Well, I pulled the trigger......

muddocktormuddocktor
edited August 2006 in Hardware
On ordering an Asus P5W DH Deluxe Conroe ready mobo about 2 minutes ago.:bigggrin:

With all the hype about Conroe I just couldn't resist and wait.:ninja:

Tomorrow bright and early I will be checking around to see if there are any E6600's listed at the major e-tailers like the Egg and ZZF and order it and some DDR2 to go with it. I will have to hold off on the graphics card for a while though until all this is payed out and just use a pci Radeon 9250 I already have. Hopefully next month I'll be able to scrape up enough for something like a 7900GT. Or maybe hold off a couple of months and get a 7950GX2. :eek3:
«1

Comments

  • airbornflghtairbornflght Houston, TX Icrontian
    edited July 2006
    I just ordered some stuff too, a trackball mouse for some video editing, a MX610 mouse for normal stuff, and an intel NIC, $108...
  • lemonlimelemonlime Canada Member
    edited July 2006
    Awesome stuff, mudd. I'm really looking forward to seeing what that combo can do! :D

    I'm itching to get a Core duo under phase!
  • airbornflghtairbornflght Houston, TX Icrontian
    edited July 2006
    lemonlime wrote:
    I'm itching to get a Core duo under phase!

    Arent we all:D, I here they are good overclockers, and that they will be decently priced.
  • muddocktormuddocktor
    edited July 2006
    Well, I know that a guy over on the OC Forums bought one of the X6800's from Newegg a couple of weeks ago when they listed them for around 12 hours before Intel made them pull them and last week I read that he had it up to around 4 GHz on water. He was going to try some DI cooling next, but I haven't checked his thread this week.

    Yeah, I'm hoping that they can overclock to high speeds too. So far, the P5W DH looks to be the best overclocking board, but it still has some limitations in that the nb voltage options don't go high enough to get much past 450 fsb. But reading reviews at Anandtech, most all the other boards are having trouble getting past 400 fsb so unless you have really deep pockets and can afford an x6800, the Asus board is the ticket so far. That's not to say that future bios revisions won't help the other mobo's out there. I also looked hard at the Gigabyte 965 DQ6 too, with it's super power regulation circuitry, but I just don't trust Gigabyte to cough up timely bios revisions.

    And lemonlime, yeah I would love to see C2D under phase too. I'm sure it would rock the house. :ninja:
  • csimoncsimon Acadiana Icrontian
    edited July 2006
    I'm really interested in seeing what that e6600 will do but I'll be in houston all next week. Post as much as you can k? Hope you get 4ghz!

    edit:\ also let me know when its time to break out the hole saw!
  • muddocktormuddocktor
    edited July 2006
    csimon wrote:
    I'm really interested in seeing what that e6600 will do but I'll be in houston all next week. Post as much as you can k? Hope you get 4ghz!

    edit:\ also let me know when its time to break out the hole saw!

    I figure I'll be lucky if I get all the components in by the end of next week, Chris. So you shouldn't miss out on my adventures with Mr Conroe.:respect:

    I ordered an e6600 from TigerDirect today and ordered a 2 gig kit of G.Skil PC800 from Newegg, so I have the basics to get it up and running. I'll be using the PC P&C Turbo 510AG I got from mmonnin last year and I will most probably use my Praetorian case for now, since the mobo uses a damn heatpipe on the nb I can't use it in the Silverstone I got from Gnome until I change the heatpipe out with something that can work in an upside down configuration. I tell you though, all those new components cost a big damn bundle; it's expensive buying on the bleeding edge when the ram and vid card formats are changed from everything you already have. I'm going to use that PCI Radeon 9250 card I bought as an emergency backup card a few months ago until I can afford to drop a nice graphics card in her. I haven't decided whether I'll use the SI-120 with the monster GFB fan or my XP90-C with the Delta 3 blade for cooling yet.
  • WuGgaRoOWuGgaRoO Not in the shower Icrontian
    edited July 2006
    what in the heck is that damn "fan" that comes with it...i saw it in one of the pictures off newegg...
    also..why does your computer have to be upside down?
  • airbornflghtairbornflght Houston, TX Icrontian
    edited July 2006
    his computer cant be upside down, because the heatpipe works off of the convection principle, and if he mounts the board upside down, it will move the water to the other end of the pipe, where it will do absolutely no good. Heatpipes are really cool, but a little more comlex, thus more care must be given to make sure they are working right.
  • WuGgaRoOWuGgaRoO Not in the shower Icrontian
    edited July 2006
    well i understood the whole convection thing...i was just wondering about why his comp would be upsode down in the first place
  • LeonardoLeonardo Wake up and smell the glaciers Eagle River, Alaska Icrontian
    edited July 2006
    i was just wondering about why his comp would be upsode down in the first place
    Because he moved to Australia, silly!

