Best i7 Motherboard?

I think I'll give the plain EVGA X58 3X SLI a try. Do you really think Intel next generation of CPU will work on this board? It will be the first in awhile seems every time I upgrade I'm doing the motherboard and memory.
 
Obscene-Ignorance said:
I think I'll give the plain EVGA X58 3X SLI a try. Do you really think Intel next generation of CPU will work on this board? It will be the first in awhile seems every time I upgrade I'm doing the motherboard and memory.
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Except for the new heat sink design, I don't see why i9 shouldn't.
 
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Obscene-Ignorance said:
I think I'll give the plain EVGA X58 3X SLI a try. Do you really think Intel next generation of CPU will work on this board? It will be the first in awhile seems every time I upgrade I'm doing the motherboard and memory.
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The Core i9 is supposed to be a six core CPU and a 32nm refresh of Nehalem. It is supposed to be a drop in upgrade for X58 chipset based motherboards. The generation beyond that is called Sandy Bridge and it is unlikely that any Sandy Bridge CPUs will work in any existing motherboards. LGA1366 and LGA1156 are actually supposed to be relatively short lived compared to previous sockets.
 
Dan_D said:
The Core i9 is supposed to be a six core CPU and a 32nm refresh of Nehalem. It is supposed to be a drop in upgrade for X58 chipset based motherboards. The generation beyond that is called Sandy Bridge and it is unlikely that any Sandy Bridge CPUs will work in any existing motherboards. LGA1366 and LGA1156 are actually supposed to be relatively short lived compared to previous sockets.
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thats suck, so i got get a new mobo?
 
Dan_D and other OC'ers:

Not sure if I should post this here or in the OC forum but I am in the market for a new X58 motherboard so I will ask here in this thread. Is water pretty much necessary to OC 920's 24x7 stable @ 4.0 GHz under normal gaming and application use?

I haven't been much of a [H]ard overclocker since the days of the Socket 370 440BX's and, although I've been building custom PC's for the past 20 years, I've never ventured into watercooling. I have the itch to build a new X58 based, high-end, system and thinking about what to go with. I've only built one X58 system so far. It was an i7-920 on a P6T6 WS Revolution and I was able to run stable on air, Noctua cooler, at 3.7GHz, 24/7 with HT enabled. I'd really like to run with the 4.0GHz+ club and HT enabled with 2-way SLI is a must have. Should I go with an EVGA 3-way Classified and water? Open to any and all suggestions. I really liked the P6T6 WS Revo when I had it; decent overclocker, native PCI and rock stable. However, I think I'll need something a bit better going forward.

Thanks
 
Tobit said:
Dan_D and other OC'ers:

Not sure if I should post this here or in the OC forum but I am in the market for a new X58 motherboard so I will ask here in this thread. Is water pretty much necessary to OC 920's 24x7 stable @ 4.0 GHz under normal gaming and application use?

I haven't been much of a [H]ard overclocker since the days of the Socket 370 440BX's and, although I've been building custom PC's for the past 20 years, I've never ventured into watercooling. I have the itch to build a new X58 based, high-end, system and thinking about what to go with. I've only built one X58 system so far. It was an i7-920 on a P6T6 WS Revolution and I was able to run stable on air, Noctua cooler, at 3.7GHz, 24/7 with HT enabled. I'd really like to run with the 4.0GHz+ club and HT enabled with 2-way SLI is a must have. Should I go with an EVGA 3-way Classified and water? Open to any and all suggestions. I really liked the P6T6 WS Revo when I had it; decent overclocker, native PCI and rock stable. However, I think I'll need something a bit better going forward.

Thanks
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Water is not necessary to run an i7 @ 4.0Ghz stable, but an excellent air cooler IS necessary. I use a Prolimatech Megahalems with Shin-Etsu X23 thermal paste and 2x Enermax Clusters in push/pull config. It's linpack stable @ 4.1Ghz. Yes, Hyperthreading is enabled. With a good watercooling setup, a good D0 stepping chip and an EVGA Classified, I wouldn't be surprised if you could run 4.4-4.5 ghz.
 
vjcsmoke said:
Water is not necessary to run an i7 @ 4.0Ghz stable, but an excellent air cooler IS necessary. I use a Prolimatech Megahalems with Shin-Etsu X23 thermal paste and 2x Enermax Clusters in push/pull config. It's linpack stable @ 4.1Ghz. Yes, Hyperthreading is enabled. With a good watercooling setup, a good D0 stepping chip and an EVGA Classified, I wouldn't be surprised if you could run 4.4-4.5 ghz.
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100% agreed.
 
