[Fr3ak] EVGA nForce 750i SLI FTW review

[SavageFuDD]

ok,, lol sorry, ahh its not as loud as my cpu fan, or case fans..

[triple_A]

Very cool board.

Can't you use clockgen to monitor pci-e speed and rivatuner to monitor real gpu speed of the 9600's?

[drizzt5]

I see people hit 4ghz on air (for tests, not daily usage) with q6600's on a 680i a1 board... can it be done on this new 750i?

[saaya]

your new name tag is much better
and thanks for those infos!

the 9600gt stuff sounds weird tho...

[Ghost742]

What fan would be good to purchase to go along with the 750i...to replace the stock NB fan?

as of now i have a coolermaster 60mm fan on it.
when im not gaming or anything else demanding i keep it at 30%.
at 100% it keeps the mcp at 40c tho .
wish i could read the spp temp

[gigabit]

Will the Ultra 120 extreme fit on this board with the fans facing out the back or will the NB heatsink+fan block that?I will have this board tomorrow now im worried im gonna need another H/S

[mascaras]

Will the Ultra 120 extreme fit on this board with the fans facing out the back or will the NB heatsink+fan block that?I will have this board tomorrow now im worried im gonna need another H/S

Hi

I made the review of the mobo with that cooler (thermalright extreme 120)


you have a photo with the cooler installed on the mobo (Hardwre photo) in the review :

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...d.php?t=184096

[Fr3ak]

The fan controller of the board is pretty sweet aswell. You can set it up in many different ways. I totally forgot to take pictures of the BIOS. Will do so in the evening, after I insulated the board for single stage. I will test 2 9800 GTX or GX2s on the board to see if those cards have similar issues as the 9600 GT.

[Leeghoofd]

I put a 6cm fan on the 780i NB (SmartCooler LFM 1560MV) attached it with two strips... cools way better and less noise...

[Roch]

The Antec Spotcool works a treat I've been told.

[BrokeDown]

Anyone testing this board with a Q9450? I'm definitely buying this board soon, but need a good CPU to run it with.

[Fr3ak]

The 45nm quads top out at 450-490 MHz on booth P35 and 780/790i. From my experience the 750i is equal in terms of overclockability and performance to 780i.

[BrokeDown]

The 45nm quads top out at 450-490 MHz on booth P35 and 780/790i. From my experience the 750i is equal in terms of overclockability and performance to 780i.

On air or water?

From what I've been reading from reviews of the 9450, is that it does pretty good in the mid 3Ghz range, which would be just fine for me.

[Fr3ak]

On good air or watercooling. Cooling is not that important when it comes to FSB walls. Most CPUs have the same FSB wall on air and watercooling. It only changes when you go subzero - at least from the testing I have done.

Too bad I came home from work late, so again no BIOS pictures, but I am almost done with the insulation of the board and I have a 9800 GTX here for additional testing. For more info on the board, have a look at mascara's review: http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...d.php?t=184096

Some pictures of the setup, my single stage and the top of the Cooler Master 1,000W PSU reflecting my desk =)

[drizzt5]

Fr3ak, i asked this in a diffrent thread, so I apologize for posting this twice but I really wanted some more opinions.

Would you recommend this board over an equally priced p35 and x38? Even if someone doesn't have any intention for SLI atm and doesn't know if he wants to SLI in the future?

[Fr3ak]

That is a difficult question. If you have no intention of running either SLI or crossfire, a cheap P35 board will do just fine. I haven't seen a single board that cannot do 500 MHz FSB with the right equipment. So far mainboards with Intel chipsets have been less troublesome for me in regards to overclocking, but I have to admit, Nvidia did a really good job on the 790i. The 750i impressed me aswell. So far I didn't have any weird booting behaviour. It is completely different to 680i. For me 750i and P35 are equal, so I cannot recommend one over the other. At some point, it is a matter of price, as P35 boards are cheaper than 750i. Then again, why should someone buy P35 now, ehen P45 will be on the market by the end of the month.

[drizzt5]

You bring up exactly what concerns me. P35's are becoming dated.

