Core i7 920 or 960 for OC'ing on water?

prasvt

Gawd
Joined
Dec 8, 2005
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557
Hey guys - from what I've read, the 920 is a great chip. Looks like 4ghz+ is doable with good cooling.

I've been running a Q9650 @ 4.2ghz on water (see sig) for the last year and have been pondering an upgrade to an i7 system. I do alot of blu-ray -> 720p/1080p encoding and gaming. Looking at stock benchmarks on tomshardware, it looks like there's a big enough perf difference (esp w/ hyperthreading) between the Q series and i7 to warrant an upgrade - plus it's just been too long since I've done a new build :)

So I'm trying to figure out something here - everywhere I've read people have said "oh just oc a 920 and you'll mop the floor w/ a stock 960". Okay that's fine.

But I haven't been able to find any info on whether a 960 would oc higher than a 920 or vice versa. Any significant advantage w the 960 aside from higher stock clocks?

So I'd like to get your insights on that - I'd rather not waste $589 on something that isn't going to have any advantages over a $200 - $300 cpu right.

Otherwise, components I've sort of chosen right now are ...

Asus P6X58D mobo
12 GB GSkill Trident 2000mhz DDR3 (cas 9 ...12 gb cas 8 gets pricey)
Swiftech Apogee XT waterblock (I'll take suggestions here...)

Thanks guys!
 
If you get a Noctua NH-D14, and you get a decent chip, and a board that either can do nice high BCLK and/or lock the multiplier of the 920 at 21, you can do 4.2+Ghz on AIR very easily.

With my 920 running at 3.8Ghz with HT enabled and the Noctua NH-D14, my load temps in Prime95 never go over 62c. My board has issues with a BCLK over 190 and it can't lock the multiplier at 21 so I am kinda stuck for now.

Compare that to 84c when running my old modified Thermaltake Big Typhoon.

No need for water cooling unless you have a very nice board and want to go to 4.6Ghz+.

With the 960, you will have a higher default multiplier which in theroy will let you overclock the chip without rasing the BCLK nearly as much as with a 920... but I am pretty sure it is not worth the extra money if you are only looking for 4-4.2Ghz.... and then, even with a really good board and 920 chip, you should be able to do 4.4+Ghz.
 
Well, cooling-wise I already have a water cooling setup. I'd just move the Q9650 and mobo into another box and air cool it (or get a corsair h50, which works well on my other q6700 box @ 3.6ghz). So for the core i7, I'd just buy the cpu, mobo, and a new waterblock.

So if you're saying with good hardware I could get up to 4.2 on air easy, then on water I should be go to go right?

So, it comes down to choosing a mobo. I picked that Asus board b/c it has USB 3 and SATA 6gbps, so figured I'd be a little future proofed.

Money isn't an issue for the motherboard, so if you guys have suggestions on a great OC'ing board I'd love to hear them!

But I don't need 4 PCI-E x16 slots ...2 or 3 would be fine. I'm not sure I'll be upgrading my GTX 295 anytime soon.

Like you said, a board that can do high BCLK and/or lock the multi would be ideal.

Also, since my oc experience has been with core 2 duos and quads, I need to read up on what's involved with the oc'ing the i7s :)

So looks like first vote is for the 920 ... you make some good points! Thanks cyclone3d!
 
Hmm and Microcenter has the 920 for $200 ... good price and the store is like 5 min from my office. hmmmm
 
Done!

Bought a Core i7 920 from Microcenter which I will pick up this week.

Also ordered the Asus P6X58D motherboard, 12GB of G.Skill DDR3 2000, and the Swiftech Apogee XT block, along w/ some Arctic Cooling MX-2R tim.

Looking at my newegg order history, it looks like it has been over a year since I bought the Q9650 - so that seems like a long enough of a time between upgrades lol.

Thanks again for the input fellas!
 
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