    The computer wouldn't be upside down, but in the subject Silverstone case, the motherboard is oriented with CPU and heatsink at the bottom of the case. There is a tube that has at the front of the case an intake fan and at the back an exhaust fan. The center of the tube is partially open to envelope the top of the CPU heatsink, preventing the hot air from the CPU rising into the rest of the computer.
  • muddocktormuddocktor
    edited July 2006
    The Silverstone case is designed to mount the mobo upside down like the BTX cases to promote better flow regime in the case as far as airflow is concerned.

    I'm presently in the process of looking for an alternative northbridge cooler for the Asus board. Oh, and I got confirmation that the mobo has been shipped and UPS shows that they have received it. :D This eBay seller I bought the mobo from was decently quick on getting it out the door. :thumbsup:
  • csimoncsimon Acadiana Icrontian
    edited July 2006
    sidewinder has good nb coolers and mofset sinks ...the thermalright is real nice but damned expensive. The microcool should be more than sufficient but I didnt see it last time i was there.

    edit:\ nvm it's there http://www.sidewindercomputers.com/minoxewh.html ...it's called the whisper now due to a quieter fan.
  • GargGarg Purveyor of Lincoln Nightmares Icrontian
    edited July 2006
    I'm eager to see how the new setup works out, Mudd! I'm thinking about getting one of the new cheap E6300 or 6400's, but I think I'll wait until there's a more affordable OC'ing board out there.

    But if you get close to 4Ghz with your fancypants chip & mobo, I think I'll have a real hard time buying a cheaper setup :D
  • muddocktormuddocktor
    edited July 2006
    I'm curious to see how the p965 chipset boards mature and if their fsb speeds come up higher than present limits. But it's a new chipset and mobo combo, so I imagine bios improvements will get it better. There's also the Nvidia 5xx chipset for Intel and ATI R600 chipset for Intel to debut in the next month or 2 and maybe those will overclock like crazy too.

    Chris, I was looking at the Swiftech MCX159-Cu at Newegg I was thinking about going with. Sidewinder has it too but with no fan for the same price as Newegg. It looks to me like it shouldn't give me any clearance problems either.
  • MachineGunKellyMachineGunKelly The STICKS, Illinois
    edited July 2006
    Should be a real spanker Mud! The Sept. issue of Maximum PC gives us the Dream machine for '06. It has an nvidia nForce 590 Intel edition reference design mobo (not avail. yet to the public :( ) paired with an Intel Core 2 Extreme x6800 that stocks at 2.93 GHz as well as all the top of the line components to fill it out. It broke and now holds five of the six benchmarks the MaxPC uses for testing. And by a HUGE margin to boot!

    Plus they say it doesn't get hot...;) You should be REAL happy!
  • muddocktormuddocktor
    edited July 2006
    How you been doing, MGK? I haven't seen you around for a while. :)

    Yeah, I'm looking forward to this build. With all the hype about Conroe and seeing the performance improvements it has over both Intel netburst and AMD, I really want to see how it feels in everyday usage compared to my DC AMD machines. I know that it is a faster processor overall from all the reviews, but that's not like having actual hands-on experience. Plus, all indications are that it overclocks much better than the AMD offerings on the market too.

