EVGA 680i or Abit

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fireblast713

Limp Gawd
Joined
Mar 24, 2006
Messages
202
So I'm building a new computer and trying to decide on a motherboard. I've narrowed it down to the Abit Quad GT or the EVGA 680i they're roughly the same price (i'd be getting the 680i elsewhere). I'm trying to decide which one would be better for my purposes. I will be running the following hardware on it:

Intel C2D E6600
2gb Coldfusion PC6400 Ram 4,4,4,12
Foxconn 8800 GTX
Creative Xfi XtremeMusic
Raptor 150

I want a board that can OC well and also is very stable. I don't really care about SLI as I doubt I'll ever go that route. Any suggestions? (reasons for why I should go one way or another would be appreciated). Thanks! :)

Abit QuadGT:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813127019

EVGA 680i:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813188019
 
I would think with my own personal experience on the 680i, the 680i would be alot easier to overclock. This is coming from a guy who doesnt know much about all the different settings in a BIOS. I just know the very basic settings.

As for stable that is another question. Seems like its the luck of the draw with the 680i. As for me, I can easily reach 450-460Mhz on the FSB and pass Orthos for more then 8 hours. But sometimes my screen randomly goes black and locks up and then I have to restart the system. So some stabliity is not there and I dont know what is causing it. I upped the voltages and everything. Oh well I backed it down to a 400FSB and its fine. Running 1:1 on my ram still at 2.8Ghz on my E6300.
 
hehe, that's fine, the other guy had a 680i, you guys had to decide one way or another, I'm just curious why you think one board is better.
 
Personally, I wouldn't buy an eVGA 680i board unless it was one of the ones that supported quad core OCing. The TR revision isn't one of them.

I'd buy the QuadGT. For $130, I'd take that over the similarly priced DS3 in a heartbeat.
 
QuadGT:

* Posts in this forum and around the web agree that it's a very stable and solid board with very good performance and a strong overclocker, as well.

* As mentioned above, the 680i is a Manila bar back-room crap shoot (my words, not Lazy_Moron's, for whom I have the most laconic respect). The QuadGT delivers quite consistently.

Good luck with your purchase!
 
kirbyrj said:
Personally, I wouldn't buy an eVGA 680i board unless it was one of the ones that supported quad core OCing. The TR revision isn't one of them.

I'd buy the QuadGT. For $130, I'd take that over the similarly priced DS3 in a heartbeat.
Click to expand...

None of the boards you are commenting on are really even in the same class.

Pepsiennis said:
QuadGT:

* Posts in this forum and around the web agree that it's a very stable and solid board with very good performance and a strong overclocker, as well.

* As mentioned above, the 680i is a Manila bar back-room crap shoot (my words, not Lazy_Moron's, for whom I have the most laconic respect). The QuadGT delivers quite consistently.

Good luck with your purchase!
Click to expand...

This was the case with the first round of 680i boards. No one was more critical of the 680i based boards than I was. I went through three 680i boards before I found one that worked ok. Today much has changed and the 680i chipset is pretty solid. I have two EVGA 680i boards and I haven't had any problems with either of them. Although one of them is one of the boards that doesn't work correctly overclocking quad core CPUs. Both of them overclock well and have been very stable for me provided I have the quad core installed on the A1 board and not the AR.

fireblast713 said:
So I'm building a new computer and trying to decide on a motherboard. I've narrowed it down to the Abit Quad GT or the EVGA 680i they're roughly the same price (i'd be getting the 680i elsewhere). I'm trying to decide which one would be better for my purposes. I will be running the following hardware on it:

Intel C2D E6600
2gb Coldfusion PC6400 Ram 4,4,4,12
Foxconn 8800 GTX
Creative Xfi XtremeMusic
Raptor 150

I want a board that can OC well and also is very stable. I don't really care about SLI as I doubt I'll ever go that route. Any suggestions? (reasons for why I should go one way or another would be appreciated). Thanks! :)

Abit QuadGT:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813127019

EVGA 680i:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813188019
Click to expand...

As I said before, those boards are as different as night and day. If you want SLI the choice is clear. The 680i SLI is the only way to go. If you aren't interested in SLI at all then the Quad GT is worth a look. You might also want to consider the ASUS P5K as well with the newer P35 chipset. I haven't worked with that board so I am not endorsing it in any kind of way, but the P5K seems to be all the rage in the forums. You might want to check it out.
 
Skip the 680i if you're not going SLI. The Abit is an excellent P-965 board with a great feature set, but the Gigabyte DS3 is still king of FSB speeds (which helps to overclock.)

