ok so im building a new SB setup and was pretty set on getting the MSI P67-GD53 thingymamobo but i have noted that the price of Z68 mobos is dropping and i like a few of the features that come with the Z68. namely the SSD caching and the ability to use the SB GPU as a 2d rendering device. So i was hoping for some peoples thoughts on this, preferably experienced Z68 owners thoughts and some sort of picture as to the best value Z68 mobos around. I know thus far BT isnt a huge fan of the Z68 and (decent) reviews are still pretty hard to come by. So..... P67 Vs Z68....Go!
SSD caching is working only for one hard drive and only for boot drive, so for now it is rather pointless feature. Quicksync is another rather pointless feature for now, there is no free solution for it and even the existing ones often choose CUDA over Quicksync. The only meaningfull feature form my viewpoint is the IGP itself for secondary display, because it allows the NVIDIA card to idle at lower clocks. On other side, there is really no point buying P67, you only lose features for no reason.
i can see why ssd caching (intel smart responce i think its called) is attractive but in this quick business by the time you have setup a p67 rig and finished installing your software onto it. SSD's would have fallen in price and become more affordable. so you might aswell get p67 and grab a seperate ssd if not now at a later date. - another note if you get a z68 board i doubt you'd use the graphics if you dropped the 570 you have in your sig into it. i think most people go for them if there getting for example a gigabyte ud7 and the p67 is the same price as the z68. might aswell get more features for free even if you dont plan to use them. also the p67 had the sata chipset problem which freaks people out. the elephant in the room
i know dude i know but people still buy something else even if its fixed as they dont want the hassle if it goes wrong again. dont ask me i have got 2 msi p67 gd53 mobos in the last few months for mates builds
The price of SSD's hasn't fluctuated much since i was planning to build an i5-750 rig last year (never did it) and so i do not assume it will change in the few weeks i plan on completing this build. That doesn't matter anyhow as i have already purchased an M4 64GB to use as my boot drive and i am well aware that ISR will need some of the space on there to function (~20GB i believe). Secondly i think you may have missed my point on the SB gpu. I do not intend to use it for gaming or any 3D rendering, i will be keeping my 570 for that but i would like to think that i can use the SB chip to render my desktop etc saving some energy. My question is more along the lines of what kinds of experiences people have had with the features of Z68 and what the best mobo's are.
erm why? A win 7 64-bit installation is roughly 20 gigs and given that i redirect all my libraries, games etc to my primary HDD it should stay roughly the same size. IRS uses up to 64gigs but you choose how much to dedicate, so if i dedicate 20 gigs to IRS that would leave me with 20+ gigs left on a 64GB drive. or am i missing something??
Yes you are missing a lot. Why have the OS on the hard drive and cache it to the SSD, when you aleady can have it on SSD ? Even my old Windows 7 install has just 20GB Windows directory. So instead of directly running OS from SSD which will occupy 20GB, you will use that 20GB as a cache for hard drive. Does this make any sense at all ? I don't think so. Simply put - use your 64GB SSD as a system drive, with basic apps installed on it, keep few gigs (maybe 10?) for yourself as "free workspace". Install the rest of the apps on hard drive, use Steammover to have games on both SSD or hard drive... Using RST SSD caching on anything bigger than 20-30GB SSD is using just because you want to use it - it is actually the worse option when you have 60GB or bigger SSD.
I see your point. Maybe I misunderstood, I thought the cache was to speed up the overall performance of the HDD when freqently used apps are called. My thought was to use the SSD as an OS drive increasing the 'pop' from windows and using the cache to increase reponse times for frequently used apps called by the OS thereby incresing the overall performance of the pc.
I see your point. Maybe I misunderstood, I thought the cache was to speed up the overall performance of the HDD when freqently used apps are called. My thought was to use the SSD as an OS drive increasing the 'pop' from windows and using the cache to increase reponse times for frequently used apps called by the OS thereby incresing the overall performance of the pc.
That is all fine - but you could install those apps on the SSD as well in the first place . And to be a bit more on topic - i own P8Z68-V PRO, and while it is generally a good board, it has few small quirks : - use the blue memory slots first. No exceptions. If you don't, be prepared for random BSOD. - CPU fan is required, you can't disable the CPU fan check for now. Maybe some BIOS update in future will fix this. - it will probably support NVIDIA Optimus/Synergy when it will be finally released by NVIDIA (the option for enabling Lucid Virtu says NVIDIA Optimus as well).
Just built a new PC with an Asus P8Z68-V Pro last week, I was kind of interested in SSD caching too, but then I read this, apparently the SRT technology rags SSD's constantly. So the recommendation is to use a SLC drive like the new intel ones, not a less robust MLC drive like the M4, like the guy says I would be interested to see how an MLC drive performs in the long term. In the end I ended up getting a 256GB M4 and forgoing it all together, like the guy says I would be interested to see how a 64GB drive held up over time. My board was maybe £10-£15 more expensive than the P67 equivalent so not too bothered, its an option.