    BTW, I decided to get the Swiftech northbridge cooler and since Newegg just begged me to open a preferred acount with them with no payment for 6 months with no interest for orders over $500, :vimp: I went ahead and splurged on a eVGA 7900GTX for this critter.:rockon: What the hell, you can't take it with you (money, that is). I also bought the cheapest LGA Celeron that the Egg had, since I read that the P5W DH boards won't boot with a production Conroe without a bios update. :( That's one of the drawbacks of being an early adopter.
  • GargGarg Purveyor of Lincoln Nightmares Icrontian
    edited July 2006
    How fast is that Cely? Might make a decent folding rig with a second el-cheapo mobo (hey, it's only money :D).
  • DaxxDaxx
    edited July 2006
    airbornflght wrote:
    Arent we all:D, I here they (Core 2 Duo's) are good overclockers, and that they will be decently priced.
    I just got back from Fry's. I started BSin' with one of the store reps and he decided to show me the store pricing on the Core 2 Duo's. They've already got 'em and the pricing is already set but they're waiting for the official release date. So I got some insider info from the Fry's guy!! The cheapest one was the E6300 @ $249.00, next one up $279.00, next $379.00, then $579.00 and I forget the next one...but it's pretty high.

    Online e-tailers will be cheaper than Fry's plus no tax. All you need to do is go HERE!!!! to see for yourself. This is going to be good.

    Of course I am crying :bawling: for buying a $399 Opty 170 a couple of months ago, with a new A8N32-SLI, 2G DDR (not DDR2 - I hate myself...). But, on the bright side is this computer folds like a bat out of Hell and my kids will get a great hand-me-down gaming computer...minus the 7950 GX2 - oh yeah.
  • WuGgaRoOWuGgaRoO Not in the shower Icrontian
    edited July 2006
    btw... coolerguys.com has that chipset cooler and like 5 bucks cheaper..they have a lot of stuff there actually and its all really cheap..like fan grills for .49dollars..yea thats right.. like a laser cut metal dragon fan grill for cheap
  • airbornflghtairbornflght Houston, TX Icrontian
    edited July 2006
    Daxx wrote:
    I just got back from Fry's. I started BSin' with one of the store reps and he decided to show me the store pricing on the Core 2 Duo's. They've already got 'em and the pricing is already set but they're waiting for the official release date. So I got some insider info from the Fry's guy!! The cheapest one was the E6300 @ $249.00, next one up $279.00, next $379.00, then $579.00 and I forget the next one...but it's pretty high.

    Online e-tailers will be cheaper than Fry's plus no tax. All you need to do is go HERE!!!! to see for yourself. This is going to be good.

    Of course I am crying :bawling: for buying a $399 Opty 170 a couple of months ago, with a new A8N32-SLI, 2G DDR (not DDR2 - I hate myself...). But, on the bright side is this computer folds like a bat out of Hell and my kids will get a great hand-me-down gaming computer...minus the 7950 GX2 - oh yeah.


    EXPENSIVE!!!
  • muddocktormuddocktor
    edited July 2006
    Gargoyle wrote:
    How fast is that Cely? Might make a decent folding rig with a second el-cheapo mobo (hey, it's only money :D).

    It's a 2.53/533 Presshot edition. If my Conroe gets held up in shipping I will use that Celery to test out the system and you can bank on it that I will see how well it overclocks.:thumbsup: Who knows, I might just hang onto it and replace one of my older systems with it later if it overclocks like crazy. I figure it has a decent chance of making 200 fsb, since it has a 19 multi.
  • muddocktormuddocktor
    edited August 2006
    Well, I had a lot of the components delivered today. My P5W DH came in from the eBay store I bought it from and I also received my G. Skill ram, the eVGA 7900GTX 512, my Celeron 326 flashing processor, my Swiftech MCX159-Cu northbridge cooler and a tube of AS Ceramique too. I will be waiting for my Conroe until next week it looks like, because Intel has told all vendors not to ship before then. There are a few vendors that have shipped early, but usually with a premium added to their prices. I've got mine on order with www.tankguys.biz and one of the co-owners there is a fellow enthusiast such as us here. His prices on Conroe are reasonable too, considering that they are a small vendor compared to companies such as Newegg and Tigerdirect.

    I spent the evening by prepping the mobo for overclocking my Conroe. I took the southbridge off, cleaned the bubblegum tim pad off and remounted it with some AS Ceramique. Since I am going to run this mobo in a Silverstone Temjin TJ06-B case, which mounts the motherboard upside down, I have to replace the stock northbridge heatpipe and replace it with something that will work in my application. I chose the Swiftech MCX159-Cu for my replacement northbridge heatsink because it doesn't depend on any heatpipe for it's cooling. It's solid copper, with a great finish on the base of the nb heatsink. It also comes with 4 little rubber pads that you use on a flip chip northbridge such as Intel makes, to keep it from stress cracking the nb and to make sure it mounts flush with the nb slug.

