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What is the best motherboard for Intel P4 to overclock?

B

Bad Dude

Diamond Member
I plan on getting the P4 1.6A processor and try to o/c it to 2.4Ghz. I have not kept up with the recent reviews.
Here is what I would like on the board if possible:
1) Stable overclocking with good features.
2) Flexibility on RAM management.
3) USB 2.0
4) Firewire build in on board if possible.
5) No on board sound or video.
6) At least 6 PCI slots.
7) At least 3 RAM slots.

I also would like to know if RDRAM is better or DDR is better. I like to keep the cost down and will get 1Gig of RAM on the board.
Please give link to reviews to your favorite boards would be great and nice.
Thanks for all of your help.
Bad_dude.
 
With all the choices, and most of my favs having onboard audio, I'm also curious what others have to say (and I almost posted the exact same question...been reading and comparing all morning, my eyes are getting tired). I also want to get a 1.6a and overclock.

To answer one of your questions, I read that DDR should be fine. It's speeds over 2.4G when the DDR becomes a bottleneck (please correct me if I'm wrong)

I'm currently considering the Asus P4S533 (got an old T2P4 and a P2B-LS that are both still rock solid, so I trust Asus). However, the P4S533 does not have USB 2.0 (ding), has onboard C-Media audio (ding), and no firewire (ding). I suppose you could just buy an add-on card, and I also remember seeing a combo card with both USB2 and firewire in MaxPC a couple of months ago (can't remember the manufacturer or model, tho'). At $110 for the retail box, this seems like a good bargain.

The board also comes with S/PDIF in/out, which if I decide to use C-Media, might be perfect for my sound system (I hate running three analog cables from my 5.1 X-Gamer to my amp). But I don't know the sound quality of this chip...would I be better off disabling it and continue using my SB?

Otherwise, I understand the P4S533 is good for overclocking, has flexible RAM management, 6 PCI and 3 DIMM...which covers some of your requirements.

Another board you could consider is the Gigabyte GA-8IEXP. Except for onboard audio, it fits your description. However, there's another loooong thread around here that suggests it may not be good with handling RAM (can't get it much over 350), and people are having probs getting it to overclock at high speeds.
 
>>I also want to get a 1.6a and overclock.

I want one too - in fact we all want one. Lets call Intel.

"1) Stable overclocking with good features.
2) Flexibility on RAM management.
3) USB 2.0
4) Firewire build in on board if possible.
5) No on board sound or video.
6) At least 6 PCI slots.
7) At least 3 RAM slots."

Look at either the Asus boards mentioned (P4S533/P4533) and the new Epox 4G4A+ . Check out their web sites and related reviews.
 
The Epox 4G4A+ has both on board sound and video, but it's a GREAT overclocker. Only 5 PCI slots though.

I hate to recommend them, but some of the Soyo boards fit your requirements (I think the Fire Dragon and some others), although they do have on-board sound.
 
Right now, the 3 top boards for overclocking look like the Abit BG7, Asus P4B533-V and the EPOX 4G4A+. These are all i845G board that will give you the best combination of CPU AND mem speed overclockability.
 
Contrary to most, I personally feel that Asus P4T533-C is the best P4 board with PC1066 RDRAM, however it is somewhat expensive. It has USB2, CMedia 6 Channel Sound I believe, 4 RIMM slots, no firewire tho, and only 5 PCI slots. But, since you want to keep costs down, I have to say that the 845G (yes 845G, the 845E does not support DDR333 and 845G has an improved memory controller, and it is as much as 15% faster than 845G with DDR333, if you insist on no on-board video, then your only choice is 850e with PC1066. Using anything but 845G, P4X333 with DDR333 or 850e with PC1066 drastically affects the P4's performance.) Which 845G board? I'd say the top 3 are Abit's BG7 EPoX's 4G4A+ and Asus' P4B533-V (very pricy tho, if you want to go that, you're better off with the P4T533-C), but neither has Firewire. And I will also comment to stay away from SiS 645DX, even tho it supports DDR333, it is no better than 845E and will be as much as 15% slower than 845G/P4X333 or 850e.
 
OK, now I'm seriously considering the P4B533 instead of the P4S. After the cost of the USB2 card, the price difference is nil (and I've got a Spyder that is arriving Monday, so I need the big 2).

However, I'm still using a standard PSU that comes with the Inwin Q500 (PowerMan). However, the original PSU burned up almost two years ago (can't remember exactly when), and I replaced it with a similar but upgraded PowerMan model, which the sales dude said was AMD approved (the original wasn't). Plus, I believe it's 300W, and likely not fully compatible with the current mobos of either camp.

So I'm considering Enermax, either the EG365P-VE(FM) at $49 or the EG365P-VE(FC) at $57 from newegg. Both seem highly regarded, both deliver 350W, they have loooong cables for my huge case, etc, but the specs are *almost* identical. Is it worth it to spend the extra $8 on the FC model? Or would the Antec SL400 be an even better choice? (three more bucks won't kill me)

edit: The reason I'm asking about the SL400 is cuz I've got three optical drives, two hard drives, and a Voodoo5 PCI that I need to juice up...and tho' my system runs fine with a third hard drive and the other stuff on this old PSU, I don't want to overtax the PSU when I overclock
 
Thhhhpppt. Didn't hear back, so I went with the Antec True330 instead. After additional reading, it looks like the True330 has the L&G technology for regulating cooling fans, and I surmised it's as good as any 350W for power. Plus, some people around here have reported a few complaints about Enermax, not enough to completely disregard them, but I had to make a choice someday. Almost considered Sparkle after some reading, but their site came up 404...that was a bit scary...

Also picked up the B board and the chip. Total came to $341 after shipping. Then I grabbed two IDE, one SCSI and one floppy rounded cables from SVC for $27 and a stick of 2700 at memplus for $102.

Now I gotta start organizing the backup and get to burning before all the schtuff arrives.
 
Last month the SIS chip set ruled, but this month MoBo's with the i845G chip set wins!

Intel: http://developer.intel.com/design/chipsets/845g/
SIS Review: http://www4.tomshardware.com/mainboard/02q1/020311/sis645dx-12.html

I just bought an ASUS P4B533-V for $170, but Epox also offers a good one for $120. You can run PC 2700 memory at a 166 bus speed.

i845G Review: http://www4.tomshardware.com/mainboard/02q2/020520/i846eg-12.html

I also bought Corsair PC 2700 and a P-4 2.26 Ghz Northwood at 533 mhz with the 512 L2 cache.
 
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