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Took the Haswell Leap

exar333

exar333

Diamond Member
Parted-out my 'aging' X79 build and replaced it with a budget Haswell build. Grabbed the following:

-4670K
-CM 212+
-MSI Z87-G41
-2x8GB Ballistix 1600mhz
All told, ~$400 at MicroCenter 😀

Selling/sold my 3939k, Sabertooth, and RAM. Will be saving my NH-D14 w/ 3x fans for the new 8C build.

Setup was a breeze. The UEFI BIOS sucks (what can you expect for a $25 MB?) but everything is rock-solid. Bumped multi up to x40 and runs like a champ. These CPUs are HOT (coming from SB) but 100% stable after torture testing.

Looking forward to X99 and 8C/16T goodness, but I don't need more than 4C/4T until middle of the year. This let's me cash-in on X79 parts now and I will probably give this CPU/MB/RAM combo to a buddy when I get the new build. Can't beat this for around $400.

Will try and push the CPU to around ~4.4ghz after the IC7 Diamond gets a couple days to burn-in.
 
Sweet! Make sure when you go to push it, that you aren't just upping Vcore and changing multiplier, otherwise you will not be happy.
 
OCGuy said:
Sweet! Make sure when you go to push it, that you aren't just upping Vcore and changing multiplier, otherwise you will not be happy.
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Any suggestions based on what you have done?

I built 2 IB setups similar to this for friends, and only had to hit maybe 3-4 other settings outside voltage for really solid 4.4-4.5 speeds. Not sure if others have specific calibrations or things that worked well for them.
 
So the G41 isn't terribad? I have been flirting with the idea of picking up the same bundle for a while, but... Not sure if it is worth it if the mobo sucks.
 
I did the exact same thing. Havent changed my sig but im rocking an i5 4570 with some B85 asus board. And the 5850 that just wont die :biggrin:

X99 looks like it will be sweet!
 
How bad is MSI's BIOS? I'm glad I went with an ASRock board because the UEFI makes sense and I hope this brand new Asus Essentio I set up for somebody is not indicative of how Asus designs BIOS menus these days as it was the worst I've ever seen. Curious now what everyone's UEFI BIOS menus are like because I know how bad it can be.

Anywho! Welcome to the club, I built a system around a 4670k last year and it rocks along at 4.6Gigglehertz and now have an i3-4330 on the way for an efficient NAS capable of transcoding for Plex Media Server. Quite happy with Haswell!
 
podspi said:
So the G41 isn't terribad? I have been flirting with the idea of picking up the same bundle for a while, but... Not sure if it is worth it if the mobo sucks.
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where did he get it and what was the deal? wasnt g41 a core 2 chipset?
 
podspi said:
Typically for these deals you need a Microcenter B&M nearby, they won't ship it to you.
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This. The MB was on sale for $75, and I got an extra $50 off for getting the 4670k. Can't complain for that price. The CM 212 was more than that, LOL.

Going strong and staying pretty cool at 4.0, and I will be tweaking it more this week to see what the headroom is.
 
escrow4 said:
Always heard bad things about MSI - cheapo VRM's, so so quality. Not surprised that board was going cheap with these reviews:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813130695

and a hexa core to an i5 is a sidegrade at best.
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ive had the opposite experience. i use msi boards because they used to give them out with the bundle deals at frys and theyve all lasted years (>5), have been very bug free and very linux compatible. never gotten a bad one and never had one die, and i leave them on 24 hours a day from the day i build them. id highly recommend them
 
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My past two builds were MSI. First was a bundle from frys on an i5-750 and the thing was rock solid. Not as many oc features but never really needed them.

Stuck with MSI for my i7-2700k. Same series. Z67-gd45. Rock solid, decent oc and never had an issue.


Went with asrock extreme 6 for my Haswell build and had issues from day one. System would randomly freeze and I had to power cycle...got that fixed, and then it would lag in games.

Swapped it out for an MSI z87-gd45 this weekend and it's been rock solid since I rebuilt the system. They may use cheap parts but gotta say the boards I've had have been great. Probably stick with them or Asus in the future. Two I've had the best luck with.
 
saratoga172 said:
My past two builds were MSI. First was a bundle from frys on an i5-750 and the thing was rock solid. Not as many oc features but never really needed them.

Stuck with MSI for my i7-2700k. Same series. Z67-gd45. Rock solid, decent oc and never had an issue.


Went with asrock extreme 6 for my Haswell build and had issues from day one. System would randomly freeze and I had to power cycle...got that fixed, and then it would lag in games.

Swapped it out for an MSI z87-gd45 this weekend and it's been rock solid since I rebuilt the system. They may use cheap parts but gotta say the boards I've had have been great. Probably stick with them or Asus in the future. Two I've had the best luck with.
Click to expand...

I'm crossing my fingers because I just bought an Asrock H87 Performance. I hesitated a lot before using SATA drives after using PATA drives. Now I'm allowing myself to take more risks.
 
I had an ASRock Z87 Extreme4 back when Haswell first came out, and it was quite the problematic board for a few BIOS updates. However, ASRock eventually got it under control, and the board is definitely a lot better. Although, I'm using an ASUS Maximus VI Formula now anyway. 😛
 
coolpurplefan said:
I'm crossing my fingers because I just bought an Asrock H87 Performance. I hesitated a lot before using SATA drives after using PATA drives. Now I'm allowing myself to take more risks.
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Really hoping I just got a bad board since I haven't heard of many issues with asrock recently. They've supposedly been doing pretty good recently.
 
Aikouka said:
I had an ASRock Z87 Extreme4 back when Haswell first came out, and it was quite the problematic board for a few BIOS updates. However, ASRock eventually got it under control, and the board is definitely a lot better. Although, I'm using an ASUS Maximus VI Formula now anyway. 😛
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Ah yes I updated the bios through a few revisions and nothing improved it. Oh well I tried. Hoping it was just a one off bad board because competition and choice is always a good thing for us. But I'm sticking with my MSI for now....Asus has done well for me so other choice.
 
Hmm. I've used around 300-310 AsRock boards for 1155/1150 now, and am at less than a 1% failure rate. I build 3-4 a week, sometimes more. It's honestly one of the lowest failure rates I've seen, memory I see closer to 3% bad (including a huge group of unstable Corsair of all things, Vengeance 1600/1866 that they replaced quickly).

Some vendors unscrupulously repack used boards though, but the ones I get out of the OEM cases are absolutely rock solid.
 
exar333 said:
Sidegrade? Downgrade is more like it...just tiding me over until 8C/16T Haswell-E. Selling SB-E now before the bottom drops on it everyone is selling their X79 rigs. 🙂
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What socket will that be? 2011? Whole new chipset required, etc?

I'll admit it... I get an evil grin thinking about one. :twisted:
 
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