High end 1156 vs low end 1366?

T

Tudz

Supreme [H]ardness
Joined
Jun 15, 2008
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G'day all,

I'm wondering what the [H] community thinks regarding getting either a higher end 1156 mobo/CPU combo like a P55A-UD7 or P7P55D-E with an i7-870 or maybe 875K, or a low end end 1366 combo, like an X58A-UD3R with an i7 930.

The higher end P55 mobos have more power phases, 24, compared to the X58A-UD3R which I believe has 8 phases. So do you think the higher end P55 mobos would actually overclock better than the low end X58 boards, given the cost for them are similar?
 
1366 gonna be faster any way you look at it...x58 + triple channel ram + 930 will get to 4ghz on almost any x58 board..power phases are fine on the x58 board be it 5 on msi or 8, or 24 they all perform fine..
just go 1366 and be done with it for at least 2 years..youll have the fastest thing out for a while..sandy bridge so far isnt all that much of an upgrad to 1366...these things are so incredibly fast with an ssd drive ,its really amazing.....
 
Adding more phases doesn't make a difference except in certain extreme overclocking scenarios. My personal opinion is that it's not worth spending a lot of money on an LGA1156 setup since you'll still be limited by fewer PCI-E lanes, a dual-channel memory controller, and CPUs that tend to overclock worse than their LGA1366 counterparts. If you're going to sink a lot of cash into a PC, go LGA1366.
 
Zero82z said:
Adding more phases doesn't make a difference except in certain extreme overclocking scenarios. My personal opinion is that it's not worth spending a lot of money on an LGA1156 setup since you'll still be limited by fewer PCI-E lanes, a dual-channel memory controller, and CPUs that tend to overclock worse than their LGA1366 counterparts. If you're going to sink a lot of cash into a PC, go LGA1366.
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My thoughts exactly. Continuing from that train of thought, I usually limit my LGA1156 motherboard recommendations to under $160. Any higher than that and you might as well go for LGA 1366.
 
Meh, I'm at that price point now. Have an i7-875k, but the motherboard I want, Asus P7P55D-E Premium, out of my price point. Got the i7 back in mid June for 199, but still, I want to OC this bizotch soo bad, may have to bite the bullet, gahhhhh!!
 
saar said:
but the motherboard I want, Asus P7P55D-E Premium, out of my price point.
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That mobo is currently deactivated on Newegg. Where are you getting it from?

With that said, what features does the Premium version have that justifies the price over the regular Asus P7P55D-E?
 
wesleys_dad said:
1366 gonna be faster any way you look at it...x58 + triple channel ram + 930 will get to 4ghz on almost any x58 board..power phases are fine on the x58 board be it 5 on msi or 8, or 24 they all perform fine..
just go 1366 and be done with it for at least 2 years..youll have the fastest thing out for a while..sandy bridge so far isnt all that much of an upgrad to 1366...these things are so incredibly fast with an ssd drive ,its really amazing.....
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What makes the X58 so much better exactly? If you dont want to go high end SLI, so the extra PCI-E lanes wont help (even GTX460 SLI seems to the same in 16x/8x). Reviews I've read show barely any difference in speed between triple and dual channel memory, even in synthetic benchmarks...

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/Intel-Core-i7-Nehalem,2057-13.html

The reason I bought up power phases is because my current PC is an i5 750 on a P55A-UD3 and it'll happily run at 4GHz, the thing stopping me pushing it further is the voltage... I set 1.4 in the BIOS and it runs at 1.36V but drops to almost 1.3V at load. I'm sure I could run 4.2GHz if setting the voltage at 1.4 actually meant it stayed above 1.35 (well I have run 4.2, but not for any length of time). I figured more phases might mean more consistent power, but if I'm wrong I'm happy to concede that point, I'm pretty new to overclocking. :)

I'm just trying to understand why 1366 is so much better and people recommend it over 1156. As I'm considering buying a few new computers around either a X58A UD3R with i7 930, or a P55 with an i7 870 or 875K, which will end up cheaper or the same price if I go for a higher end P55 mobo.
 
Tudz said:
I'm just trying to understand why 1366 is so much better and people recommend it over 1156. As I'm considering buying a few new computers around either a X58A UD3R with i7 930, or a P55 with an i7 870 or 875K, which will end up cheaper or the same price if I go for a higher end P55 mobo.
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Main reason why I recommend Core i7 930 + X58 mobo when the budget is capable of doing so is if the usage scenario involves a ton of video editing, photoshop work, or virtualization work. The extra RAM slots that the X58 route offers does help out with those usage scenarios.

I try not to recommend Core i7 930 + X58 route for just a gaming setup unless the OP is planning on a tri-SLI/XFire setup.
 
Tudz said:
What makes the X58 so much better exactly? If you dont want to go high end SLI, so the extra PCI-E lanes wont help (even GTX460 SLI seems to the same in 16x/8x). Reviews I've read show barely any difference in speed between triple and dual channel memory, even in synthetic benchmarks...

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/Intel-Core-i7-Nehalem,2057-13.html

I'm just trying to understand why 1366 is so much better and people recommend it over 1156. As I'm considering buying a few new computers around either a X58A UD3R with i7 930, or a P55 with an i7 870 or 875K, which will end up cheaper or the same price if I go for a higher end P55 mobo.
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That article doesn't show the whole picture.... if you have ANY program that uses a lot of RAM, the triple channel setup will blow away the dual channel setup very easily.

