreme OC).
 
The only problem I have ran into with the P55 is my wife :D

I agree don't scare people based on crazy overclocking setups.
 
I took my 750 out and checked the socket today; no burn and I've run LinX a few times at ~1.45v
 
if you read the article you will see that on boards that have foxconn sockets, something like 50 or 60 socket pins (by my count) are not making contact with the cpu. now it sounds to me like its a problem with extreme overclocking - so far. if you had say an old amd cpu and 5 or 6% of the pins were broken off, would you think that it might be problematic, if not now, possibly sometime in the future?
 
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if you read the article you will see that on boards that have foxconn sockets, something like 50 or 60 cpu pins (by my count) are not making contact with the cpu. now it sounds to me like its a problem with extreme overclocking - so far. if you had say an old amd cpu and 5 or 6% of the pins were broken off, would you think that it might be problematic, if not now, possibly sometime in the future?


I'll quote myself from another thread.

Click on the 2 links and see the difference. This IS a problem.

Well, I can definitely say that this really is just a 1156 problem.


Here is a pic of my 1156 I posted earlier

Here is a pic of my 950 that was from in a FoxConn 1366 connector.

Notice a difference? :eek:
 
I took my 750 out and checked the socket today; no burn and I've run LinX a few times at ~1.45v

But did you check the pin contacts? I'm presuming that stock voltage + vdroop (which is what I'm leaving it on for now) should at least significantly reduce the possibility of a burn mark. I see you're at 3.4Ghz (which is a pretty low OC like mine) so I think we both should be ok...but who knows.
 
But did you check the pin contacts? I'm presuming that stock voltage + vdroop (which is what I'm leaving it on for now) should at least significantly reduce the possibility of a burn mark. I see you're at 3.4Ghz (which is a pretty low OC like mine) so I think we both should be ok...but who knows.

Yeah, I did. There was no burning but I did noticed that a lot of contacts had two impressions while some had none. It's definitely something I'm concerned about but I'm not going to make a big deal out of it for the moment. It is something I hope the companies address though.
 
Yeah, I did. There was no burning but I did noticed that a lot of contacts had two impressions while some had none. It's definitely something I'm concerned about but I'm not going to make a big deal out of it for the moment. It is something I hope the companies address though.

Those impressions are from the factory, not from the socket. The pins don't make fine point contact marks, they're more like little lines.
 
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