Mobo Suggestions for Phenom X6 Upgrade Kit

[Van G]

With BF coming quickly was hoping for suggestions on upgrading my Athlon 64 X2 3800+, 3 GB Ram, Radeon HD 3400, Asus A8N-E, Antec TPII-430 running Win 7.

As the title states, the heavy lifting I'm looking to do is hd video and photo editing using Adobe CS5 and Lightroom. I would consider my use of these appz moderate but want a relatively smooth/fast experience.

I would like to share my music library with my AVR so quality of content passed to AVR (ethernet or dig coax) is important.

No gaming

Dell 2410 and MS Wireless 4000 key/mouse are good to keep
I'll likely go with one of the hybrid drives for the system and move my other SATA's to scratch and storage.

I would like to keep cost under $600.

What I've found so far:

220 - AMD Phenom II X6 1090T Black Edition Thuban 3.2GHz 6 x 512KB L2 Cache 6MB L3 Cache Socket AM3 125W Six-Core Desktop Processor

90 - MSI N240GT-MD1G/D5 GeForce GT 240 1GB 128-bit GDDR5 PCI Express 2.0 x16

200 - MSI 890FXA-GD70 AM3 AMD 890FX SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 ATX AMD Motherboard

Not sure if I need to spend that much on the mobo and I don't know which memory package to purchase (8 GB).

Cheers,

Van G

 

[flexcore]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131646

Unless you need IOMMU this should do the trick.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231311

Great deal and great ram.

 

[Van G]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131646

Unless you need IOMMU this should do the trick.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231311

Great deal and great ram.

Don't need IOMMU (application?) and that is a nice price on RAM.

What is the advantage of this board over the MSI? Do I give up anything for the savings?

 

[superccs]

The 1090 isn't really required... The 1075 or 1055 will do the same clocks.
Unless you plan on SLI or Xfire, the 890Gx board may do all you need and save some money.

I have a OC'd 1055 in a MSI 890GX and its works perfectly.

 

[Van G]

I assume 1055 clocked to 3.2 is the same as a stock 1090? Stable at 3.2 - 3.8 with stock cooler?

 

[Van G]

I've got the following in my cart:

AMD Phenom II X6 1075T Thuban 3.0GHz Socket AM3
G.SKILL Ripjaws Series 8GB (2 x 4GB) 240-Pin DDR3 SDRAM DDR3 1333
Antec Nine Hundred Black Steel ATX

ASUS M4A88TD-V EVO/USB3 AM3 AMD 880G SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 HDMI ATX AMD
MSI 890GXM-G65 AM3 AMD 890GX SATA 6Gb/s USB 3.0 HDMI Micro ATX

ASUS RT-N16 802.11b/g/n Gigabit Wireless Router


Questions:
- Given the $30 premium of the MSI, are there tangible differences (to me) and do I want microATX given my case?

- If I need to upgrade cooler, will either of the AC Freeze or Zalman 9500 have problems fitting in either of the boards (assume ATX Asus will have have more room)?

Van G

 

[flexcore]

I've heard of problems with some MSI boards and X6. I would go ASUS myself. If you want upgrade your HSF, the Hyper 212 is on sale at theegg. Good cooler for very good price.

 

[Van G]

Discussion continued here for final input on the build.

Thank you flexcore & superccs for the posts.

Van G