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Correct me if I'm wrong, but as I understand it in order to SLI you have to have a northbridge chipset from nVidia right?  I was looking at motherboards with either the 780i, 790i, or 790i ultra northbridge because they seemed to be the top of the line from nVidia at the moment.  The boards I've found were mostly from Asus, EVGA, or XFX.  Any input on which is a good brand or specifically any boards that are known to be stable and good overclockers?  I'm looking for a board that still supports DDR2 because I can't really afford all new ram at the prices that DDR3 is running

 Thanks for all input and suggestions!

790 is a DDR3 board (chipset) 780 is a DDR2 board (chipset) 750 is a ddr2 chipset.....etc

What is your price range? the prices vary ALLOT from $80 to $350.

As Cool said 780i & 750i are the choices you have since you want to stay with ddr2 RAM here are your choices.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Productcompare.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=2010200280%201070509908%20107172451%201075707618&bop=And&Order=PRICE&CompareItemList=N82E16813131232%2CN82E16813130159%2CN82E16813188026%2CN82E16813188024%2CN82E16813130158%2CN82E16813131255

Thanks for the info on the chipsets, that helps a lot.  My price range tops out at around the $300 range, so everything in your list HOGHAULER is in range, thanks for making a list for me!!

 

I have a Q6600 of the G0 stepping, and I want to put in 4 gigs DDR2 that I hope to be able to clock to around 1200 or maybe a little higher.  On the board I have now (Asus p5k-e) I have the Q6600 clocked to 3.33 stable on air, I'll be switching to water soon but is there a best board out of that group that you think gives me the best chances when it comes to overclocking?

I looked a lot at the Asus Striker II Formula and from the specs the board looks great, but reading reviews I found people that thought it was god of all motherboards then I found people who thouht it was trash.

 

*EDIT* : Thought of another question, I saw on several of those boards that there are 3 PCI-E x16 slots, but two of them are PCI-E 2.0 and one is not.  They seem to favor putting the one that is not 2.0 in the middle of the three, for SLI do you then put once card in a 2.0 slot and one not, or do you get a really long bridge and put both in 2.0 slots?

Overall the Asus Striker II is the best but I would highly advise you to read and heed the warnings about picking out the RAM.

Pros: Great overclocker. Q6700 at 3.8 ghz on air cooling. If your planning on overclocking a 45 nm processor 1066 rated boards seem to display a better pattern of stability with high FSB then ddr2 800 standard.45 nm processors are sensitive to Vcore increases you'll have a better time overclocking them with this board. Its the only 780i board with 1066 standard currently aside from a poorly performing MSI board. The area around the CPU is alot more spacious then the original Striker - all heatsinks will fit.

Cons: Price, I can't recommend this if you don't plan to push the clock speeds as best you can. People mention the hot northbridge but i never experienced stability issues, its almost as if its tailored to work at those ridiculous temps. If the heat isn't an issue i don't understand why people cite it as a con. Stability issues with a wide range of memory.

Other Thoughts: Make sure to google "Asus Striker II Formula QVL" to get the PDF off asus for the list of memory tested to work with the board. As with most Asus - Nvidia boards memory stability is a huge issue so do not purchase memory for this board before reading up. The OCZ Reaper HPC isn't listed under the QVL as of writing this but i've tried it and it works. Don't worry about the space around the processor - even the largest air coolers will fit. People seem to site crashing and BSODs - I've built 4 computers with this board for friends and none had issues - so i'm assuming those people need to either RMA or they were ignorant and didn't read the QVL. " most of the complaints are consistent with memory issues. "

3 out of 3 people found

http://www.asus.com/999/download/products/2016/2016_10.pdf

If I'm understanding that QVL correctly then it seems that no memory at DDR2 1066 is supported running four dimms.  That being so the only way to run 4 gigs would be 2 2-gig dimms.  The 800 MHz dimms on the other hand nearly all seem to support 4 dimms simultaneously, taking into account that I do in fact want to run 4 gig's, would you recomend the 1066 way or the 800 way as being better for overall performance?  And also, If i put in 4 dimms at 800 then overclocked them to higher frequencies, would the board stop recognizing some number of dimms?

