Phase noob...

[ses.RoadRunner]

Hi all, I am investing in some phase cooling for my next PC.

I have a buget of around £1,500 - £2,000 and am after something with some future to it, rather than an all out high benchmark.

My plan is to go phase cooled so I can buy mid-range CPU's and OC them into high range, thereby paying for my phase cooler over time in the savings.

Well, thass the plan!!

I have been chatting about it for a few weeks on my clans forums and have been leaning towards the DFI Lanparty UT NF4 SLI-DR Expert, but some people have had problems with it.

Any help / advice would be greatly appreciated!

 

[Phil Stanbridge]

Hey there, welcome to the friendliest techy forum on the planet

Okay you've got a good start with the board, the Expert is probably the best 939 board at the moment, although it has a tendency to bite you if you're not careful. Its certainly not the friendliest board but it is quick! It's great with the Mach II that much is for sure, and quite a few of the members have this combination so you'll get plenty of advice.

As for overclocking cheaper cpu's that's always a good bet - it keeps your outlay to a minimum but you get the best performance. The X2 3800 in The Tempest is overclocked to 2.8ghz - it out performs a watercooled X2 4800 that is considerably more expensive. That's the sort of bandwidth you can get with the cheaper cpu's and the Mach II - its definitely a good investment.

 

[weescott]

I was in the same boat as you ses.Roadrunner, and through my own research I have ended up with a system VERY close to The TEMPEST.

X2 3800, 7800GT (to be watercooled), Tempest case and cooling.

Personally I am inclined to stay away from DFI as while they are VERY good for overclocking in my experience they are not the most reliable. I have heard first hand of similar experiences. This is why I am looking at the MSI Diamond (had good experience with them in the past), to replace the Gigabyte board I have ATM, which will not overclock past 210.

 

[maverik-sg1]

Welcome to the fold my friend.

Lets be honest - most people say its not reliable because we push harder with the board, mainly because it lets us, no other motherboard offers such a high range of ooptions (voltage and settings). The other problem we have is we buy things as soon as they are released - the first few BIOS are never as good (or stable) as they should be, I have lost count of playing the waiting game for a decent BIOS - The EXPERT is a seasoned board now and will serve you well.

Set yourself goals before you start and stick to them - example if you got a x2 3800+ - you'd say right I am gonna push this to 2.8Ghz once it's there and it's stable - I am happy, I am clocking better than most and it's faaaaaaassssssst.

Problems start when you want more than the rig can give ya

 

[Highland3r]

Problems start when you want more than the rig can give ya

Thats the fun bit

Might be worth checking out the new ATI RD580 based boards? Only seen a proper review of the Asus board so far, but the new chipset is looking like an overclockers dream.

X1800;s (you'll probably want X19/79xx cards tbh) should now (or will soon) run without master cards in Crossfire too, which makes things a tad more tempting (only on RD580 though, non RD480 based boards)

 

[clone38]

You made it then roady m8

Hope you have better luck with the Expert board than what i did.

Roadrunner is one of my fellow clan m8s so be gentile with him

 

[ses.RoadRunner]

Thanx for all the reply's people, you are indeed a friendly bunch of helpfull folk

I must admit, I like the idea of a pre-built, pre-OC'd machine, but I'd end up taking it apart and rebuilding it before I could realy call it 'mine' anyway!!

My intentions right now (bearing in mind I don't have the cash yet!) are to go with the DFI Expert board.... I intend to go for something like an X2 3800 and clock it to perform / outperform an X2 4800 thereby making a nice saving.

I then intend to do the same again when the 4800 drops in price, grab one and clock it.