Buying new hardware, opinions?

[moshpit]

In about 2 hours we're making the run up to Fry's to pick up my new toys. After major deliberation and considering all factors, including bang for buck, I'm getting a E6600 retail, Gigabyte G965P-DS3, 2Gb Corsair XMS2 2048-6400 Pro (love the little LEDs on top for my windowed case), eVGA 7950GT, and Zalman CNPS9500 LED for my HSF unit. I'm getting some good discounts already from Fry's because of my brother working there. All together I'm paying 1192.54 for all of it. I know I could cut even more cost by ordering online, but having the convieniance of being able to just drive up the street for RMAs if anything goes wrong is just too good to pass on this time.

I hope to get this rig to 3Ghz on the 334mhz bus and keep it there for a week or 2 while I get used to it before pushing for the 400x8 setting I want to finally get out of it. I would have gone with a better board like the AW9D Max or the P5B Deluxe but that was just out of my cost reach and still be able to get a better HSF for the CPU. I figured I could reach my overclock goals on this board fairly easily, at least according to what I've seen here in these forums.

Any suggestions on how to get the most out of this hardware with the cooler and parts mentioned would be GREATLY appreciated as this is my first Intel rig in a decade and I've been rabidly anti-Intel (coming for so long I've missed learning alot of the Intel oriented tricks over those years...

Edit: When I get back with my new toys, I'll be sure to take lots o pics and post em :D

[Quest_7F]

i bet u feel good inside

cant wait to see some pics

[moshpit]

Indeed, I'm quite excited. And the fact I'm excited about buying an Intel setup is an irony not lost on me at all. But Core 2 negates the majority of my anti-Intel feelings overall as there's no denying Core 2's superiority and the timings right. When I get the money to do an upgrade, it's spend it or lose it, so saving and wating for other stuff just doesn't work for me usually. I'm not planning on immediately overclock it this first night unless somebody here eggs me on to do so and can assure me that this retail chip doesn't need a good burn in before trying to see what it can do.

[moshpit]

Okay, just finished getting everything. All went together flawlessly, is running Prime95 stable @3Ghz right now. A little concerned about hitting 60C as a peak temp with the Gigabyte G-Power Pro http://www.frostytech.com/articleview.cfm?articleID=1904 and AS5. Not going to push it any harder right now as I just ran a quick 3Dmark 01 to compare against my old X2 4400+ rig, and was awed by a 42k score, an unexpected leap up overall.

I was concerned about going Gigabyte as I've never owned one, but then I haven't owned an Intel in so long either that this whole new rig is full of nice suprises so far. :woot:

Pics and screenies coming tomorrow, too much testing to do tonite.

Edit: 60C still seems to be the high using Core Temp and Intel's TAT. Still tho, 85 being the cut off point, I'm starting to wonder if I could shoot for 401x8 and 3.2Ghz on the DS3 with the F5 bios. Anybody have experience taking the F5 to 401x8? Additionally, I haven't touched the Vcore yet except to make sure it's manually set to the default 1.325 called for. I would totally be satisfied that i was getting the most out of this chip I could safely if I don't break 70C full load and maybe not exceed 1.45 or so vcore. True or false? Theoretically speaking, of course, I'm fully aware of YMMV.

[moshpit]

Little bump to point out edit to above post and question it posed...

[moshpit]

Just a little update, got to feeling a little ornery this evening, and seeing how stable the machine has been since yesterday, I decided "what the heck" and went ahead and set the fsb to 401 and the multi to 8. I'm now in the middle of prime95 testing at 3.2Ghz thanks to all the info you guys have put all over this forum. I never would have tried for a 40% overclock on air in the old days. WOOT! :woot: :woot: :woot: :banana: :toast: :clap: :clap: :clap:

[Turtle 1]

Indeed, I'm quite excited. And the fact I'm excited about buying an Intel setup is an irony not lost on me at all. But Core 2 negates the majority of my anti-Intel feelings overall as there's no denying Core 2's superiority and the timings right. When I get the money to do an upgrade, it's spend it or lose it, so saving and wating for other stuff just doesn't work for me usually. I'm not planning on immediately overclock it this first night unless somebody here eggs me on to do so and can assure me that this retail chip doesn't need a good burn in before trying to see what it can do.

Your so lucky in many ways . I wish I could feel the same way as you do.

Its not easy being me. Good luck on your purchases and may the cpu god give you a good one.:clap:

[moshpit]

Just as a interesting update, I decided to try to put it back to 9x multiplier to see if it would run. The first attempt at doing it with the vcore set where it is now plus the 9 multi resulted in Windows almost finishing boot up and then rebooting itself right before the desktop. Instantly knew it needed more vcore, bumped it up to 1.4 and tryed again. This time got into Windows, got this screenshot:

http://i12.tinypic.com/4535ftt.jpg

Prime95 almost instantly failed on the first instance while the second instance showed no signs of letting up. I then went back to bios and set vcore to 1.425 and this time when I tried to start the first instance of Prime95, it instantly caused the machine to reboot! Time for more vcore :D

1.45 was my next step and this time was able to start and run Prime95 for all of 2 minutes on both instances before the machine rebooted itself again. Before it rebooted tho, I saw Core Temp reporting 75C for both cores. I now know that once I go to a nice liquid cooled setup, I'll be able to tag 3.6Ghz on this rig, no sweat. I know 1.5 will nail it down, but the temps at that vcore will be way more then I want to play with while air cooled. For now, I'll happily satisfy myself in the knowledge that I snagged a nice 40% overclock on air and minimal vcore and be patient while I formulate my plans to aquire a liquid cooling setup :D

[rahtid]

with really low temps it should be stable at 1.5v 3.6ghz.

i was prime stable for 4hr 3.6 with 1.55v. max core temp 52c.

[moshpit]

I indeed am planning my liquid cooling adventure now, but I also haven't attempted anything like lapping my CPU yet, tho am afraid to void my warrenty like that. RMA'ing it isn't an option in this case because the chip works GREAT and I would be an ass to take it back because I can't overclock to a certain point, lol. I know it'll hit 3.6Ghz tho if I cool it down more. I expect if I can keep it in the 50's, it'll be smooth. Lapping could also achieve the same kind of result tho. GAAAAHHHHH! Choices, choices, choices! heheheheh!

[[XC] moddolicous]

Make sure your IHS isn't convex. If it is, it could results in bad contact.

[moshpit]

That's my suspicion. It looked straight when I put it in, but in my excitement, I didn't double check by setting it on the IHS to see if it had any lack of flatness. It certainly didn't appear to be lower in the middle the edges tho. But it could have been slightly bowed out and I wouldn't have noticed as I didn't check :(

Shows what impatience gets us ;)

[moshpit]

A little update:

http://i11.tinypic.com/2e1sxee.jpg

How does that look so far? Prime/Orthos stable and updated bios to F7. I think I've found my new 24/7 speed :D

[perkam]

Indeed, I'm quite excited. And the fact I'm excited about buying an Intel setup is an irony not lost on me at all. But Core 2 negates the majority of my anti-Intel feelings overall as there's no denying Core 2's superiority and the timings right. When I get the money to do an upgrade, it's spend it or lose it, so saving and wating for other stuff just doesn't work for me usually. I'm not planning on immediately overclock it this first night unless somebody here eggs me on to do so and can assure me that this retail chip doesn't need a good burn in before trying to see what it can do.You are the envy of all us Asus mobo buyers who usually wait a day before everything runs stable :p:

Perkam

[-n7-]

It still wants to go higher ;)