what makes boards from some manufactorer's oc better than others?

[l3ored]

if this doesnt belong in here, i apologize, but to me, it seems like a pretty technical question.

as far as i can tell, the chipset manufactorer fabricates all the chipsets and distributes them to motherboard makers, so it cant be the actual chips that oc better. the only things that motherboard makers do different is their bios and the chipset cooling. i can almost understand the cooling part, but that can't be all of it. i dont understand how a different bios could allow for higher overclocking either. i wouldnt be suprized if the claims were all made without sufficiant data (user a says his nf7-s oc'd to 2.8, user b says his lan party ultra oc'd to 3.2, therefore everyone believes the lan party is superior). if anyone knows the real answer, please come forward.

 

[Mik3y]

higher quality parts and a more stable chipset. basically, it all comes into stability, and quality boards, a.k.a. name brand boards, are usually just that. dfi have perhaps the best overclocking motherboards out there because they are made for overclocking and crazy computer guru's.

 

[oldman420]

Manufacturers of better boards put more into the layout of the board from an engineering standpoint.They also use higher quality caps and transistors that support the chip sets on the MB.

 

[kedvale]

Originally posted by: l3ored
if this doesnt belong in here, i apologize, but to me, it seems like a pretty technical question.

as far as i can tell, the chipset manufactorer fabricates all the chipsets and distributes them to motherboard makers, so it cant be the actual chips that oc better. the only things that motherboard makers do different is their bios and the chipset cooling....

This is not true. Take a look at a motherboard. There are thousands of components and thousands of traces to route the components. It's all about margins. The more you skimp on component (such as capacitors, both in quantity and quality), and the less thought/time/engineering effort you put into the placement and routing of each of these components on the board, the cheaper it is to manufacture, but the smaller the margins (timing margins, noise margins, thermal margins, etc.) the board will have, which will lead to decreased product stability (even at the nominal, non-overclocked speeds) over time and less headroom for things like overclocking.

 

[Gamingphreek]

Well then in that case why aren't Gigabyte boards up with Abit Asus and DFI??

Gigabyte has the 8phase power DPS and all that crap what happened.

Also why doesn't one manf use the highest quality parts for a m/b they can get and charge us more for it... like an Extreme OCers Edition.

-Kevin

 

[kedvale]

Originally posted by: Gamingphreek
Well then in that case why aren't Gigabyte boards up with Abit Asus and DFI??

Gigabyte has the 8phase power DPS and all that crap what happened.

Also why doesn't one manf use the highest quality parts for a m/b they can get and charge us more for it... like an Extreme OCers Edition.

-Kevin

Well, there are many more issues in a system design besides the power supplies that would contribute to the limits in max. operating speeds. Also, it's not just as simple as putting in more expensive parts. It also has a lot to do with the engineering resources that go into the overall board design. So, it's probably not economically viable to make an expensive design that will only be bought by the (relatively) few number of people that will want to operate their systems beyond the manufactured specs.

 

[l3ored]

Originally posted by: Mik3y
higher quality parts and a more stable chipset. basically, it all comes into stability, and quality boards, a.k.a. name brand boards, are usually just that. dfi have perhaps the best overclocking motherboards out there because they are made for overclocking and crazy computer guru's.

by more stable chipset do you mean k8t800 vs nforce 3 or one nforce 3 chip being hand selected as more stable than another?

thanks for the replies

 

[cirthix]

from my experience, asus is not with abit and dfi. on topic: the chipsets are sold to the companies by the maker and it is specified: ok, these shoudl work between voltages X adn Y, withint specs blah blah blah. what dfi and abit (not asus) do is allwo those chipsets above nominal voltage, and we all know how voltages affect an oc. (example: my dfi infinity runs the chipset betwen 1.6 and 1.9v, while my asus board ran it at around 1.4 (also explains MANY reports of high chipset temperatures) (my dfi needs a sb heatsink better than stock and a fan on the northbridge to stay stable at 260+fsb