    I also mounted the processor into the LGA socket this evening and mounted the stock Intel hsf on it too. I ran into a bit of a snag on the heatsink I was going to use. I'm planning to use my XP90-C on it, but what I thought was the LGA775 adapter in the box I got the XP90-C was actually the socket 478 mounting hardware. So I'm going to have to order the LGA775 adapter first thing tomorrow from Sidewinder before I can use it. This is my first LGA775 machine I build and I must say, I'm not impressed with the stock Intel mounting system with those stupid pushpin mounts. They could have come up with something better, IMO.:grumble:

    And I opened up my eVGA graphics card box and I was really surprised at how freaking big the heatsink is on it. The thing is freaking huge compared to the heatsink on my X800XT-PE in my Opteron rig.:headbange I bet that sucker could cool an old P2 proc passively.

    Tomorrow I start to install the mobo into the case, as well as rob the PC P&C psu out of the Opteron rig and swap some psu's around.
  • WuGgaRoOWuGgaRoO Not in the shower Icrontian
    edited August 2006
    hmmm why did they chose to turn the mobo upside down... is it an engineering idea like why is it a good idea
    oh and did ur mobo come with a weird fan or sumehting like that...whats it do?

    btwi actually had a p2 that was passively cooled...the damn cooler was the size of a cd
  • muddocktormuddocktor
    edited August 2006
    Several case manufacturers have gone to this style mounting on some of their cases, Wugs. They've done this to emulate the BTX design, for improved cooling and setting up of cooling zones within the case. In my case, this design would actually interfere with Asus's cooling setup because Asus decided to use a heatpipe cooler on their northbridge, which won't work worth a crap when it's mounted upside down.

    Here's a link to the case I'll be using. The case I have doesn't have that cooling tunnel through, since I bought it used instaed of new and the former owner of the case said that tunnel gave him problems so he chunked it in the trash. Linkage to case
  • DaxxDaxx
    edited August 2006
    muddocktor wrote:
    Well, I had a lot of the components delivered today. My P5W DH came in from the eBay store I bought it from and I also received my G. Skill ram, the eVGA 7900GTX 512, my Celeron 326 flashing processor, my Swiftech MCX159-Cu northbridge cooler and a tube of AS Ceramique too. I will be waiting for my Conroe until next week it looks like, because Intel has told all vendors not to ship before then. There are a few vendors that have shipped early, but usually with a premium added to their prices. I've got mine on order with www.tankguys.biz and one of the co-owners there is a fellow enthusiast such as us here. His prices on Conroe are reasonable too, considering that they are a small vendor compared to companies such as Newegg and Tigerdirect.

    I spent the evening by prepping the mobo for overclocking my Conroe. I took the southbridge off, cleaned the bubblegum tim pad off and remounted it with some AS Ceramique. Since I am going to run this mobo in a Silverstone Temjin TJ06-B case, which mounts the motherboard upside down, I have to replace the stock northbridge heatpipe and replace it with something that will work in my application. I chose the Swiftech MCX159-Cu for my replacement northbridge heatsink because it doesn't depend on any heatpipe for it's cooling. It's solid copper, with a great finish on the base of the nb heatsink. It also comes with 4 little rubber pads that you use on a flip chip northbridge such as Intel makes, to keep it from stress cracking the nb and to make sure it mounts flush with the nb slug.

    I also mounted the processor into the LGA socket this evening and mounted the stock Intel hsf on it too. I ran into a bit of a snag on the heatsink I was going to use. I'm planning to use my XP90-C on it, but what I thought was the LGA775 adapter in the box I got the XP90-C was actually the socket 478 mounting hardware. So I'm going to have to order the LGA775 adapter first thing tomorrow from Sidewinder before I can use it. This is my first LGA775 machine I build and I must say, I'm not impressed with the stock Intel mounting system with those stupid pushpin mounts. They could have come up with something better, IMO.:grumble:

    And I opened up my eVGA graphics card box and I was really surprised at how freaking big the heatsink is on it. The thing is freaking huge compared to the heatsink on my X800XT-PE in my Opteron rig.:headbange I bet that sucker could cool an old P2 proc passively.

