Help with a motherboard

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dtess17

2[H]4U
Joined
Feb 7, 2005
Messages
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I am looking for a very stable, SLI MB.

i'm not too impressed with the overclocking on the board i have, and i think this opty 170 has a lot more headroom before it hits a wall.

I know DFI is usually regarded as the best overclocking boards, but i'm not too familar with their product lineup.which of their SLI boards are the best.


Also i hear that MSI, Abit, and the Asus 32 boards are doing well.

I am also open to any other brands...just looking for something that is going to OC well, and be stable. Also i will need the at least one PCI slot under the SLI cards.

Just incase it matters most of the parts that will be used are already listed in the sig but i will have a different case, and will likely be watercooling by then.

So what to yall think?
 
EVGA's just released a new NF4 x16 like two weeks ago. A user at EVGA's forum is reporting that he likes this board very much. Not much filled with unused features like that of Asus' or other brands, but perfectly solid in every other area. Better layout (kind of like MSI) than a few other brands. I know it's my next board when I can afford it. You may want to check it out. Newegg's has it for a mere $150 for NF x16 board. Nothing can beat that.
 
interesting...board was a very no nonesense type thing. Not much in the features department. I don't care for only having 4 sata ports though. with sata opticals and then hard drives seems somewhat limiting.
 
If you're looking for overclocking, get a DFI SLI-DR or the SLI-DR Expert. They're also quite stable. SLI-DR is a much more mature board it seems, and doesn't seem to have some of the SLI problems the Expert has. I'd say go for the SLI-DR. That G.Skill memory you have will love it :D. Check out dfi-street also, they can be quite helpful.
 
I;ve also seen a lot of people talking about the MSI K8N Diamond plus...how well does that board OC?

I was looking at the DFI boards and it seems that their chipset fan might get in the way of SLI...does anyone have these problems or do the cards fit fine?
 
The cards fit fine. The end of the card might hang over the HS, but it won't touch. Really not a big deal. I don't know about the MSI's OC potential. Probably on par with Abit, maybe a little better than Asus.
 
seems as though the expert, DR and UT DR are all pretty similar.

Is there any real difference on these boards...besides the layout on the expert?
 
UT denotes the version without as many extras. That is the only difference between the two SLI-DRs. Obviously the Expert has a different layout, but other than that, they're all very similar. All overclock extremely well.
 
you said there were issues with SLI on the expert...what type?
overall it seems to be a nice board that many people like...
 
I've just seen a lot of posts at dfi-street concerning SLI stability. This was before the last BIOS revision. I think it may have had to do with PSUs though. The expert draws more power than older boards, so make sure your PSU is up to it. That Liberty 620 will be fine. I'm using a Liberty 500 on my expert without any issue. Definitely go over to dfi-street and look around. There's also the notoriously inaccurate temp readings on the expert to consider. Mine reads about 10C off. Others have been worse. It just seems to me that the Expert has more common problems, where the problems people have with the SLI-DR are more random, and usually not severe.
 
Thanks for the info on that...
so it seems that the SLI DR is a major choice at the moment.

anyone have any other boards they think might be a good choice?
 
I am having good success with an A8N32-SLi Deluxe mobo .. I have never messed with a DFI and hear that they can be a booger to setup initially , but once "tweaked" to perfection are pretty solid

..this Asus mobo is kind of in the same category . At first I thought , "..darn , I got a dud 170 Opteron" .. but It was because I was unfamiliar with all the "new" settings on the A8N32 . I was used to my previous mobo (A8N-SLi Premium) , and new it backwards and forwards as far as bios settings and what did what ..etc.

relearning the bios lingo, and now I'm getting (slowly but surely) my 170 to up and over my previous x2 +4400 max of 2.5ghz. Prime'n at 2.6ghz and then I'll go from there . (the 170 was failing prime at 2.6ghz after 4 minutes ..now with some bios tweaking I'm going on 30 minutes and counting w/ 1205 bios)

oc'ing is a crap shoot .. sure is cool when the dice roll your way for change tho :)


[F]old|[H]ard
 
As you can see i got the premium now, and it just isn't doing it for me.