Seconded. I run 3.7 with HT on stock cooler and a moderate case and MB without a problem. Stopped at 3.7 for no reason, so I don't think it's the limit even for that cooler. Therefore I don't see water needed for anything close to that, a decent air cooler should suffice.
 
vjcsmoke said:
Water is not necessary to run an i7 @ 4.0Ghz stable, but an excellent air cooler IS necessary. I use a Prolimatech Megahalems with Shin-Etsu X23 thermal paste and 2x Enermax Clusters in push/pull config. It's linpack stable @ 4.1Ghz. Yes, Hyperthreading is enabled. With a good watercooling setup, a good D0 stepping chip and an EVGA Classified, I wouldn't be surprised if you could run 4.4-4.5 ghz.
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Honestly, I'd be surprised if you COULDNT hit 4.4 or 4.5 with water. My TRUE and eVGA x58 SLI sit at 4.0 24/7 comfortably and is stable at 4.2. Now heat is a concern at that point, but I've even booted with just enough stability for cpuZ at 4.5 and a superpi 1m run.
 
I have a real quick question about a potential motherboard for my new Core i7 based PC. I've looked at the reviews on here of the P6T Deluxe from Asus and the EX58-Extreme from Gigabyte and I'm half-tempted to go with either one, but I'm also looking at the 3X SLI board from EVGA that's been reviewed on here as well. I know that all three boards are comparable in their own right, but I'm kinda leaning towards the eVGA board (or the EX58-Extreme) at this point. Any reasons or suggestions in favor of one of the three boards listed here?
 
For someone who doesn't plan to overclock past 3.6-3.8ghz would it be worth it to spend the extra money on an EVGA X58 Classified?
 
SleazyC said:
For someone who doesn't plan to overclock past 3.6-3.8ghz would it be worth it to spend the extra money on an EVGA X58 Classified?
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In a previous post in this thread, Dan_D emphatically said "NO". :cool:
 
Just a quick thank you for this thread and the detailed responses (especially from Dan). I feel like I now know all I need to know to make a good choice. One stop shopping/learning! =)
 
Tobit said:
Dan_D and other OC'ers:

Not sure if I should post this here or in the OC forum but I am in the market for a new X58 motherboard so I will ask here in this thread. Is water pretty much necessary to OC 920's 24x7 stable @ 4.0 GHz under normal gaming and application use?

I haven't been much of a [H]ard overclocker since the days of the Socket 370 440BX's and, although I've been building custom PC's for the past 20 years, I've never ventured into watercooling. I have the itch to build a new X58 based, high-end, system and thinking about what to go with. I've only built one X58 system so far. It was an i7-920 on a P6T6 WS Revolution and I was able to run stable on air, Noctua cooler, at 3.7GHz, 24/7 with HT enabled. I'd really like to run with the 4.0GHz+ club and HT enabled with 2-way SLI is a must have. Should I go with an EVGA 3-way Classified and water? Open to any and all suggestions. I really liked the P6T6 WS Revo when I had it; decent overclocker, native PCI and rock stable. However, I think I'll need something a bit better going forward.

Thanks
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I can 2nd or 3rd the water cooling issue. It's not neccessary, but nice to have. Water cooling can be a pain in the ass, but it gives me peace of mind. My rig was 100% stable under air, for 24/7 4.0GHz... But I wasn't lucky to get a 920 that LinX'd at 70C for air cooling... My chip was about 5 degrees away from Tjunction after an hour of Linx (which is 95C) which made me cringe.

I've discovered kill coils and it's my third water cooling rig. I'm not going to sing "Hallelujah" on the kill coils yet, but I've got no cloudy buildup in my water after almost 6 months of operation, so I only need to deal with the dust, as I do with my air cooling setup.

On your motherboard choice. It's been said here and elsewhere many times. The classified costs a pretty penny for good reason, but there comes a point where an extra $100-$200 is worth it to you to squeeze out an extra 100MHz from your cpu... Other motherboards can achieve similar results, but if you want to factor out finding a "golden sample" mobo, then go with the classified.
 
Flexion said:
I can 2nd or 3rd the water cooling issue. It's not neccessary, but nice to have. Water cooling can be a pain in the ass, but it gives me peace of mind. My rig was 100% stable under air, for 24/7 4.0GHz... But I wasn't lucky to get a 920 that LinX'd at 70C for air cooling... My chip was about 5 degrees away from Tjunction after an hour of Linx (which is 95C) which made me cringe.
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But that's only at 100% load. Do you really run your system at 100% load 24/7? I don't think it would be anywhere near Tjunction about 99% of the time for the average user.
 
PC_User said:
But that's only at 100% load. Do you really run your system at 100% load 24/7? I don't think it would be anywhere near Tjunction about 99% of the time for the average user.
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You are absolutely right sir on this point. But I like to be prepared and it's the [H]ard thing to do! :D
 
I'm a little late to the thread, but thought I'd toss in a couple-o-cents... I had a Rampage II Extreme, which was quite nice. Very solid, lots of sensor ports (if you're into that sort of thing,) lit-up atx plate, OCs well, etc. etc.

I've been dabbling in Hackintosh science as of late though :D and I find that the Gigabyte line is the best supported for this. So, I picked up a UD5. It's ridiculously stable, plenty of tweaking options, runs OSX and W7 dual boot beautifully using various methods, etc. etc. Not quite as flashy as the ASUS board, but it gets the job done perfectly, and at a lower cost.

Regardless of whether you care about the OSX bits, it's a good board. I'd recommend either one. There are a few other X58 boards that look nice, but these are the ones I've used.
 
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