Best mobo with Q9550

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Alroy

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I recently bought the Intel Q9550, which board would you recommend for best performance. I want to overclock as well. My budget is 3-4K
 
Don't spend that much on a motherboard. I would recommend a good quality Intel Chipset P45 motherboard, of which there are so many from R1500-R2500

This is an excellent motherboard - top specs & gets great reviews Gigabyte EP45-UD3P
http://www.prophecy.co.za/gigabyte-gaep45ud3p-motherboard-p-33981.html

But you can overclock even with a R700 G31 motherboard! If you spend R1400 on a P43 motherboard with some half decent RAM you will still get a great overclock.
 
I heard that the intel extreme mobos can overclock too, I recently installed a cheap intel mobo and I really liked the build quality and am thinking of getting the skyperG.
 
I've got a cheapo motherboard (R580) and got 3.312Ghz out of my E5200. It can go further I suppose because the max voltage draw is 1.264V at the moment with max temps of 62 degrees with Prime95 running. Only thing is that the CPU is limited to 265FSB in the BIOS. I think that is due to the CPU configuration of a max of 33% overclock and not due to the motherboard. So I'll have to do a BSEL mod to trick the motherboard into thinking it's a 266FSB CPU in order to go further. 3.312Ghz is fine for now :)

The motherboard you should get depends on the FSB of the CPU. If you care about getting a 1:1 FSB:Ram ratio then you'll need a motherboard with that can reach 400FSB+. That's if you're using DDR2 800. A more expensive motherboard that can reach these high FSB's would allow you to drop the multiplier and raise the FSB to get the 1:1 ratio.

If you just want to overclock the CPU and dont really care about the FSB:Ram ratio then a cheap motherboard will be fine as long as the motherboard can get a much higher FSB than the CPU stock FSB. The Q9550 has a stock FSB of 333. So you'd want a motherboard that can do 400FSB to get a 20% overclock from 2.8Ghz to 3.36Ghz. If you want a 40% overclock to 3.92Ghz then you'll need a motherboard that can do 466FSB.

My cheap Foxconn G31 motherboard is rated at 333FSB. It can probably go a bit higher as well but with the E5200 a 333FSB means a CPU speed of 4.163Ghz. So the CPU temps will be the limiting factor in overclocking and not the motherboard. With a more expensive CPU that comes stock with a 333FSB you'd need a motherboard that can do more than that to overclock. If you're not overclocking then you shouldn't see a difference a R3000 motherboard and a R600 one. (Apart from SLI/Crossfire support and the ability to take more than 4GB ram)
 
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G31 = No OC ,rather spend more on a higher end board and be able to oc.Take nothin away from the G31 It's a great ENTRY LEVEL board but expect nothin spectacular from it.
 
Tejen said:
G31 = No OC ,rather spend more on a higher end board and be able to oc.Take nothin away from the G31 It's a great ENTRY LEVEL board but expect nothin spectacular from it.
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Yep, with the Q9550 you'd get no overclock with a G31 motherboard. Expensive CPU's need expensive motherboards if overclocking. I'm happy with my R1300 3.3Ghz CPU+mobo combo :)
 
OK I said you *can* overclock on a G31, it's true not very well, because you don't have all the required voltage controls.
 
I have the G31 motherboard, does not oc very well. Got my q8200 to 2.8 Ghz max. Thanx for the replies
 
Seconding the Gigabyte EP45-UD3P (although I have the EP45T-UD3R).

I have the Q9550 and shall be overclocking to 3.4GHz as soon as my cooler arrives. I also splashed out on 4 Gigs of DDR3 RAM which that board is capable of.

Have fun!
 
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Thanx for the relies all, think i am going with the GA-EP45T-UD3R, now what ram to buy??
 
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