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The P5N32-SLi has to be the SE Deluxe edition for $240 because the regular doesn't support Core Duo 2.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.asp?DEPA=0&type=&Description=P5N32-SLi...

A8N32-SLi is $170.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813131568

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In order to get anything in NV for SLI or other upgrades your spending bucks Cam.... on top of that you did not even mention the MEMORY REQUIRED to run Conroe. No one is going to want to run anything less than 2gigs or it would not be worth the upgrade with VISTA and FSX.

You also failed to mention that to be able to overclock Conroe on a decent NV board (which is not available in 590 as of yet) your looking at memory rated higer than DDR2 PC800 because the NV boards that are available for core 2 SUCK for overclocking and need the higher spec memory to do it. That purchase ALONE is 400-500 bucks.

The bottom line with Conroe is you can buy a stripped down VW for top dollar or you can do it right and spend the money and have a GREAT rig.. That rig will cost you TOP DOLLAR no matter how you look at it.


AMD at least gives options. Intel forces you into the top dollar parts.


You cannot argue that... not even for a second and get away with it.

EDIT: And there is one more tid-bit you left out... On motherboards that do not come with a BIOS which will BOOT with Conroe,.. in order for the older Intel boards to even BOOT with Conroe installed you must have an temporary intel processor to put in the board and FLASH the latest BIOS. This is a issue that has been noted in many, many forums. Anyone with AMD that buys a cheap Intel board that does not include the Conroe stepping information in the BIOS is screwed.  

Some of the newer boards that do support Conroe even require the CMOS be cleared or the system wont boot.


There is allot of crap and hoops you have to go through with changing over to that processor.  Although I do not deny the fact that if you buy the RIGHT parts and make it worth the upgrade you will have a superior system (this year) I dont not think the typical AMD user is ready to shuck up the bucks for the RIGHT parts and go through all the hassles Intel requires for the switch.

To PROPERLY switch over to Intel from AMD and GET something worth the switch is not a cheaper venture as Intel fans tend to bull-shoot people into thinking it is. Sometimes they just dont know themselves because thier thoughts are clouded by the 'daRk-SiDe of the force.

 

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So what's that make the E6300 ?  

Decent Conroe boards are > $350 here, an E6600 will set you back $500 and half decent PC6400 cas4 ddr2 ram is $320.

That's about $1200aud delivered for a new core set Cameron. I only save $150 by dropping down to an E6300 as well.

I've been seeing a lot of your posts saying how Conroe is cheaper, but that's not true in my part of the world.

IF you mean cheaper than the ridiculously expensive FX60, then yeah, maybe, but there are plenty of inexpensive yet powerful AMD alternatives.

I just read about a guy who's getting up to and over 500mhz fsb on his conroe o/c's, he has access to some Engineering Sample cores as well, and is running them without vcore increase at his max bus speeds.

I'm sorry I don't have the links, I was away when I read about it.

Ahh, but the point...... he was using G.skill PC6400 (800mhz) cas4 stuff  (HZ) and he wasn't loosening the timings, I wish I could recall what speed his memory was at   

He was running combinations of 6300, 6400, 6600 cpu's on an Asus P5 series board, and a gigabyte (S3?) board.

He was verifying with a full 32mb run in super PI, which isn't the be all end all of course. Still, pretty darn good results.

Also, I saw some early conroe adapters here in aussie forums getting great results with the g.skill PC6400 ram, though one of the best results was obtained with an Engineering sample 6600.

I'll probably be going back up to my friend's place in a week, so I'll check the explorer history on his PC and see if I can get you a link. Unfortunately, my friend isn't proficient enough to search out that info for me.

Some of the expensive g.skill ram uses late technology chips, and the cheaper PK designated modules (the oveclocker in question was using HZ modules), probably use the older ic's. However, the cheaper PK modules still rate 4-4-4-12 @ 800mhz, so they are my choice at the moment.

I couldn't find any locally available OCZ with the same spec, at least not in a "normal" price bracket, and I don't generally research the very best available.
I figure if they have that much money to blow, they can do their own research! This is in line with my attitude of helping the majority of users, not the elite enthusiast. I guess we all need a niche  

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Yeah it does, but let's see how it overclocks.

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thats why

The P5 is the best overclocking board for Conroe. No Sli or other goodies though.  the Gskil memory is another reason as I think they are the only company that makes the better low latency sticks for DDR2

But they ARE expensive

Still a 500MHz O/c is impressive

I would be curious if he would be able to complete a 3Dmark06 run @ that speed