    Tomorrow I start to install the mobo into the case, as well as rob the PC P&C psu out of the Opteron rig and swap some psu's around.
    Mud Doc, I would immediately load up 3DMark06 and run several iterations on that 7900GTX. 3DMark06 has killed a'many 7900GTX's and it's a great way to determine if you got a good one. eVGA has excellent customer service, so you won't have any problem getting a replacement - it's lifetime. I personally went through four 7900GTX's from eVGA and 3DMark06 killed every single one of them. Hopefully they have all those issues worked out by now, but it doesn't hurt to check it out.
  • muddocktormuddocktor
    edited August 2006
    Thanks for the advice on the vid card, Daxx. I thought the one they were having the problems with were the 7900 GT, not the GTX. But no matter as I was planning to run all the 3dmarks anyways. And the warrantee service of eVGA is why I went with them too. I've heard (and had) horror stories from some of the other manufacturers on their vid cards and their support (or lack of).

    I didn't get a whole bunch accomplished on the rig today. I got my mobo mounted and then had to take another rig down to start swapping power supplies around. I pulled an Antec TC550 out of a folding rig and put the Ultra X-Connect I got from Gnome in that Silverstone case I bought back into the folding rig. I just hope that X-Connect doesn't self destruct and catch fire like I've read about others have happen with their X-Connects. The Antec will go into my soon to be relegated as backup machine Opty system and I will pull the PC P&C Turbo 510AG out of it for the Conroe rig. The Turbo 510 is a native 24 pin connector psu that I had modded by putting a 20 pin connector on, so it will be going back to it's original configuration before I install it. I also took my time and did some serious cable management in the case while hooking up all the jacks and ports on the case. One thing that is neat about this P5W DH is that it comes with a jack that you can feed a mp3 player into it even when powered down so you can listen to some tunes without booting up. I guess I'll see how well that works when I get it up and running.

    Then this evening the pci sata card I was waiting for to finish getting my brother's computer back up from a lightning strike came in and I got his machine back running again, so that pretty much finished my progress on the Conroe rig this evening.
  • WuGgaRoOWuGgaRoO Not in the shower Icrontian
    edited August 2006
    w00t!
  • Mt_GoatMt_Goat Head Cheezy Knob Pflugerville (north of Austin) Icrontian
    edited August 2006
    The problem vid cards were the GT OC version. They also have sorted out the problem and recalled the old cards so the chance of getting one now is possible but very slight. Jim, let me know how that case works out as I am considering one. Fry's has them on closeout here for $99.00.
  • TheLostSwedeTheLostSwede Trondheim, Norway Icrontian
    edited August 2006
    My 6600 arrived today. Yay! No mobo yet though :/
    I just got a couple of groovy kits of ram to test out as well so we are looking at an interesting August i'd say.
  • muddocktormuddocktor
    edited August 2006
    Mack, what mobo do you plan to go with? I haven't gone there to read about them, but I've heard that some folks at Extreme have run the Gigabyte DS3 way on up on fsb speeds. I've also read a few posts and thread on the P5W that make it look like they will do over 400 fsb without too much problems too. I'm leery of Gigabyte and getting timely bios updates myself, which is why I didn't go the DS3 or DQ6 route myself.

    And I am sooo jealous of you getting all those nice kits of ram from OCZ too. I had to go with some G. Skill DDR2 667 myself for budgetary reasons, since I wanted 2 GB. I guess that later on I can always upgrade and use the G. Skill in a folding only upgrade later.

    Larry, the only thing I don't particularly like about the case is the fact that there is no active fan in the hard drive mounting area. The only ventilation in the top side of the case is the psu itself, which seems inadequate to me. But other than that, the case is real nice and it's easy to do decent cable management in (plenty roomy). I'm going to see how it does with the stock ventilation and if necessary, will add a fan to the rear side of the case in the hard drive cage. I also didn't get that vent tunnel tube with the case (Gnome threw it away, so it was crap), so I won't be able to tell you if it works or not. But the build quality is excellent on the TJ06.
Sign In or Register to comment.