The p35 i had my eye on (the dfi lp lt) is the same price as this board... Creating a hard decision... I never know when i might want to splurge money into 2 9600 gt's or another 8800 gt.

I need to think it over myself, maybe i should wait until the end of the month since i'm not in desperate need yet.



edit: I may get an x38 dfi lt... i found a sweet open box deal on newegg for $200.

[cornman]

How stable has the board been compared to a p35 or x38? Any problems when running 2 cards in sli?

[Fr3ak]

Apart from the fact I had to downclock the 9600 GTs which is a issue of the card rather than the board, I didn't have any problems. I will test a new BIOS in the evening to see if there are still any problems and test the board with a 9800 GTX. I will try another card in SLI tomorrow, in case everything works fine and I will go sub zero on the E6600 to max out the FSB.

drizz75: Why getting X38 now when X48 is already out?

[Fr3ak]

Ok, I have a good and a bad message.

The bad one is: Even with the new BIOS and a PCIe frequency of 101 MHz, I have trouble getting the 9600 GT to work. I still have to downclock it in order to finish a benchmarks.

Now to the good point: With the 9800 GTX, the board totally rocks. No problems whatsoever. Great performance and no iddues at all so far. I will get a second 9800 GTX tomorrow to test SLI.

3D is stable from bootup with a PCIq frequency of 140 MHz. With a working windows tool, I am pretty sure you can even increase the speed a little further. Max FSB with the new alpha BIOS seems to be the same. No improvment there.

I made some pictures of the BIOS I will add in Post #2. Those pictures are one of the worst I ever took. My deepest apologies.

From what I can tell, the board overclocks my memory better than on P35. Though I have to measure the voltage first to make a fair comparisson. The difference from the vcore I set in BIOS and what CPU-Z displays is miles different: 1.45V in BIOS are 1.408V in windows, according to CPU-Z. I will measure the exact voltage tomorrow with a DMM: I have to measure from the back of the board and I am way too tired to do something like that now as I would fall asleep during the process.

For the voltage screenshot, I maxed out all voltages in the BIOS to show what the maximum voltages are. That is everything I can think of at the moment. If you have any questions, feel free to ask.

[drizzt5]

drizz75: Why getting X38 now when X48 is already out?

A little above my price range.. i was hoping to spend $130-230... If you can recommend a good one that isn't too expensive that I'll consider it.

Based off of the clocks i've seen people get on this board
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813136043
I might just get this one and throw the extra money into a fund for my WC setup.


I just found this one though
http://www.motherboardpro.com/DFI-La...ard-p-557.html

[AndrewL1950]

I am thinking about getting this board, but I am slightly worried about what heatsinks will fit it. Do you think most will be able to fit, and if not, do you have any recommendations for something around $50 for this board? I will also be getting the Thermal light LGA775 mounting kit, hopefully that works as well.

[BrokeDown]

Fr3ak,

Are you testing different types of memory as well, or are you just running the same sticks? What kind of speeds are you able to get?

Also, what CPU do you think is showing to be the best for this board as far as OC and stability?

[JacobF]

Just a heads up, a new BIOS is available that allows PCIe frequency adjustments, it can be found here:

http://www.evga.com/forums/tm.asp?m=329864

[Fr3ak]

Thanks jAckUp for the information!

I didn't see the mounting of many new air coolers, so honestly, I cannot tell which one will fit. The NB is not that high, the critical point would be the mounting of the NB, because the screws of the NB mounting are pretty close to the CPU socket. Any cooler that fits a 780i reference board just fine, will fit on this board too.

I tested several kits of DDR2 memory, but they are all Micron D9GMH based. I just got a 4GB kit that I will try in the evening, but I only have 32bit XP installed.

As for the choice of CPU: That is up to you. The board shows great stability with booth dual and quad core CPUs. I wouldn't get a low end CPU with a FSB wall at 400 MHz ish, because that would be a waste for the board.

As for overclocking, the EVGA nForce 750i SLI FTW is one of the most troublefree mainboards I ever used. I can fully recommend this board in terms of overclockability and performance - with one exception: If you are going to use a 9600 GT (SLI), you should probably get a 780i or Intel based board, until the problems with 750i + 9600 GT are solved.