system is flaky, decided to start over but need help deciding

[cmdrdredd]

I wasn't sure where the best place to put this topic was so I thought "general hardware" was safe.

I am having so many issues with this current system it's not funny. my Q9550 is basically dead. I'm on my old E6400 and have none of the issues the Q9550 was giving me. I have swapped my PSU as well. I tried this current PSU which is a seasonic S12 600w unit with the Q9550 and it's no good. I have swapped the video card to a single 9600GT and it's no good with the Corsair TX750 and Q9550 installed. I even tried the E6400 and 9600GT on the Corsair PSU and no go. So the only way to get stable is to use the Seasonic 600w PSU, the 9600GT video card, and the E6400 CPU. The seasonic PSU doesn't handle the GTX295 well when it's under load.

I've decided it's time to start over and I'm moving to i7. Now my dilemma is that I really don't know which socket I want to go with. 1366 is easier to overclock with, I've just never built a 1366 system. I have built 2 1156 socket systems for friends but only very mild overclocking and basic systems. Not what I am going to go for. I'm planning to toss a Megahalem on for cooling the CPU. I've read about the differences between the 1366 platform and the 1156 platform. I also know that 1366 supposedly will get Gulftown CPUs down the road, I am aware of the 1156 socket issues. The problem for me is, I'm going back and forth on which socket to choose. I do believe I'm going to go with an EVGA board as the reviews are always stellar despite the price premium. I don't know if I want to go with 1366 and spend a bit more and do an i7 920 with triple channel memory, or if 1156 is the better option with an i7 860 and dual channel.

I know some of you have been trying to make the same decision. I am also not totally against the i5 750 if there is some reason it's a better option. I'm unaware of any issues HT brings up and whatnot so maybe that's a consideration? I honestly don't know. I have no personal experience on these sockets & CPUs other than a few simple builds that didn't go crazy on the overclocking and tweaking.

So if you've managed to read through my long winded babble I commend you, but pose a question to you at the same time. If you were going to build a new system around a new mobo/cpu/memory combo which socket would you go with? If you went 1156 would you go i5 750 or i7 860? To that end does anyone have experience with both maybe? I guess I need someone to tell me which to buy lol. I'm not nitpicking price here either, I mean if the system is going to be $900+ instead of $600+ then so be it. I'd rather spend more and get a better setup if that's what it takes. I've read the reviews and I see that both platforms are generally close in performance. The difference being so minor as to not worry about, performance wise. That's why it's so hard for me to decide. Do I care about the possibility of getting Gulftown CPUs, or do I want to save a bit of money initially?

Any thoughts?

 

[Hyperlite]

bummer. Really dude, if you've got the money there really isn't any reason not to go 1366. Sounds like it's got longer legs than 1156. I'd make the argument about 1156's better turbo mode, but if you're OCing you may end up disabling turbo either way. 1366 gives you better memory bandwidth, better high end GPU/CF performance, longer/clear upgrade path, better OCing ability...

I keep going back and forth about this. I think the i7 860 needs to be about $50 cheaper. It usually doesn't make sense to drop the extra $100 on an 860 over a 750 and NOT just move up to 1366.

I'm in a similar boat, but largely for budget reasons i'll be going with an i5. I justify this with the fact that this will be an everyday use setup that won't see a lot of intensive gaming or media encoding, so i'll probably OC to 3.4 or so and leave turbo mode enabled, and it should come in handy for my uses.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Yeah that was my initial thought to go 1366, but saving a few bux never hurts of course.

I did a few builds on newegg and they are as follows.

EVGA E760 X58 Classified Motherboard, i7 920 CPU, 6GB G.Skill Ripjaw DDR3-1600 = $863.97
EVGA P55 FTW SLI Motherboard, i7 860 CPU, 4GB G.Skill Ripjaw DDR3-1600 = $624.97
EVGA P55 FTW SLI Motherboard, i5 750 CPI, 4GB G.Skill Ripjaw DDR3-1600 = $534.97

So between the i5 and i7 920 setup it's a $329 difference. That's another video card to run SLI or crossfire depending on what card someone is running. That's what's got me thinking. That's a very large disparity between pricing, but obviously the x58 is the high end platform and demands a price premium as a result. It's almost $100 to step up to the i7 860 and that in itself might not be a huge amount, but both CPUs overclock to the same levels generally and aside from hyperthreading which might not even be a big deal, it seems like a large jump. However, I have not been able to find definitive test results of an i5 vs i7 on LGA1156 in real world apps. I'm still looking for something like that. I don't need the extra 2GB of memory either so that's not an issue.

