Is my motherboard compatible with Phenom II ?

[mhahnheuser]

....quck follow up to my ealier posts. I bit the bullet and replaced the mobo and DDR3 RAM with Gigabyte 785G chipset and managed pc boot up and driver instalation without having to put on a fresh operating system. P2 965 (3.4) at default settings and able to crank up graphics settings in Crysis and Far Cry 2 to full 1680 x 1050 res and smooth as silk. Nice to get some extra FPS out of the 4850. No need to OC it although it's a BE, got overhead in the GPU too if I need it, but plenty fast enough for my needs at stock, the X2 was too, but what the hell these new AMD products make a man go crazy and do things he doesn't need to do.

Unfortunately hybrid X-fire between it and the onboard 4200 can't be done, or at least haven't been able to get it running yet, but other than that a quite nice performance boost overall without being too dramatic as the X2 6000+ was pretty slick at any rate. Only did it because I had bought the CPU to test the previous mobo and thought I should probably use it rather than sell it at a loss. Will sell the old kit on ebay to recover some of the cost. Overall pretty satisfied with the upgrade.

 

[luzagodom]

PII X4 940 is working fine so far at stock. Stress testing with OCCT just to check for temps. I'm kind of afraid to overclock it much though because of the 125W TDP (and previous non-support of 125W Phenom I CPUs).

Note: this is the board with the crazy NB temp readings. With the PII running the NB at 1.8 GHz up from 1.0 GHz with an X2, the temps are soaring!

 

[Markfw]

PII X4 940 is working fine so far at stock. Stress testing with OCCT just to check for temps. I'm kind of afraid to overclock it much though because of the 125W TDP (and previous non-support of 125W Phenom I CPUs).

Note: this is the board with the crazy NB temp readings. With the PII running the NB at 1.8 GHz up from 1.0 GHz with an X2, the temps are soaring!

What motherboard ???

 

[Peter Trend]

I've been away but I just found this. PHII 940 X4 works fine in my ASUS M3A78-T, but the board needed a bios update first, and all my attempts at overclocking resulted in an unstable machine. I'm not sure of the BIOS version I have, but the latest one will support PHII.

 

[netxzero64]

maybe you just need a bios update...

 

[Peter Trend]

I'm not sure, to be honest I think I just have a 940 which doesn't overclock very well. I never had overheating as it is very well cooled anyway, but it isn't stable running folding or gaming at anything over 3.4GHz, and out of fear of further problems while doing critical tasks (e.g. multitrack recording) I have returned to stock speeds. A bit disappointing but I can't afford to brick it either..

 

[andylawcc]

damn, should have found this earlier.

I got a Biostar TF570, with the expectation that it will be compatible with AM3, which AMD has explicitly claimed it will. It sucks that mobo makers has no financial incentive to do so. So, I am gonna either return the Phenom II I just bought, or suck it up and go all the way and get a new mobo and probably DDR3 memory too.

anyway, this is a good summary:
http://forums.anandtech.com/showthread.php?t=313280

AM2+ motherboards only take DDR2 ram but both cpus. AM3 motherboards only takes DDR3 ram and only AM3 cpus.

AM3 processors work on AM2+ motherboards because they have both ddr2 and ddr3 controllers (for now). This is is why some motherboards are labeled "AM2+/AM3," in reality both are the same (although you may need to update a BIOS)
AM2+ processors do not work on AM3 motherboards because they do not have a ddr3 controller.

The base question to decide is what ram and cpu to get. Honestly there is not yet much difference between the different ram. HOWEVER there is a difference between the availability of cpus. The popular AM2+ 940 is sold out everywhere, meaning AMD is probably retiring it, and probably the only other AM2+ Phenom II as well. For a performance cpu, AM3 cpus are pretty much the only way to go now.

While you can use AM3 processors on AM2+ boards that support it, you run the risk of future AM3 processors not supporting your ddr2 ram and you're only going to save about $25-$50. Unless you can get a screaming hot newegg deals on this, the small "premium" will probably just not be big enough to matter for you.

from Midnight Rambler

 

[andylawcc]

just got a Jetway 790GX DDR2 AND DDR3 Combo motherboard. Newegg has it for 80-90 bucks or so. It ran with my Athlon X2 with DDR2, and Phenom II 550 X2 with DDR2 just fine. It even has DDR3 slots for future expansion. It's an odd board but it fits my needs (don't wanna get DDR3 right now)

 

[mhahnheuser]

...well, after my last job firing up a 965 and getting to love it I had another crack using another Gigabyte 880GA on my second PC, but this time used the 1090T and cross-fired the setup with a pair of Gigabyte 5770's and again used the old OS installation without so much as a hiccup. X-Fire cards instantly recognized by the system and activated by the Catalyst software.

System booted and ran smoothly right from changing the main-board through to adding all the hardware and its associated drivers....oh so easy, and bloody fast to, biggest hassle was needing to ring Microsoft to reactivate the OS.

These two upgrades have been the easiest I have ever done...kudos to AMD for such user friendly products...the performance for the price can't be beat IMO...

 

[chickenIT]

Often, Main SK AM2+ can suport Phemnom II( <=125W)