alienware
Banned
Hey peeps.
Right. I have this friend in the USA and due to him having the worst luck ever he has a whole pile of parts that don't really give him what he wanted.
To explain this I will be as brief as I can..
Firstly he has a Rev1 EVGA 790i board that he brought upon release for $450. Sadly it's a pile of dog sh*t and the ram channel is screwed due to bad design. He cannot flash the bios so it's pretty much a paperweight. It won't see more than 2gb ram no matter what he does and EVGA fobbed him off with excuses until the warranty was done. This is a part of the reason for my hatred for all things EVGA.
Any way, the good news is he has a perfectly working C2D E8500 which with some gentle overclocking is the best CPU he owns by far.
He also has a Radeon 5850 which has been marvellous and a XFX 8800 Ultra that he just got for use with Physx. He got it mint in the box for $80 delivered, none too shabby.
He also has 4gb Patriot DDR3 1333 which he cannot use all of and some OCZ DDR3 1066. He also has 4gb Patriot Viper DDR2 1066.
Lastly he has an Asrock A785GXH/128M which supports all Phenom 2s including the Thubans.. However this board was bought as a cheap standin when he recieved a DOA Foxconn Destroyer (one of the nicest boards I have ever seen). However, he also recieved a cpu that did not (for some bizarre reason) work in his Asrock (the 9950 he gave me). Thus, he is using a standin Athlon X2 cpu that's a bit Tom Tit.
I want to try and get him where he wants to be by spending as little money as possible. I don't want to encourage the poor sod to dump loads more money and I truly believe the E8500 is an absolutely fantastic CPU that will take him pretty much anywhere he wants to go.
So, on his behalf I have deduced that what we are looking for is a motherboard for the E8500 (so socket 775) which supports either DDR2 (preferably as he can still return the DDR3) or DDR3 and supports both SLI and Crossfire as he is as indecisive as me. I remember some one saying that a certain Intel chipset (P35 or P45? can't recall) supports both.
Thus, I need to know ASAP so I can track him down a nice board in order to complete his system. He has more than enough other parts to complete it including, but not limited to -
An Alienware ALX chassis in black.
A Cooler Master HAF (the mid sized one).
A Cooler Master 750w SLI approved PSU.
A Rosewill 850w non SLI psu (which I found to be rather strange).
Lots of ram, lots of fans, lots of other stuff..
We can happily sit down and discuss what parts to use (obs the 5850 and 8800u) and so on, but I really do need help on this board. Intel boards are not my forte at all.
Please remember that price isn't really an overall object ($200 would be perfectly acceptable) as right now he is considering dumping $2000 on an Alienware. The reason? Well, he's totally fed up. And I can't say I blame the poor sod. I mean really, you could change his last name to RMA and it would be spot on.
Right. I have this friend in the USA and due to him having the worst luck ever he has a whole pile of parts that don't really give him what he wanted.
To explain this I will be as brief as I can..
Firstly he has a Rev1 EVGA 790i board that he brought upon release for $450. Sadly it's a pile of dog sh*t and the ram channel is screwed due to bad design. He cannot flash the bios so it's pretty much a paperweight. It won't see more than 2gb ram no matter what he does and EVGA fobbed him off with excuses until the warranty was done. This is a part of the reason for my hatred for all things EVGA.
Any way, the good news is he has a perfectly working C2D E8500 which with some gentle overclocking is the best CPU he owns by far.
He also has a Radeon 5850 which has been marvellous and a XFX 8800 Ultra that he just got for use with Physx. He got it mint in the box for $80 delivered, none too shabby.
He also has 4gb Patriot DDR3 1333 which he cannot use all of and some OCZ DDR3 1066. He also has 4gb Patriot Viper DDR2 1066.
Lastly he has an Asrock A785GXH/128M which supports all Phenom 2s including the Thubans.. However this board was bought as a cheap standin when he recieved a DOA Foxconn Destroyer (one of the nicest boards I have ever seen). However, he also recieved a cpu that did not (for some bizarre reason) work in his Asrock (the 9950 he gave me). Thus, he is using a standin Athlon X2 cpu that's a bit Tom Tit.
I want to try and get him where he wants to be by spending as little money as possible. I don't want to encourage the poor sod to dump loads more money and I truly believe the E8500 is an absolutely fantastic CPU that will take him pretty much anywhere he wants to go.
So, on his behalf I have deduced that what we are looking for is a motherboard for the E8500 (so socket 775) which supports either DDR2 (preferably as he can still return the DDR3) or DDR3 and supports both SLI and Crossfire as he is as indecisive as me. I remember some one saying that a certain Intel chipset (P35 or P45? can't recall) supports both.
Thus, I need to know ASAP so I can track him down a nice board in order to complete his system. He has more than enough other parts to complete it including, but not limited to -
An Alienware ALX chassis in black.
A Cooler Master HAF (the mid sized one).
A Cooler Master 750w SLI approved PSU.
A Rosewill 850w non SLI psu (which I found to be rather strange).
Lots of ram, lots of fans, lots of other stuff..
We can happily sit down and discuss what parts to use (obs the 5850 and 8800u) and so on, but I really do need help on this board. Intel boards are not my forte at all.
Please remember that price isn't really an overall object ($200 would be perfectly acceptable) as right now he is considering dumping $2000 on an Alienware. The reason? Well, he's totally fed up. And I can't say I blame the poor sod. I mean really, you could change his last name to RMA and it would be spot on.