 

[Hyperlite]

Yeah, that is a big price difference. It's win/lose though because P55 only has 1/2 the PCIe lanes that X58 does, so CF/SLi performance won't be quite up to the level of 1366 if you're saturating that pathway. Have you read AT's Lynnfield launch article? It's pretty insightful: http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3634 It's long though, go grab a beverage.

some selections...
PCIe -> http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3634&p=9
Not a huge difference, but if you're running top tier video cards, it will at least be quantifiable...maybe not qualifiable.

Benches start on the next page.

The fact of the matter is most of the processor differences go out the window when OCing is involved, it'll be MAYBE a 5% difference in any direction ultimately, so i'd almost suggest saying screw the processor and focus on your video/larger platform needs to make the decision.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Yeah, that is a big price difference. It's win/lose though because P55 only has 1/2 the PCIe lanes that X58 does, so CF/SLi performance won't be quite up to the level of 1366 if you're saturating that pathway. Have you read AT's Lynnfield launch article? It's pretty insightful: http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3634 It's long though, go grab a beverage.

some selections...
PCIe -> http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3634&p=9
Not a huge difference, but if you're running top tier video cards, it will at least be quantifiable...maybe not qualifiable.

Benches start on the next page.

The fact of the matter is most of the processor differences go out the window when OCing is involved, it'll be MAYBE a 5% difference in any direction ultimately, so i'd almost suggest saying screw the processor and focus on your video/larger platform needs to make the decision.

Well, video wise I have the GTX295 at the moment and beyond that waiting for GT300. I'm rebuilding this current system under a new PSU and reusing my video card.

I did read that article you linked, problem is it didn't really have the i7 860 there with performance and overclock results. The 860 is what I'd be looking at, not 870.

 

[Hyperlite]

Well, video wise I have the GTX295 at the moment and beyond that waiting for GT300. I'm rebuilding this current system under a new PSU and reusing my video card.

I did read that article you linked, problem is it didn't really have the i7 860 there with performance and overclock results. The 860 is what I'd be looking at, not 870.

Well the only difference between the two is 130mhz, which is why they didn't include it in the test.

 

[lothar]

Do you live near a Micro Center or Frys?

 

[cmdrdredd]

Unfortunately no, South FL isn't so lucky to have stores like that. Actually after reading about the overclockability of both platforms I am leaning heavily to the x58 now. I've spent the last 4 hours reading every possible review and forum post I could find online. I'm looking at the Asus P6T Deluxe as it's about $100 cheaper than the equivelant EVGA board.

I will admit, and it's probably a stupid reason to change one's mind, that my decision to lean toward the x58 was because the P55 has issues with syncing the iPhone. Stupid maybe, and if it's fixed before I buy my parts I will consider my stance on the issue. So far Gigabyte has a BIOS for their P55 boards that supposedly fixes this.

edit: it seems adding a $10 PCI USB card and plugging the iPhone to those ports eliminate the issue altogether. I will chalk this under non-issue that will be fixed in a later BIOS update.
Looking like I'm going to go with a P55. Realistically 3.8Ghz is easily achieved on i7 860 CPUs, maybe 4Ghz. After that it seems that heat and hyperthreading being enabled will limit you.

 

[Hyperlite]

Realistically 3.8Ghz is easily achieved on i7 860 CPUs, maybe 4Ghz. After that it seems that heat and hyperthreading being enabled will limit you.

yup! socket burn issues aside, there isn't any proof that the max OC's are any different. It just costs a little more to get the P55 there, in the form of cooling. But hey, you saved a bunch of money in the process.

 

[cmdrdredd]

yup! socket burn issues aside, there isn't any proof that the max OC's are any different. It just costs a little more to get the P55 there, in the form of cooling. But hey, you saved a bunch of money in the process.

Researching pricing more now, I can build an x58 setup around an Asus P6T Deluxe for only $100 more than the P55. Have no socket issue and overclock better on lower voltages.

Plus if I wanted to SLI or something later I could do so uninhibited. It looks like x58 isn't all that much more expensive unless one was going EVGA or bust.

Cooling won't be an issue. Going to grab a Megahalem and a couple 120mm Scythe S-Flex fans for push/pull.

 

[Net]

i'd go with the 1366 so you have more freedom for processor upgrades in the future.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Back and Forth, Back and Forth...argh. heh

 

[lothar]

After buying your system, how often or when next do you plan to upgrade?
Are you the type of person that upgrades every year? every 2 years? every 4-5 years?

