Down to these two! ASUS P5K vs. P5N32-E

[0ptional]

I'm mostly looking for experiences with Quad-core overclocking, and just any experiences you guys have had with either of these boards.

I won't be using SLI or Crossfire, but just for performance and overclocking with a Quad-core with say an 8800GTS 320 at the helm and 2GB of DDR2 800/1066 whatever.

What do you guys think?

System will start with:

Either mobo listed above
E6400 (to be upgraded to Quad)
2GB DDR2 667 (to be upgraded to 800/1066 or whatever is a good deal later on)
750GB WD
XFX 8600GTS 256MB (to be upgraded to 8800GTS or whatever is in that bracket later on)
Corsair 520W or 620W PSU (which would you reccomend in that department?)

No idea on what HSF I'll use, but something huge and quiet preferably; I don't care about super extreme overclocking, but say 3ghz on either the Quad or the E6400 I have now, and then what stability/driver issues have you see in XP Pro SP2 and Vista (both x86 until drivers mature in the Vista x64 side for older games that I still play; read: FFXI)

 

[magoo]

I have a P5n32-E SLI board.
I have had excellent results with it. Some have not.
Those P35 boards are supposed to be really nice and fast.
If you dont plan SLI then I think,honestly,I'd grab the P5K board.

I have an e6700 (soon to be G0 Quad) Corsair 6400C4,8800 GTX in SLI, and watercooling.
I run XP and Vista 64 bit in dual boot for now. No problems. The 6700 is clocked to 3.3 with room to spare, but I dont see the need right now. I hope to get the Quad to match that clock.

 

[Betrayer00GT]

I have the P5N32-E SLI Plus, and I would think its 3x X16 PCIe (two @ full x16 speed, one at x8), 45nm support confirmed in current BIOS revision (0801) by ASUS, and a <$190 price combine to make it still a good choice. Well, if you don't mind playing in the BIOS for the best overclocking.

I would imagine that was not one of the ones you meant by P5N32-E, but it does qualify.

 

[0ptional]

I have the P5N32-E SLI Plus, and I would think its 3x X16 PCIe (two @ full x16 speed, one at x8), 45nm support confirmed in current BIOS revision (0801) by ASUS, and a <$190 price combine to make it still a good choice. Well, if you don't mind playing in the BIOS for the best overclocking.

I would imagine that was not one of the ones you meant by P5N32-E, but it does qualify.

actually it is the SLI Plus I'm looking at. 179 at the egg, vs 139 for the P35 P5K board.

 

[Betrayer00GT]

actually it is the SLI Plus I'm looking at. 179 at the egg, vs 139 for the P35 P5K board.

Well, I have both of my 8800GTS XFX boards, already. Just waiting on a case big enough for me to mod into into it a dual, internal WC-loop setup (basically two of what I have now) with both of those bad boys installed.

I also actually think GPU accelerated physics would add cool things to games, if any game actually ever supported it. 3x x16 PCIe slots was a requirement of my MB selection. One of the few, actually. The 45nm thing was not confirmed until recently, I believe.

Honestly, if you don't care about the 3x slots, you might want to go with the cheaper solution. If you do, I can't think of a better (read: cheaper) choice.

 

[AlderaaN]

actually it is the SLI Plus I'm looking at. 179 at the egg, vs 139 for the P35 P5K board.

Hello Optional87!

IMO, you've made a great choice narrowing down to just 2 very solid mobo's.

But just as magoo said, it's a matter of you either going on SLI in the GPU department or not.

I'd recommend that you also check the review of this mobo over at AnandTech: http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=2958

The ASUS P5N32-E SLI Plus turned out to be a true hybrid beast, check out the Dual/Quad overclock results.

But again, it's worth the extra $$$ only if you go SLI on the GPUs since the ASUS P5K isn't SLI capable, only *cough* crossfire *cough* compatible

Good luck! and do keep us posted.

Samuel.

P.S. I've subscribed to this thread.