Intel mobo as a gaming board.

[gorka]

Planning on building the most stable board I could possibly build for my brother.

He'll be gaming all winter long.

Anyways, I was thinking of going with the Intel DP35DP. Which is the P35 chipset.

No frills on this board, but stability is top priority and he won't be overclocking.

My question, are these destop Intel boards to be used for gaming, or are they really meant for desktop/workstation use?

I've got an Asus P5K Deluxe myself and its still has a few AHCI bugs that make sme not weant to go that router again. The Abit IP35 seems good, but the vdroop is a miss on my books as well.

Just curious about this, as I've never built around an Intel board.

Intel DP35DP
Q6600
eVGA 8800GT (512mb)
8GB DDR2
Corsair HX620



Thanks for any feedback!

 

[Keitero]

Intel boards are known for the stability. I had a DG965WHMK and currently own a D975XBX2 and a DG33TL mainboard and both work great as a HTPC and gaming machines. Granted, the XBX2 is has options to overclock but it is still a stable platform in which to build a gaming machine out of.

 

[JPB]

Don't you think that 8 gig of memory is a bit overkill ?

I am in this same situation though, I have always had AMD, and now finally made the jump to Intel. Wish me luck

 

[Buck Armstrong]

The only concern I have with Intel boards is that only the top-of-the-line "Extreme" models come with any sort of OCing or other manual configuration features in the BIOS. Right now, that would be the D975XBX2 and the new DX38BT. As far as I can tell, the P35 is just as fast and solid, and much cheaper...you just won't have all the same options.

And JPB is right; there's no way he needs 8GB!

 

[NXIL]

Hi Gorka,

if you look at user reviews for the Intel version of the P35 board at Newegg, and take them with the proverbial grain of salt, it doesn't look like the Intel branded version of the P35 board rates more than about a "B" on the A-F scale.

BIOS bugs, driver issues, etc.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16813121314

Generally, Intel boards are manufactured by Foxxcon, possibly Asus and others as well, so, each board is different. Intel boards are usually among the most stable, rock solid reliable, etc--but, Intel has been known to put out a few stinkers as well. No one, and no company, is perfect, except for Apple.

OK, that was a joke--

These P35 boards are the most highly rated at Newegg:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...8064%2CN82E16813131219

The Abit IP35 seems to have the most positive press behind it--see The Royal Serpent's 1000+ comment thread on it....with thousands of enthusiasts using it, I would guess it would guess its variants would be the most stable by now--as for vDroop: from what I have read, that is more of a problem for overclocking than at stock speeds? (But, IANAEIT, I am not an expert in that BAM by any means.....)

I also linked the Intel X38 chipset board in there: their flagship board, so, it's going to be stable, rock solid, indestructible. Note that it has essentially uniformly glowing reviews, except for this unfortunate:

Cons: I can't believe i just spent so much time and money to get this mobo aligned with the new 8800gt sc's (supporting pcie 2.0) in SLI. I got my hands on a pair, and guess what? THIS MOBO DOESNT SUPPORT SLI!?!?!?

Um, no, dude, SLI on nVidia chipsets only as of now....

Also, one generation back, but still solid:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16813121059

Bad Axe II.

For no overclocking, some solid DDR2 800 1.8V memory will be good too, JDEC compliant...should just work without issues.

HTH

NXIL

 

[LR6]

If you get this board you must have standard 1.8v non-overclocked memory, this is good, because this memory is cheaper.

 

[gorka]

Thanks guys!

The abit IP35 Pro does seems like a solid board...I think it will be between this and the Intel.

BTW. The only reason we were looking at 8Gb was because its very, very cheap now.

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: gorka
My question, are these destop Intel boards to be used for gaming, or are they really meant for desktop/workstation use?

How could a motherboard manufacturer change their board to preclude one use or another? It doesn't matter what it is marketed, designed, or pretends to be. Within a couple of percentage points all boards with the same chipset tend to perform identically for whatever task you throw at it... except for overclocking where there can be huge differences. You mentioned no overclocking, so get whatever floats your boat.

 

[johanh13]

Hello,

I just built four new computers for our Christmas LAN party this year. Three of them have the DP35DP, one has the DX38BT. All of them have Seagate hard drives and PC Power & Cooling 610 watt Silencers in an Antec SOLO case. Two are running 8800GTS video cards, and two are running 8800GT cards. I have had absolutely zero issues with these Intel boards, and I have built over two hundred systems using Intel boards, with only 1 or 2 issues ever...