If you are CPU, GPU or other I/O limited then it won't make much of a difference though.

AND the whole system is going to be a lot smoother with triple channel as well.
 
Triple channel and dual run neck and neck... Nothing is blown away....

http://www.insidehw.com/Reviews/Mem...l-Channel-vs.-Triple-Channel-Memory-Mode.html

http://www.overclock.net/intel-memory/681697-truth-about-i7-1366-memory-both.html

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I7 930+GA-X58A-UD3R+triple channel > i5 750/i7 870/i7 875K+GA-P55A-UD3+dual channel > I3 540
 
I;m just wondering, in a lot of benchmarks the i7 870 beats the i7 920 comfortably in each and every benchmark. it comes quite close to the more expensive 970 i believe which ran over 500 bucks.

I own an i7 920 system myself, but from benchmarks why does the 920 lose to the 870?

Sorry for going offtopic.
 
firas said:
I7 930+GA-X58A-UD3R+triple channel > i5 750/i7 870/i7 875K+GA-P55A-UD3+dual channel > I3 540
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Well of course, but that wasn't the question. The P55A-UD3 out here in Australia is $130+ cheaper than an X58A-UD3R and 6gb triple channel is almost $60 more than 4gb dual channel, the X58 damn well better perform better at that price difference.

What I'm talking about is low end X58 (UD3R) with low end triple channel memory (say, 6gb 1600MHz CL9) compared to high end P55, like a UD6 with high end dual channel memory (say, 4gb 2200MHz G.Skill PI series).

The costs are similar, with heavy overclocking which will give better results? Given you can afford higher end RAM and motherboard when going 1156, assuming you have a fixed budget around that price (which is what I have :p).
 
There is no such thing as low end 1366 combo. Hehe. I have had that board and it is a quality board.
 
vietkangta said:
I;m just wondering, in a lot of benchmarks the i7 870 beats the i7 920 comfortably in each and every benchmark. it comes quite close to the more expensive 970 i believe which ran over 500 bucks.

I own an i7 920 system myself, but from benchmarks why does the 920 lose to the 870?

Sorry for going offtopic.
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The 870 has a higher stock clock speed. If the 920 was overclocked to the same frequency, it would perform as well as or better than the 870 in every benchmark.
 
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Tudz said:
Well of course, but that wasn't the question. The P55A-UD3 out here in Australia is $130+ cheaper than an X58A-UD3R and 6gb triple channel is almost $60 more than 4gb dual channel, the X58 damn well better perform better at that price difference.

What I'm talking about is low end X58 (UD3R) with low end triple channel memory (say, 6gb 1600MHz CL9) compared to high end P55, like a UD6 with high end dual channel memory (say, 4gb 2200MHz G.Skill PI series).

The costs are similar, with heavy overclocking which will give better results? Given you can afford higher end RAM and motherboard when going 1156, assuming you have a fixed budget around that price (which is what I have :p).
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if you're paying the same price for 1156 as a decent 1366, you're just overpaying (unless you're not using your money, but why go 1156 over 1366 any way? lol). that's about all I got to say about that.
 
The 1156 setup does just as well as the 1366, except cost less. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link. Look at your/peoples video card, also. A 1366 with a 4870 wont match up to a 1156 with a powerful card. A 1366 can do tri sli. If you arent going to use tri-sli, then I believe 1366 is a waste of money.
 
even the lowly i5 750 beats the 920 in these gaming benchmark. How is that possible?
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I was wondering the same since the i5 has a few disadvantages versus i7. However I think I figured this out. The i5 has a higher single and dual threaded turbo boost (24X) than the i7 920 (22 X).

Edit: I somehow did not see the second page. Sorry for repeating..
 
vietkangta said:
Its true in some cases but in certain cases like this

http://www.anandtech.com/show/2832/16

even the lowly i5 750 beats the 920 in these gaming benchmark. How is that possible?
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They mention that it's due to more aggressive turbo modes. In other words, at stock speeds, the i5 is overclocking itself higher than the i7. If you turned off turbo (as many overclockers do), you might see a different picture.
 
The worst thing about this gen of cpus is to know that Intel is coming out with a new socket next year? I'ts not like amd were you can have a good board and throw in a new cpu in 2 years from now.
 
@dmin said:
The worst thing about this gen of cpus is to know that Intel is coming out with a new socket next year? I'ts not like amd were you can have a good board and throw in a new cpu in 2 years from now.
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However, I would go with 1366 over 1156 just because of the physical limitations of 1156 with on board gpu and less than awesome memory controller.
 
lol....ok...p55 doesnt have onboard gpu....h55 does..sort of....on cpu really....both are 1156.
 
dccmadams said:
lol....ok...p55 doesnt have onboard gpu....h55 does..sort of....on cpu really....both are 1156.
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H55 doesn't have a built-in GPU. It does however allow you to take advantage of the integrated GPU present in certain LGA1156 CPUs.
 
As others have stated, 1366 is overkill unless you use multiple GPUs.
 
I agree. And besides, you can get something like a UD4P and still be able to do CFX/SLI without issue.
 
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