However, if I knew I wasn't going SLi, I would get a P35 board because they are guaranteed to support Peryn Processors (Intel's Core 2 architecture refresh / enhancement.) This is BIG deal. Also, preliminary reviews show P35 boards to be worthy contenders in speed and OC ability. I say look at the Asus P5K or the Gigabyte DQ6.

Btw, 680i boards are still top-class boards... Excellent through and through. However, with their feature set geared towards the experienced OCer, they're known to be a bit harder to work than Intel chipset boards. Just another thing to think about.

Mark.
 
Dan_D said:
None of the boards you are commenting on are really even in the same class.
Click to expand...

"Class" is irrelevant because they are around the same price. The QuadGT seems to be the best price/performance in the $130-150 range.
 
kirbyrj said:
Class is irrelevant because they are around the same price. The QuadGT seems to be the best price/performance.
Click to expand...

Well as I already pointed out, if you aren't interested in SLI, the Quad GT is a good bet.
 
as others have said unless SLI is in your future i would choose the QuadGT but it's also worth considering the P35 mobos.
I know that here in the UK the Asus P35 mobos are expensive compared to the Gigabytes & the pre-order price for the abits e.g top spec. abit IP35 Pro is the same price as the lowest spec. Asus P5K.
 
I've had very good luck with my 680i, though it is one of the boards that supposedly won't overclock quad cores -- something I was unaware of when I bought it, should have done some more research. I've been able to push FSB past 1333, however, and supposedly the quad core OC issue is due to inability to reach higher FSB -- maybe it's just with the quads? Unfortunate, but not that big a deal.

That said, if you buy one of the TR series and it's an older one you can spend the $30 for advance RMA when you register it with EVGA and they will supposedly swap you a quad-core overclocker, no problems, if you contact them and ask as much. Sounds crazy to me, but unless I'm misreading something, that seems to be the deal. Until the end of last month they were swapping /everyone's/ boards, so somewhere there's a massive stack of good core2 boards... or something.

I run 1333 FSB constant now, no "real world" stability problems at all, though OCCT will crash it if run for more than about 6, 7 hours with vcore at 1.35 -- doesn't bother me, it has yet to lock up in game or anything and I would prefer it run cooler. At 1.40 vcore my E6420 runs 3.2Ghz rock solid around 33C idle and around 60C long term full load, vs. 30C and 56C at 3.5 vcore. Very happy with this board, and it's an easy overclocker. Processor is a champ too, though as I understand the E6600's are much more popular as OC chips.

Just leave the settings you aren't sure about on auto, buy some DDR2-800 or faster, link and sync, and push the FSB up. Tada. There's a detailed tutorial on the EVGA forums if you need more info on overclocking in general and this board in particular. Also update the BIOS right away when you get this thing, just to be safe. They provide bootable ISOs (~2 MB) to burn to CDR that make this very easy and safer than using a Windows-based app. Early BIOS revisions apparently have data corruption issues when using RAID -- not sure how early, but hey, I'm not taking chances.

Of course, my goal is eventual SLI when the GTX starts working too hard, hopefully keeping this thing 2+ years, swapping for a quad core later when they're less expensive and more "useful" in most applications. If this isn't you, the Quad GT may be the way to go. Lots of people do seem to like it.
 
silent-circuit said:
I've had very good luck with my 680i, though it is one of the boards that supposedly won't overclock quad cores -- something I was unaware of when I bought it, should have done some more research. I've been able to push FSB past 1333, however, and supposedly the quad core OC issue is due to inability to reach higher FSB -- maybe it's just with the quads? Unfortunate, but not that big a deal.

That said, if you buy one of the TR series and it's an older one you can spend the $30 for advance RMA when you register it with EVGA and they will supposedly swap you a quad-core overclocker, no problems, if you contact them and ask as much. Sounds crazy to me, but unless I'm misreading something, that seems to be the deal. Until the end of last month they were swapping /everyone's/ boards, so somewhere there's a massive stack of good core2 boards... or something.

I run 1333 FSB constant now, no "real world" stability problems at all, though OCCT will crash it if run for more than about 6, 7 hours with vcore at 3.5 -- doesn't bother me, it has yet to lock up in game or anything and I would prefer it run cooler. At 4.0 vcore my E6420 runs 3.2Ghz rock solid around 33C idle and around 60C long term full load, vs. 30C and 56C at 3.5 vcore. Very happy with this board, and it's an easy overclocker. Processor is a champ too, though as I understand the E6600's are much more popular as OC chips.