I like the A8N32 but i didn't think it would OC that much better.
I know i have a good opty people have got it to 3.0 already...just need a good mobo

i thought the A8N32 was somewhat cramped...SLI plus sound...
 
look over the threads in the amd mobo forum, and the mobo forum, and see which boards have the most threads about problems. now that we have eliminated asus, the epox 9npa series is cheap stable and good overclocker. dfi sli-d or sli-dr are mature stable boards, great overclcokers. the expert series is having some issues with power supplies. the previous 3 evga nf4 boards, nf41, nf43 and nf44 cannot get ram to run at 1t over 200mhz. this is a universal problem, and sometimes cannot get high htt. these are rebadged jetway boards. also, none of the evga boards has ever had an updated bios. ever. shipping bios only. so if you are waiting for a bios update to fix some problems, it will come at precisely the time that pigs fly.
 
see the HardOCP review of the Abit AN8 32X as it's a pretty fair review.
It's very stable as they agree although I would have said that their overclock of 275 was on the low side (they don't say what BIOS they used & the original shipping did have a wall around the 275-280 area since resolved in a new BIOS).
 
Went from a8n32 to the expert, whole different world bios wise. Lots more room and way more settings in bios. But once setup, the expert has been solid. BTW if you plan on going SLI, the expert has more room between the cards so heat will not be much a problem. Have 120mm fan on side blowing on mine when i had sli7800gtx. Sold both and now have x1900xt and 7900gtxSC. Just make sure your PS is up for the SLI challenge. GL man, either is a good choice.
 
troisanh said:
Went from a8n32 to the expert, whole different world bios wise. Lots more room and way more settings in bios. But once setup, the expert has been solid. BTW if you plan on going SLI, the expert has more room between the cards so heat will not be much a problem. Have 120mm fan on side blowing on mine when i had sli7800gtx. Sold both and now have x1900xt and 7900gtxSC. Just make sure your PS is up for the SLI challenge. GL man, either is a good choice.
Click to expand...

yeah i did notice that there is a lot more space on the PCie slots on the expert.I think i'll likely just throw a waterblock on the vid cards...so i'm not as worried about the heat...good ramsinks and some airflow should take care of it.


I feel as though my PS should be good. I've had no problems with it yet, and from what i read it had really good reviews.

Did you get a better overclock once you got the DFI?
 
I actually haven't gotten around to OCing on my expert much yet. I'm waiting till after I take an engineering sample CFX-3200 that I got my hands on for a spin. One thing the expert could do was run my G.Skill HZ's at its rated 250 MHz. My old A8N couldn't even POST with those things at 230. So thats pretty promising. From what I understand, the DFI's power distribution is much better than the ASUS's, which usually allows higher CPU OCs. The DFI's are going to be the best overclockers out there, so I wouldn't worry about that. The wealth of BIOS options DFI gives you is what makes these boards OC so well. The power supply should be fine on any board, but the expert is questionable. However, from my own experience with an expert and a Liberty, it should be fine. GL and have fun with whatever you get.
 
BUFF said:
see the HardOCP review of the Abit AN8 32X as it's a pretty fair review.
It's very stable as they agree although I would have said that their overclock of 275 was on the low side (they don't say what BIOS they used & the original shipping did have a wall around the 275-280 area since resolved in a new BIOS).
Click to expand...

i just read that this morning...problem is such a low OC on it...i'm looking for something in the 325+ range...seems as though DFI is the way to go.
 
Ok i think i am 100% on the DFI now. I've read up on all the other board i was looking at, i don't see them offering anything special except two 16X PCie.

Now the one thing i've seen is that the chipset fan tends to be a bit on the loud side...what are people using to replace it? I really don't feel like watercooling it is needed.
 
Post your experience with the DFI board here if you have time. Good luck and have fun building it.
 
JCNiest5 said:
Post your experience with the DFI board here if you have time. Good luck and have fun building it.
Click to expand...

there is always time to post...that's half the fun of putting everything together.
 
dtess17 said:
i just read that this morning...problem is such a low OC on it..
Click to expand...
as I said imo their OC is atypical - I have a strong suspicion that they used the original shipping BIOS rather than the latest.
Anyway, have fun whatever you go for.
 
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