Biostar T-Force and other P35's

snowysnowcones

snowysnowcones

[H]ard|Gawd
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Apr 2, 2006
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Hey everybody,
I'm about to build a new computer, and in a recent PM with Dan, he said that recent Biostar T-Force series of motherboards have been "badass overclockers". While searching through ClubIT.com, I found a Biostar T-Force P35 board. (here's the link to the ClubIT page, and here's the link to the Biostar page) Now, I'm no motherboard guru, but this looks like a good deal.... Does anybody else have any opinions on this board, or previous Biostar T-Force boards?
'Da board:
b20070521_1.jpg


Also is there any other cheap alternative P35 boards that will overclock well? (less than $130 - Crossfire is not a necessity) I've got my eye on This Gigabyte.... Isn't Abit suppose to come out with a P35 board soon?

I'll be pairing this board with 2gig's of Crucial Ballistix Tracer 1000mhz, and a e4300 (will overclock!)

Thanks for all the help! :)

-Snowy


ps... why do some motherboards have an 8pin CPU connector, and others have a 4?
 
Ive used the Tforce series in a few 939 and 754 builds. Great boards that are very stable and overclock well, not the best maximum overclockers but not to far from it. Im in the market for a new board as well but Im awating more review of the cheap p35 boards. At that price I wouldve jumped on the tforce but its sold out.:mad:
 
Wow, I had no idea these boards were getting so cheap. Wow.


Damnit, someone stop me from buying more crap.
 
Goddamnit I knew I should have waited. Biostar never emailed me back though,
Biostar is good stuff.
 
That Gigabyte P35 DS3 is $10 cheaper at ClubIT if you're really interested in it. Looks like a good board.
 
I've been a fan of biostar's p965. the p35 looks to be incredibly similar. If you head over to rebelshaven forum, you'll find out more about the board. Looks to possibly have trouble breaching 500fsb, which sadly puts it out of my book. Also looks like subtimings are still not being set properly.


I swore I wouldn't go back to gigabyte but I'm looking at the same board. The choice for me is between that and the p5k vanilla, which has shown to be a decent clocker, and only a little bit more.
 
I'll bet the biostar will be a great board with an updated/modded bios.

Ziddey, you had a DS3 right? What rev. were you using? I was never a fan of Gigabyte, but the DS3 rev. 1.0 treated me alright.
 
I've had both rev1 and rev2 ds3's. The rev1 was a c1 also. The rev2 was able to reliably deliver 500fsb. The rev1 took a little more finessing and wouldn't consistently post past 480fsb or maybe 460.
 
I'll bet the biostar will be a great board with an updated/modded bios.
Click to expand...
I've never used Biostar before, but the board looks nice. Is Biostar likely to update the bios?

Looks to possibly have trouble breaching 500fsb, which sadly puts it out of my book.
Click to expand...
For $115, fsb > 500 is not something I really expected. Right now, one of the only things holding me back is lack of experience with Biostar and apprehension about being stuck with a crappy bios.
 
well if you're expecting in the mid-upper 400's, then the biostar won't fail you. the only discrepancy is with oddly set subtimings, I believe looser than expected
 
Barium said:
I've never used Biostar before, but the board looks nice. Is Biostar likely to update the bios?


For $115, fsb > 500 is not something I really expected. Right now, one of the only things holding me back is lack of experience with Biostar and apprehension about being stuck with a crappy bios.
Click to expand...

Biostar doesn't put out bios updates as regularly as some other board manufacturers do. Over at rebelshaven there is a nice collection of modded bioses that tend to OC a little better depending on how much you trust them with your bios.

Biostar isn't that bad. I've had pretty good experiences with them. As I said earlier in this thread. Nothing spectacular, but better than expected.
 
Thanks for the info on Biostar, all. Don't suppose anyone knows anything about that MSI? It looks to be inferior to the Biostar (in fariness, it costs less too), but who knows.
 
I bought the biostar a few days ago too... it hasn't arrived yet, but I'll update!

From the looks of the picture, I think I'm going to have to buy a new NB heatsink
(I hope this risk pays off! >.<)
 
Ahh, please do let us know. I have yet to see a review for this board, and I'm torn between it and the P6N SLI-FI (all I really want is 400 fsb).
 
There is one review at Newegg that states he cleanly got it to 500FSB with these notes:


newegg dude said:
Pros: A nice inexpensive P35 board that went to 500FSB fairly easily, once I realized the chipset voltages are fine at default. North Bridge and South Bridge will need active cooling when overclocking to 500+. CPU Power Supply FETS will benefit from even a passive heatsink. Especially with a Quad.....
Cons: I don't like the Serial BIOS chip they used. Too hard to get a replacement, but this isn't a issue for 99.9% of the users....
Other Thoughts: Looks just like their 965PT/965 Express motherboards.... If you want to get your feet wet with a P35, this is it...
Click to expand...

I'm just waiting for the price cuts to happen and I will get a nice, low end 8 or 9 multiplier chip, and just set it to 400FSB and live happily.
 
Well... there's only 1 IDE connector on the motherboard, and the cable that connects it with the harddrive/dvd drive isn't long enough to connect to both of them :/ I'm currently just having the harddrive running, so as of now, I can't do a fresh install of XP/Vista. Also, it's not detecting my LAN port, or something... I downloaded the drivers for it, but I still can't get my internet to work on it. (I'm posting this from a diff. pc ;) )
It's been a bit frustrating so far.
 
Only thing I don't like about this board is...

The location of 24pin connector...
 
Ok, I can't get the LAN drivers to install... it seems like they load up, and right before they get to the wizard install process, it just stops loading... Do you think it'd hurt to try the Deluxe edition of this board? I think the only difference is that it supports DDR3... worth a try?
 
I finally got my LAN driver to work, I had to use an image of the one on the CD (wtf, the one on the website didn't work :confused: ) I'll probably over clock tomorrow... here's some pics:

MB1.jpg


MB2.jpg


PC.jpg
 
Does anyone know if this board can OC with 4 1gb sticks in it ? I'd like to drop a q6600 in it,as I have a lot of 1Gb Corsair DDR2 667 chips.

I'd be happy with 9x350 or even 9x333.

And if not this one,any other P35 board that could with 4 1 gb DDR2 sticks ? Thats under 160 USD.
 
Stupid newegg, my board will be here Monday. Bitches.

I want to mod this old Intellistation A-Pro case to accept this board so it will be a sleeper :D
E-ATX
 
I like mine with ALL Solid State Caps only. Sorry, it might be $40 cheaper than the P5K but not worth it for me.
 
I've got a small little update on this - it "seems" to be stable at 2.4ghz overclock, but today when I booted up, it says that it's an un-stable overclock, and has me go into the BIOS. I decided not to touch anything, so I quit the BIOS.... got a black screen, motherboard made a lot of short, high-pitched beeps then reset, and did the same thing again - so I set it back to stock.... I don't get this, it only happens every few days... I've not run any "official" stability tests, but I do game for hours at a time, and nothing has happened.

It's being weird on me.
 
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