Quad-core upgrade, buy new MB or keep current one?

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Raudulfr

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Hello,

I'm about to buy a Q9550, the question is: should I buy a new P45 motherboard or keep my current P5B Deluxe?

With the latest BIOS it supports 45nm quads (I'm using a 45nm dual right now) but I don't know how well a P965 will handle an overclocked 45nm quad-core. I see a lot of people saying things like limited overclocking (FSB), massive vdroop, overheating NB, too much stress on the MB which will lead to instability, etc, etc.


Anyone has any experience with it?
 
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try it first.. if it doesnt work the way you want it then buy a new motherboard.. since you already own the P5B deluxe you are better off trying it before wasting money on getting a new board to only find out the P5B works perfectly fine with the processor..
 
I really wanted to keep my current MB but seeing all those potential (and real) problems makes me a bit uneasy. The upgrade itch is expanding...
 
Depends on whether you want to upgrade or not and time frame between upgrades to justify them.;)
 
It should work at stock but you can probably expect reduced overclock potential. If you're okay with that then stick with your current board. If you want to push your chip to its limits, you'll probably need a P45 board.
 
troisanh said:
Depends on whether you want to upgrade or not and time frame between upgrades to justify them.;)
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Well, with this quad-core upgrade I think I'll stick with 775 for a couple more years. Until 2011 or so. Maybe that justifies a motherboard upgrade for a better experience.

Zero82z said:
It should work at stock but you can probably expect reduced overclock potential. If you're okay with that then stick with your current board. If you want to push your chip to its limits, you'll probably need a P45 board.
Click to expand...

I was aiming for just 400MHz FSB but with horrour stories of massive vdroop... I don't know if it'd be wise.



Thanks for all the replies.
 
Yeah if you want to OC a quad, you'll need at least a P35. I had a P965 board when I got a quad. It ran stock but it wouldn't regulate the voltage enough on a quad. I got a P35 and it solved my problems. Might be some of those around cheap.
 
From my experience, P965 hates any kind of quad, let alone a 45nm

But still, you HAVE to try it, just to do it
 
It's on. Stressing at 3,42GHz (I like 400 FSB) @ 1,2375V in BIOS / ~1,20V idle / ~1,186V load / ~1,16V Linpack load.

How bad is that vdroop? Should I be worried?
Maybe I can lower the voltage a bit (1,10V min VID and 1,2375V max VID)



The old gal is holding up pretty good so far. A P965 with an overclocked 45nm Quad-core and 8GB of RAM in 4 sticks :)
 
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That is pretty bad Vdroop, but as long as it's stable, it doesn't really matter.
 
It passed 5 runs of Linpack. I'll lower the Vcore a bit and test it further.
 
I dropped the voltage to 1.2V in BIOS. So for all intents and purposes it's overclocked and undervolted :D

1.20V BIOS
1.17V IDLE
1.13V LOAD
1.12V LINPACK

Bloody vdroop!
 
Ain't there a vdroop mod out there you can apply to your system to avoid that huge wtf (lols just read those volts) vdroop?
 
I tried it a long ago... I don't think it made much of a difference. It's not that bad, I've seen worse from supposedly better boards/chipsets.

It's stable though.

2009080400026.png
 
I don't know.:confused: Never used LinX. Was just assuming one of the two might be a bit more stressful/more options than the other.
 
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