Just leave the settings you aren't sure about on auto, buy some DDR2-800 or faster, link and sync, and push the FSB up. Tada. There's a detailed tutorial on the EVGA forums if you need more info on overclocking in general and this board in particular. Also update the BIOS right away when you get this thing, just to be safe. They provide bootable ISOs (~2 MB) to burn to CDR that make this very easy and safer than using a Windows-based app. Early BIOS revisions apparently have data corruption issues when using RAID -- not sure how early, but hey, I'm not taking chances.

Of course, my goal is eventual SLI when the GTX starts working too hard, hopefully keeping this thing 2+ years, swapping for a quad core later when they're less expensive and more "useful" in most applications. If this isn't you, the Quad GT may be the way to go. Lots of people do seem to like it.
Click to expand...

The EVGA 122-CK-NF68-AR and 122-CK-NF68-TR boards don't overclock with quad core CPUs but they handle dual core and single core CPUs fine.
 
If that DFI board would have come out 4Q06 or even in Jan/Feb, I might have been interested.
 
kirbyrj said:
If that DFI board would have come out 4Q06 or even in Jan/Feb, I might have been interested.
Click to expand...

Well, I'd rather they take their time.. rather than churn something out like what happened with the 680i boards. (PS/2 problems, SATA problems, quadcore OC problems, memory frying, etc..) Not to mention the P965 runs cooler than the 680i. :)

(btw... FTR, I love my 680i A1 :) )
 
buffbiff21 said:
Well, I'd rather they take their time.. rather than churn something out like what happened with the 680i boards. (PS/2 problems, SATA problems, quadcore OC problems, memory frying, etc..) Not to mention the P965 runs cooler than the 680i. :)

(btw... FTR, I love my 680i A1 :) )
Click to expand...

True, but with the P35 chipsets coming out about a month after the DFI became available, it seems like everyone who wants a C2D/Q has one and most people (myself included) aren't going to swap out a perfectly good board (in my case my P5W) for the DFI board...either this P965 one or the Lanparty 680i LT one. Day late...dollar short.

If you're buying new now and looking to spend $140 or so, I'd personally get the vanilla P5K over this DFI (or the QuadGT for that matter). Not denying the quality of the boards...I just think it's the wrong time to buy a high end P965 board.
 
I picked up a ASUS P5K for like $159 shipped hehe. Which isn't bad because i'm in CA and the Quad GT would have been 149 after tax and shipping
 
buffbiff21 said:
ahh come on man :D it's only 140 bucks..

the P5K are more than that.. and besides, I don't like yellow PCB :p
Click to expand...

Yeah, I guess you're right. I suppose the same people who need the P35 now are the same ones who can afford to buy a $140 motherboard to play around with until the X38's come out ;).
 
kirbyrj said:
Personally, I wouldn't buy an eVGA 680i board unless it was one of the ones that supported quad core OCing. The TR revision isn't one of them.

I'd buy the QuadGT. For $130, I'd take that over the similarly priced DS3 in a heartbeat.
Click to expand...

That is not true, the only board that doesnt support quadcore overclocking is the NF-63 or 680i SE edition.
 
Well, I just wanna say, that I am very happy, with my QuadGT. Stability-wise it is rock-solid, and I find it very easy to overclock (this coming from a person, that had never overclocked before I got the QuadGT). As I don´t have "hands-on experience" with the other MoBo´s mentioned in the thread, I really can´t say anything about them. But why buy an SLI-board, if one knows that one will not use the SLI-option. Thats why I chose p965-chipset.
 
buffbiff21 said:
ahh come on man :D it's only 140 bucks..

the P5K are more than that.. and besides, I don't like yellow PCB :p
Click to expand...

Buffbiff shot Ol' Yeller! :eek: OK, seriously I agree with both points.

And with this...

Darth nIssan said:
Well, I just wanna say, that I am very happy, with my QuadGT. Stability-wise it is rock-solid, and I find it very easy to overclock (this coming from a person, that had never overclocked before I got the QuadGT). As I don´t have "hands-on experience" with the other MoBo´s mentioned in the thread, I really can´t say anything about them. But why buy an SLI-board, if one knows that one will not use the SLI-option. Thats why I chose p965-chipset.
Click to expand...
 
RussianHAXOR said:
That is not true, the only board that doesnt support quadcore overclocking is the NF-63 or 680i SE edition.
Click to expand...

