Nehalem 101 part1 - 1366 and X58

[Praz]

Very nice writeup. Your post will save users a lot of time when first jumping to this platform. Also makes it easier to choose which processor should be bought based on their requirements and expectations.

[saaya]

Very nice writeup. Your post will save users a lot of time when first jumping to this platform. Also makes it easier to choose which processor should be bought based on their requirements and expectations.

thanks
and yes, that was the idea, to make sure people know what to expect.
around 4Ghz should be max with the 920 and good aircooling, which isnt bad at all, and despite everything beeing locked, DDR3 1600 is possible with the 8x memory multiplier and a bclock of 200. going from 1066 to 1600 barely gives any boosts in games or 3d benchmarks actually... its great for synthetic memory benchmarks, but thats about it.

according to this article on bit-tech.net going from 1066 777 to 1600 777 doubled their memory bandwidth in synthetic tests, but this memory overclock plus going from 2.66ghz to 4ghz with a gtx280 gave them a boost of:

4fps in crysis (~10% boost)
6fps in far cry2 (~10% boost)
20fps in hl2 (~10% boost)

so a 50% boost in cpu clocks and a 50% boost in memory clocks results in a 10% performance boost in games... based on that id say:

920:
people who want to try the latest platform
people who want sli on an intel system or might want it in future
occasional gamers
hardcore gamers
workstation users
overclockers on air

940:
workstation users
overclockers on air
overclockers on water
overclockers on xtreme cooling

965:
demanding workstation users
overclockers on xtreme cooling
bandwidth fetishists
3dmark fetishists
people with a huge budget seeking the best of the best