Gigabyte P35-DQ6 or eVGA 680i A1

[Computer-Ed]

To be honest I am not sure since I have not had ANY issues with my DS3 and thus not had to call support

[Capper]

I've had good experiences with Gigabyte support, and have dealt with them a few times helping people on this forum......

This brings up an article idea I've been contemplating for awhile now, a roundup of tech support for hardware manufacturers

[Quakindude]

Originally Posted by Capper

This brings up an article idea I've been contemplating for awhile now, a roundup of tech support for hardware manufacturers

I'll bet Asus is near the bottom on that one.

[Elysium]

Originally Posted by Quakindude

I'll bet Asus is near the bottom on that one.

+1.

[Computer-Ed]

I can think of a few others that might join ASUS at the bottom..

[dnorf87]

Originally Posted by Computer-Ed

I can think of a few others that might join ASUS at the bottom..

Please share :p

Anyway, what I was going to say before he got the new board. lol

Advantages of the 680i over P35-DQ6

1) easier to overclock
2) you would be able to take advantage of the EPP support of the 680i, since your RAM supports it
3) supports SLI
4) great board, with good support. eVGA uses the nVidia reference design.
5) overclocks very well, even with quad cores (get an A1)
6) Cheaper than the DQ6.

Advantages of P35-DQ6 over 680i SLI:

1) It's one of the baddest boards on the market
2) It overclocks like woah (if you know what you're doing, expect to impress everybody, lol)
3) I *THINK* it would have better RAID performance, plus it would support RAID 5 and 10
4) 12 phase power. wtf?
5) buy one.

That's all :p I think...

[Computer-Ed]

Originally Posted by dnorf87

Please share :p

I am trying to be nice

Advantages of the 680i over P35-DQ6

1) easier to overclock
2) you would be able to take advantage of the EPP support of the 680i, since your RAM supports it
3) supports SLI
4) great board, with good support. eVGA uses the nVidia reference design.
5) overclocks very well, even with quad cores (get an A1)
6) Cheaper than the DQ6.
...

I saw this and I have to ask about these, not questioning you, just trying to understand? In what way do you feel the 680i overlcocks easier? What I mean is my DS was just a quick bump of the FSB and the overlcock was done and stable. If there is an easier way out there I am really interested .

I have seen EPP mentioned but I have never taken the time to look for any comparisions to see how much of na effect it has. Has anyone here directly done any testing on this yet Capper? If not this would be a cool article.

Anyway those are the two things I was curious about.

[herr_kingkong]

no the p35 dq6 is Cheaper 50 usd than the evga a1 in sweden

evga a1 680i =2400kr se

evga a1 680i lt =1900kr se

p35 dq6=1900kr se

850 se kr = 100 usd


and i dont need sli the evga a1 is good and i love it and the dq6 p35 good to .
i am going to raid my 2 Western Digital RaptorX Gamer WD1500AHFD

my 4gb ram is 1066 so no need to oc the ram .

i am only oc.ing my q6600 to 3ghz no m..

and 680i not good for 4gb of 1066 ram

[One4yu2c]

Originally Posted by Computer-Ed

In what way do you feel the 680i overlcocks easier? What I mean is my DS was just a quick bump of the FSB and the overlcock was done and stable. If there is an easier way out there I am really interested.

Not to answer for him, but I will.

'Easier' is subjective, but for those new to overclocking and wishing to tinker not just for the gains, but for the learning experience as well, I'm completely infatuated with the unlinking option. It can act as a gateway in learning about dividers, or in cases where bad luck or overlooked settings come into play (preventing a fruitful OC), the ability to unlink and lock the RAM at a certain speed (for example, telling your DDR2-800 kit to stay put at 800MHz) can be a very handy feature as you continue to push the processor's clockspeed.

In reality, most enthusiast level motherboards coupled with the Core 2 Duo line makes overclocking a mostly easier affiar, or at least much easier than in previous years. And along those lines, I'd love it if chipsets outside of the 6xxi started embracing the unlinking feature.

[Quakindude]

The 6xx series unlink option is also very nice for isolating and overclocking Ram and CPU for benchmarking. Also, if you've had to skimp on the quality/speed of your ram, you could very likely realize a higher O/C of your CPU through the unlinked option.

After all, I'll take a highly overclocked CPU any day of the week over a moderately over-clocked CPU and Ram that's at max.

EPP isn't as impressive as Nvidia would have you believe. If you have a novice overclocker that doesn't ever want to mess with Ram timings, it can help out a bit by setting the timings, voltage and speed to the manufacturers rated specs. However, it's been my experience that EPP isn't nearly as good as one would think and if you even begin to dabble in ram timings, you want to disable EPP in lieu of manual settings. Not only that, as soon as you unlink the ram from the CPU FSB, EPP can cause more problems than it's worth.