why 8gb ram? you running a render farm or an intensive server or something? 8GB is generally unnessecary in desktop builds and you certainly dont need that much for this build. will you be using vista?
8 Gig isn't necessary atm but in the future it will be as technology is always moving and by then this board will hand a nice quad Intel 965 Chipset - I'm not too clued up on this but a graphic card in the future will solve this
Could someone kindly look over my 1st post to see if everything will be ok and thoughts - looking to order soon.
In the future, your numbers of processors in a CPU will match the ones of today video card processors... which is in the 200's.
i'm going to agree with everybody else here, and say to ditch the 8GB ram. You're better off just sticking with the 2GB you've already got and spending more on the motherboard or getting a proper video card. 965 is really, really old. P35 and P45 have both come out since then and are way better.
p965 is fine, w/e fits your budget between that and the p31/p35/p45. couple that with a 4830 and you are golden for css or anything in that range. the 4830 is on par with the 9800 gt for performance. DO NOT settle for an included psu as 99.99% of the time they are garbage. the psu is the most important part of your build. the longevity and stability of your system depend on it more than anything else you plug into your mobo.go with an integrated graphics mobo and a good psu if you have to. 2 to 4 gigs is plenty depending on budget go for 2 now and add 2 later.
hi trig; Boards atm is; ASUS P5B-VM SE iG965 or Gigabyte GA-P31-DS3 or MSI P43 Neo-F iP43 EDIT: your 'best site ever' has a script virus in it.
IMO, if you can go for a Gigabyte with a better chipset than P31. I hear good things about the P35 and P45, so stretch for that if you can. I'm going to jump in the bandwagon and say you don't need 8GB RAM. Drop half of that, if not 3/4 of it, and spend it on the motherboard. You should notice a larger difference by having a better motherboard than by having 8GB of RAM, compared to 4GB.
The Abit IP35 Pro P35 you mentioned looks good, I looked it up on their website. You also mentioned the MSI P43 Neo, which TBH doesn't look as good as the Abit, but looks like it has lower power requirements (if your PSU isn't up to much). However, I'd go for a bigger brand-name if you could. You haven't mentioned a specific budget yet, but you can get a Gigabyte P45 for £100 at Ebuyer. You can also get two Asus P43 models for <£80, here and here . Take your pick They also have "ExpressGate" which is an instant-on OS so you can check your email and power off etc without loading Vista
I'm sorry but I'd suggest not getting the Abit. Sure it's a damned awesome board, but it has a dated chipset and since it's discontinued the price soars. Better to get the P5Q-Pro or the UD3P instead. And you could always get the P43 Neo or the P31, which are leagues better than the 965, albeit with the need for a GPU. Still the GPU can be gotten quite cheaply as the 9600GT can be had for $70 and the HD4830 too(if you can stand rebates).
as an owner of the abit ip35 pro, i can attest it is an awesome board. stable and built for oc adventures. bit-tech thought it was an amazing board as well. as far as everyone dogging the p31 chipset, i'm not sure why. it is fine and will do everything you want. if i read your other posts right, you don't care about oc'ing, and you don't need a major gaming rig. the p31 is fine. if it fits in your budget best, then grab that. abit did exit the mobo market, so not sure what they will do for you in terms of support and warranty, so maybe stick with the gigabyte.
I know the Abit is an awesome board, I've tested it myself, the only 2 things that bothers me is the lack of PCI-E 2.0(you'll need it for next gen) and the pretty high price tag.
video cards are backwards compatible and the performance increase was very small...very small. yup...my comment exactly