The link was to the NF-63...I'm confused :confused: . The TR and AR are somewhat cheaper and the T1 and A1 are more expensive. Which ones are the 680i SE? My understanding that the NF-63 TR version was essentially the original release of the board with poor quad core OCing. The same that eVGA allows to be RMA'd for the T1 revision.
 
kirbyrj said:
The link was to the NF-63...I'm confused :confused: . The TR and AR are somewhat cheaper and the T1 and A1 are more expensive. Which ones are the 680i SE? My understanding that the NF-63 TR version was essentially the original release of the board with poor quad core OCing. The same that eVGA allows to be RMA'd for the T1 revision.
Click to expand...

TR and AR are the original versions of the board. There is no 680i SLI SE chipset either. There is a 680i LT though it's not any of those part numbers.

Any AR or TR part number are the older versions and the A1 and T1 are the newer ones. The older boards work great so long as you don't try to OC with a quad core CPU. Getting past 1300FSB is next to impossible with those. With dual core chips this isn't an issue.
 
Dan_D said:
TR and AR are the original versions of the board. There is no 680i SLI SE chipset either. There is a 680i LT though it's not any of those part numbers.

Any AR or TR part number are the older versions and the A1 and T1 are the newer ones. The older boards work great so long as you don't try to OC with a quad core CPU. Getting past 1300FSB is next to impossible with those. With dual core chips this isn't an issue.
Click to expand...

Thanks.
 
fireblast713 said:
I picked up a ASUS P5K for like $159 shipped hehe. Which isn't bad because i'm in CA and the Quad GT would have been 149 after tax and shipping
Click to expand...
QuadGT has more features though - like Intel RAID.
If all you need is a fast but basic mobo & are happy to pay top dollar for it then fine.

Me, I like fast, basic & cheap :p or fast, full featured & reasonable.
 
Buy the 680i, if only for the customer service. If you get a TR version you can RMA it for an A1 for free... so I don't see what the problem is?
 
BUFF said:
QuadGT has more features though - like Intel RAID.
If all you need is a fast but basic mobo & are happy to pay top dollar for it then fine.

Me, I like fast, basic & cheap :p or fast, full featured & reasonable.
Click to expand...

If the QuadGT had 45nm support, I'd have it already ;).

TigerLord said:
Buy the 680i, if only for the customer service. If you get a TR version you can RMA it for an A1 for free... so I don't see what the problem is?
Click to expand...

Are they still doing this? I'd think they would have stopped after they put out 15 different versions of the board, expecting the consumer to do their homework before buying.
 
As I understand all you have to do is buy an older TR, spend the $30 (it may be less, don't remember) for "Advance RMA" when you register the board (and they pay shipping both ways, so if you ever RMA the board this pays for itself -- plus they'll cross-ship you the new one, otherwise you have to wait for them to receive the old board before they send a new one) and you can call, state that you want to OC a quad core, and they'll issue you an RMA number and ship the new board as soon as the package is confirmed shipped.

If you buy one of the newer SE-labeled boards (which are apparently old 122-CK-NF63-TR's with new stickers and boxes) you cannot do this, as the specs clearly state it will run quad core processors, but will not OC them.
 
kirbyrj said:
Are they still doing this? I'd think they would have stopped after they put out 15 different versions of the board, expecting the consumer to do their homework before buying.
Click to expand...

You can't choose which version you get... if you buy an LT or NF63 fine, but if you buy a NF68 online, the retailer isn't going to tell you if they have A1 or T1 in stock.
 
Another vote for the P5K :) The initial revision and BIOS are very mature already. I just built a system with a E6320 + P5K Deluxe - I'm still tweaking things since it was new memory (Ballistix PC8500), CPU, motherboard, but I'm up to 460MHz FSB with no stability issues at all (2 hours of Orthos). And still sitting around 37C under load.

This is a great motherboard IMO and worth taking a look. Memory performance is also improved compared to the 965 chipset - so if you're already looking to spend $150, definitely read up on the P5K.
 
TigerLord said:
You can't choose which version you get... if you buy an LT or NF63 fine, but if you buy a NF68 online, the retailer isn't going to tell you if they have A1 or T1 in stock.
Click to expand...

At newegg you can clearly see if you're getting the T1 or the A1. Plus, they are the exact same board. One has a 3 year warranty, the other has the lifetime warranty.
 
What I meant is, you wont know if you'll receive the AR or the A1... where the AR isn't quad oc compatible.
 
TigerLord said:
You can't choose which version you get... if you buy an LT or NF63 fine, but if you buy a NF68 online, the retailer isn't going to tell you if they have A1 or T1 in stock.
Click to expand...

Not true. There are plenty of websites that differentiate between the two as they have different part numbers. They may not showcase the difference, but you can clearly order both versions if you want to.
 
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