Z68 Recommendations

[LarkStarr]

As per the thread title, looking for z68 suggestions. Looking for a sounding board for ideas.

There's a whole slew of motherboards out there, and the chipset is still quite new so I'm just looking to see if any one has heard anything or knows more then me :P

The mobo most likely would be paired with a 2600k, with moderate to heavy overclocking

I was looking at the Gigabyte GA-Z68X-UD4-B3 ($160, atm) - opinions? UD5? Asus P8Z68-V pro? ($210, Probably the very top of the price range)

Thanks In Advance!
-Lark

[SKYMTL]

For their price, the Gigabyte boards (especially the UD3 and UD4 series) provide an excellent value. However, as I said in the launch day review: it's hard to see why anyone would need more than the UD3.

The only issues I have with their boards right now is there are FAR too many models.

[LarkStarr]

I went and snatched a P8Z68-v Pro , much to my own hesitation (Dislike for Asus). It seems to be widely recommended :P even in your own review. the UD4 didn't come with any internal video out. I kinda went wtf when I figured that out.

I got it for $195, so not too bad compared to most places right now too. (DirectCanada price match @ Canada Computers)

[Eldonko]

Great board, mine went into my media PC and I plan on keeping it. I did the review and have tested it extensively so if you have any questions just ask.

See this thread to grab the latest drivers. There have been updates and bug fixes since release.

ASUS Official Z68 Chipset Motherboards - Support Thread

[SKYMTL]

I'll have to talk to ASUS since 0501 completely borked my system when a cache SSD was installed. It continually tried to boot from the SSD which (of course) returned a "Operating System Not Found" error.

[Eldonko]

Cant you just adjust boot sequence? Every time you flash a BIOS it always puts the boot sequence in some random order.

[SKYMTL]

Originally Posted by Eldonko

Cant you just adjust boot sequence? Every time you flash a BIOS it always puts the boot sequence in some random order.

Nope. It didn't even recognize the HDD.

[LarkStarr]

I'm liking it so far, I'm just trying to comprehend why you can't adjust the multiplier from the ai suite manually. and the BCLK is reported at 4.2 mhz (it's at 100)

The bios menus needed to be thought out a little more too, IMO, but otherwise.. not bad at all. I didn't go extensively into the review here (or any review for that matter) I just kinda read the final words of the few reviews i've seen.

I popped 0501 on there without any issue so far, my RAID held too. I don't have an SSD for caching yet, though, but I got everything installed in RAID mode anyways (I RAIDed (0) 2 1TB WD greens, I'm pretty sure that's the ultimate in computer irony?)

Sky - downgrade to 0401 and try again maybe? Seems odd.



Right now my biggest issue is the CPU temps.. core 0 is at 61C, cores 1 and 2 are at 72C, and core 3 is at 69C... I'm waiting to see if the paste settles or something, maybe I put too much :x