Here's the thing. Right now, there is no doubt about it, the Conroe is an incredible performer. Incredible. (though it's 64-bit OS support still is not as good as it should be). But there are numerous motherboards out there that do have issues; I'm trying to build a list, but it seems as though a simple BIOS upgrade doesn't really do it for all 975 boards, so you have to be really picky -which- 975 board you get if you go that route, much more so then with 965 boards.
This will change, and I think within short order. I think you'll see more boards come out to the marketspace that are specifically designed to really work with Conroe. Right now, there are no boards out that do SLI for Conroe or Crossfire yet. Nvidia has a NV590 chipset board in the pipe - about another month or so away. But so far, performance is 'eh' especially in the memory controller, which seems to really screw Conroe. ATI, on the other hand, has an RD600 board coming. And of what I've seen, it's a hell of a performer. Very solid. But now who knows where that goes now that ATI=AMD. I think, though, RD600 will still hit the streets as board makers have already committed to it. But despite good marks etc. would you buy into a chipset soon to be owned by the competition, which means what for continual support? If it works out for you, be patient. A wait until about early September will give you new revision 965 boards, etc. specifically designed with Conroe in mind. And despite what people seem to be saying, longterm stability (if you're counting on 24/7 up) sucks in a whole lot of the boards. There are -some- boards that I've seen really good longterm, but I've seen a hell of a lot more "don't use XYZ because of stability" then I've seen "easy success". I think a lot of smaller shops are a bit worried about how well X board is going to work out with a Conroe. Besides, no problem waiting.. good luck finding a vendor with a good line of Conroes on hand anywhere. I'm seeing notices that say "Aug 1." And that references only two chips (one of them being the X6800 Extreme, ~$1350) So, there is no reason to be jumpy to grab one.. because unless you see something none of the rest of us do, you can't just run out to CompUSA and grab one ;) CW -----Original Message----- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of JRS Sent: Thursday, July 27, 2006 7:33 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; The Hardware List Subject: Re: [H] Conroe out today............. Ah.. Ok, now I get it. Thanx guys.... My idea of stable is like my trusty P4 3.2 gig here at home, been on 24/7 for a couple years now except when rebooting for patches. or adding/changing hardware like hard drives and such. :) >>Ding ding ding >> >> >>Sent via BlackBerry from Cingular Wireless >> >>-----Original Message----- >>From: Thane Sherrington <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >>Date: Thu, 27 Jul 2006 21:08:15 >>To:The Hardware List <[email protected]> >>Subject: Re: [H] Conroe out today............. >> >>At 08:27 PM 27/07/2006, JRS wrote: >> >>>They said all the boards they tested were pretty darn stable... >> >>Remember that their idea of stable is the fewest crashes in 24 hours. >> >>T -- JRS [EMAIL PROTECTED] Please remove **X** to reply... <--Of all the things I've lost, I miss my mind the most-->
