i7 Motherboard

[devione]

Hi all,

I'm looking for a reliable i7 (1366) motherboard that overclocks well and supports both Crossfire and SLi.

I'm currently building a high-end 2nd i7 system for heavy gaming. My first i7 build which i've yet to overclock, but plan to, is a Gigabyte UD-4P.

Cost in this case isn't really a factor.

Any suggestions?

Or should I go for AMD's AM2+/AM3 instead?

 

[Zap]

If cost isn't a factor, then that means you want it REALLY high end... in which case Core i7 is your only choice.

There isn't really any performance difference among different X58 chipset boards. Most overclock pretty decent though there are some differences, so really it comes down to what you want for features as long as it is a known good overclocker. I've used Intel's Smackover, MSI Eclipse, MSI Platinum and Asus P6T (the cheapest one) and out of those four the Asus P6T was by far the easiest to overclock. Of course all of them were fast and stable at stock speeds. The MSI Eclipse was probably the most feature-filled out of those four. I have not (yet) tried any other X58 board.

 

[Sacraster]

if cost is not a factor. go with EVGA X58 SLI Classified

 

[devione]

Thanks Zap for the quick reply. I'll take a closer look on the P6T. Are the other X58 Asus motherboards any good besides those you recomended? My much older build used a Socket 939 A8N-SLi Premium, and it was a solid board but a petty gripe was the PCI clips that was on the Asus boards, I personally found really annoying. But otherwise Asus products are solid. I have never overclocked an Asus board before though, but I might get one for my 2nd i7 build.

Sacraster, thanks for the reply. I've looked at that board previously, alas it only supports nVidia graphic cards. What about the other motherboards?

Also, are DFI motherboards any good overclocking wise? Anandtech seems to rate them very highly.


EDIT: Does Newegg and ZipZoomFly ship outside the USA?
EDIT 2: Scratch that, they don't. My bad, should've checked before posting. Are there any major online retailers similiar to the 2 based in the US that ship outside USA though?