I'd go with the 1066 RAM either the Corsair or Kingston 2X2gigs but remember only install 1 stick until after you get the OS loaded and the drivers updated from their web sites not the cdrom.

Forgive my ignorance but it doesn't seem like the QVL specifically lists any 2 gig dimms at 1066 but the one from Micron.  I think I'm not grasping something here?  Could you possibly tell me what models from Kingston or Corsair that are 2 2-gig dimms work with the Sriker II formula, or give me links if they are on NewEgg?

 

I looked but there does't seem to be anything on NewEgg from either corsair or kingston that are 2 2-gig dimms at 1066.  Thank you for all your help.

Its just a matter of how you search.

 

Awesome, apparently I missed that somehow.  I've always heard that Corsair's dominator series is supposed to be pretty awesome ram.

 

So if Asus' Striker II Formula and Corsair's Dominator's get along together then that sounds like a match to me.  Coupled with my Q6600 and two 8800 GTX's this will make the strongest gaming system I've had yet.  This isn't my first build, but it is the first time that I was going for higher-end hardware, so I was a bit lost and trying to find my bearings and you guys have really helped me out, thanks, it is much appreciated.

Yes Corsair's dominator series is real good RAM thats what I plan on upgrading to next myself is the 1066 since I'm only running 800 now. Glad to have been of help.

That's the ticket then, thanks all for the input and the help.  New mobo and ram is on it's merry way

I just bought that same motherboard and memory. How did it go for you? Any problems with the memory? Are you running Vista 64bit or 32bit? Thanks.

I fired it up and updated the BIOS to 1305. It keeps locking up with default BIOS settings. I am only using one Corsair (1x2GB). Any one else have this problem?

CPU - Q9300

Zalman CNPS9700 

Motherboard - ASUS Striker II Formula LGA 775 NVIDIA nForce 780i SLI ATX

Memory - Corsair Dominator (2x2GB) 240-pin DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) Dual Channel Kit

Case - Antec P182, 3 120mm fans

Power supply - Rosewill RX750 

Looks like my BIOS memory settings needed to be adjusted. Namely, the voltage from 1.9 to 2.1. The timing is set at

tCL = 5, tRCD = 5, tRP=5, tRAS=15, CMD=2T

tRRD=3, tRC=23, tWR=4, tWTR=9, tREF=7.8us, tRD=7, tRFC=51

It almost works but still locks up after some time. I am installing Vista 64 and it locked up twice before the install completed. I changed tRAS to 18 and am trying the install again.

I am not sure what to adjust next. Any ideas on my BIOS settings?  

 

 

The ram I linked is what I am running on my formula with a Q9450.

I had to enable SLI ready memory, set it to expert, then a the ram timings defaulted as they should, timings/ voltages. and it was/is stabil. still stabil after OC'ing from 2.66GHz up to 3.2GHz

Thanks for your reply. Are you using the same mobo and memory?

"The ram I linked ...". Sorry, I am not sure what you are saying here. Are you saying the FSB & Memory are set to linked in your BIOS? There are BIOS settings for the FSB & Memory. You can set it to auto, linked, or unlinked. The default is auto. I tried linked and unlinked, neither worked at all. With it set to linked, I changed the memory from 800 to 1066 and tried the ratio to 5:4 since 1333/1066 = 1.25. This did not work at all.

Increasing the voltage does seem to help. It will run longer before locking up. I have tried 2.1, 2.12, and 2.14 so far. With it set at 2.14, the Vista installation almost completed.

Does anyone have a link which explains the BIOS settings? Is there more info somewhere on setting SLI ready memory=enable? 

It looks like the NB over heats and then it starts locking up. From a cold startup, in 7 min. the temps are

CPU=28, M/B=32, NB=84, SB=47

In 15 min, CPU=29, M/B=34, NB=88, SB=50

In 20 min, CPU=28, M/B=35, NB=89, SB=50

ASUS tech support said the NB should always be less than 70. They said the board is bad and to return it. JUST GREAT....