With Sandy bridge(Q1 2011), both chipsets would be obsolete anyway so if you don't plan to do any $999 Gulftown upgrade until then it wouldn't matter what you pick.
Intel will require a new mobo like they always do for their "Tock" cycles(Conroe, Nehalem, Sandy).

Gulftown won't be anything less than $999 so you can forget about it. The thought of spending $600+(for me at least) on a processor is a bit idiotic so I'm not sure why people keep bringing processor upgrade flexibility of X58.
I would rather save that $100+ towards an SSD or a real upgrade in the future after Sandy.

The savings will certainly be more than $100 because you're forced to get 6GB on X58 vs 4GB on P55.

 

[lothar]

I've pretty much accepted the fact that whichever fate I choose, it's a dead end.
I think you need to do the same(unless you have future plans to spend $999 on a processor).

 

[BlahBlahYouToo]

it's because you refuse to go SSD.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Decided to i5 it and save some cash so I can put it toward my next video card.

 

[cmdrdredd]

it's because you refuse to go SSD.

STOP POSTING TO THREAD CRAP!

Seriously, what is so hard to understand about the fact that to some people spending $200+ on 80GB is TOO MUCH MONEY!

 

[Indus]

Decided to i5 it and save some cash so I can put it toward my next video card.

Listen to me.. if this is a gaming pc.. pick a good CPU and motherboard that you will never need to upgrade since most of the time gaming depends 85% on video card if cpu and memory doesn't bottleneck it. The thing you can upgrade is video card but get a good power supply so you can upgrade without worrying about if it has enough juice.

If you're gaming.. i5 is fine, i7 is not really needed.

If you're doing photoshop editing and rendering, get an i7 socket 1366.

I'm using a core 2 duo and it still isn't the bottleneck in my system.

Also what is your monitor's resolution. If its 1680 x 1050, a GTX 260/ HD 4890 will do you fine. If its 1920 x 1080 or higher, start looking for HD 5850 or GTX 285+.

 

[Ayah]

A classified board is way way way overpriced if you're not going to do some chilled water, phase change or liquid helium/nitrogen setups. It's just unjustified.

An E758-A1 is more than enough for air cooling and will shine more with watercooling.

The classified boards are a bit larger than the standard ATX spec and are completely designed for extreme benching.

 

[cmdrdredd]

Listen to me.. if this is a gaming pc.. pick a good CPU and motherboard that you will never need to upgrade since most of the time gaming depends 85% on video card if cpu and memory doesn't bottleneck it. The thing you can upgrade is video card but get a good power supply so you can upgrade without worrying about if it has enough juice.

If you're gaming.. i5 is fine, i7 is not really needed.

If you're doing photoshop editing and rendering, get an i7 socket 1366.

I'm using a core 2 duo and it still isn't the bottleneck in my system.

Also what is your monitor's resolution. If its 1680 x 1050, a GTX 260/ HD 4890 will do you fine. If its 1920 x 1080 or higher, start looking for HD 5850 or GTX 285+.

Lol I have a GTX 295 right now. I'm waiting for GT300 reviews before I pick a card to replace it and sell this one to a friend at work. I don't do a whole lot of photoshop stuff etc. Just a bit, nothing major at all. Honestly I don't think the heat is worth the small performance difference between an i7 at 4Ghz and an i5 at 4Ghz for me. I also have a Corsair HX1000 PSU now. Actually it seems that my system is finally working after a new Power Supply, it passed a few hours of Prime95 Blend and OCCT without issue. Memtest86+ passed at 896Mhz. I put my Q9550 back in which I thought was dead because it was causing a restart. However, I think it was a bad PSU in the TX750 that was attached when I had a component failure and shorted a molex plug. And my old Seasonic 600watt unit probably wasn't keeping up with the power needs of my quad and all when overclocked. It's a really well aged PSU that has been worked hard.

I do have a friend at work willing to buy my current system from me when I upgrade. He wants an upgrade from an Athlon x2 3800+ and this would be a huge leap for him. So I am still going to do my build, but if this holds up over the coming weeks I might postpone the build until he can buy this from me and I won't have so much out of pocket cost. Wait and see, but it will be i5 750.

 

[BlahBlahYouToo]

STOP POSTING TO THREAD CRAP!

Seriously, what is so hard to understand about the fact that to some people spending $200+ on 80GB is TOO MUCH MONEY!

how much were "regular" drives going for when you bought your raptor again?