What mobo for E8400 or E8500

wayner · Post by **wayner** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 7:40 am

I am looking at putting together a system and I don't know what mobo to go with. The system will be used in my office for email, Excel, etc. but I will be connecting a second monitor to an LCD TV that will, at times, be used for Media Center Playback. I may also use this PC to re-encode video files that are from some of my other PCs, including a dedicated HTPC in my Home Theatre room.

Here is what I am going with:
Antec P182 Case
Enermax or Seasonic PS - about 450W
Intel E8400 or 8500 CPU w 3-4 GB of RAM
Vista HP
(Hopefully) integrated graphics -alternative is HD3650 passive
Scythe Ninja CPU cooler
One or two hard drives + One optical drive

I will likely be installing a Hauppauge PVR-150 tuner card which would require a PCI slot. I don't need lots of SATA ports as I have a WHS box which is used for serious file storage. I would like the option of playing back BluRay in the future so I want a card that can handle this via a hardware decoder. I would kind of prefer onboard video, but I still want to be able to drive dual monitors simultaneously.

Should I go with DDR2 or DDR3?

One mobo that looks good is the P5EVM-HDMI but why should I use a mATX mobo when I have lots of room for an ATX board? There is supposed to be a P5EV-HDMI that is ATX rather then mATX but you can't seem to buy it at the popular shops here in Canada and I would like to have the system assembled by the PC shop.

The other option would be to go with an AMD based system with the 780G chipset but that would mean that I can't use the E8000 line of CPUs which seem to be the current kings, particularly when you are concerned about power, heat and noise.

Any other boards that anyone would recommend? I have used Asus boards in the past and I haven't had any problems but I am willing to try another brand if that suits my needs.

notquitequiet · Post by **notquitequiet** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 11:28 am

I'm doing something similar right now. I should be done already, but my motherboard was probably bad, my RAM was definitely bad (1 of 2 sticks) and I broke the stupid little plastic clips on the heatsink.

DDR3 is a total waste right now. DDR2 is cheaper and higher density too, I think. Almost no performance difference. Companies that sell DDR3 now tend to strap on huge heatspreaders, LEDs, fans (ugh) and ignore JEDEC specs for the voltage.

The E8500 is very hard to find. Impossible? I have seen the E8400 and E8200 in the wild. I paid EXTRA to buy my E8400, just because it was actually in stock.

I've got parts "in the mail" right now, but I managed to get it somewhat working with one stick of RAM before I sent things back. It's pretty fast.

Way overkill for a HTPC I would think. My HTPC is a AMD BE-2350 with BeyondTV on XP. I mainly use it for watching and recording TV though. Nothing fancy.

I also went with the Asus P5K, because the Gigabyte motherboard I originally had was questionable. Video would do strange things, random errors and Vista refused to install.

I've got a Thermalright bolt-through kit on order for the heatsink problem. Why not a factory backing plate or a stronger clip mechanism? I can't believe Intel screwed that up so much and people just accept it... Oh well. We can't whine and sue over everything.

I think the motherboard choice is the critical element. Unless you buy it assembled and tested it's a gamble. Doesn't seem to matter if everyone else is having huge success with the same part.

Best of luck.

cotswoldcs · Post by **cotswoldcs** » Wed Mar 26, 2008 4:19 pm

If you are planning on a build based on the rather large P182 then it makes sense to go with a standard ATX board. My recommendations would be:

Asus P5K Premium/Wifi (P35)
Abit IP-35Pro
Abit iX38 Quad-GT

There really isn't much performance difference between P35 boards and the newer X38 based boards. However, X38 have several advantages and for that reason I'm considering a X38 based board (Probably the Abit iX38 Quad-GT).

Of course I'm in the UK and not sure what's available over the "pond"

I definately agree with notquitequiet, DDR2 is the way to go at the moment, no question.

phil0079 · Post by **phil0079** » Sat Apr 05, 2008 4:25 pm

which one did you get??

i went with the Asus P5K Premium/Wifi (P35) originally and all i had was issues. my profession is production engineer, so lets just say i know my way around a comp

i flashed the BIOS multiple times.. no dice.. booted soo slowly into vista install

i changed the hdd's, cdrom, ram, i had tons of parts to play with... too many issues to begin with..

happily i went with the Asus P5E-VM HDMI (bios 0405)

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