http://www.msi.com/product/mb/Big-Bang-XPower-II.html looks very interesting, and actually has me thinking of upgrading my pc again...i know i know i have upgraded not to long ago, late 2010. and 2nd question is would this run my current i7 2600? or should i go to the new i7s that come out this year? now im on the subject of upgrading, currently running and liking my 768mb GTX460 OC edition by PNY, and seeing 1-2 gigs seems to be recommended nowadays, what would be a nice card to get this year? im not to fond of ATI, had some pretty shitty experiences with them before i got this card, burned through 3 stock clocked cards in 1 month, 6k series. *my current config should be on the forum still ill edit if i find it, Enigma helped me out greatly there aswell, still not running a SSD...*
That board uses socket 2011 and a different chipset, so no it wont run your i7 2600k. Socket 1155 is a midrange socket and 2011 is the enthusiest socket, it is replacing the older socket 1366. The differences are that the new one has 40 PCI-E lanes instead of 20 on socket 1155 (better for multi graphcis cards), the processors have quad channel memory instead of dual channel like 1155 does, and with that you get up to 8 RAM slots for higher amounts of memory. The chipset also has native USB3 instead of getting it from add-in chipsets, and additional native SATA3 ports. So it isnt actually very useful unless you make use of the multi GPU and additional RAM or multiple SSD's. If you are just buying and can afford it then this would be the platform to go with as it is newer and will have better future processors, however if you already own the "midrange" platform (Sandy Bridge) then it isnt really a significant upgrade to do unless you suddenly want to switch from a normal system to a big high end multi-gpu system How do you go through 3 graphics cards in a month? sounds like you have a significant electrical problem somewhere, like the PSU has a bad rail that feeds the +12v to the GPU
I had a similar problem. I had a video card die, then a new one die... my cat peed on the exhaust vent at the back of the computer- twice. Fuzzy bastard.
well we call them monday morning models... bought 1 in store put in in pc, burned within hours, PSU was fine, brought pc to store let them install 2nd tested it, worked, got home went away for couple days got back turned pc on within hours burned...called the store took pc there again, installed a card that would not be able to run on my PSU, ran fine, replaced card with GT8800, gave that one to my brother, then bought GTX460 not long after... before that i never had any problems with ATI, had many cards from them, and from Nvidia...going back to very very old models... so if i would buy that mobo, id have to get a new CPU, PSU, and get at least 2 GPU's....sounds like fun...but guess ill wait till it drops a lil in price then...cant spend 1500+ on that again...ill just get another 8gigs of ram then and ill be fine for a lil while longer.
Well to make it worthwhile to upgrade ya. But the cheapest CPU is $600 on that platform, so that, plus a $300 motherboard since that is how much a decent one costs, and two GPUs, plus the other stuff and you would be looking at closer to $2000
Actually in Europe you pay a lot more than the cost of it in the US. The exact Euro equivalent comes to $645.20, which is a little bit more expensive than it would cost here, but in addition you have massive taxes which brings the total cost to an equivalent of $774.23 for the CPU alone in Europe. Whereas after tax here the total is $645.42, nearly identical to your price before your huge taxes. Prices would be around £1800-1900 after taxes, which would equal closer to $2850 in US Dollars when we would only be paying $2000~ after tax
i'm still not sure why you would need that board, the money positioned into that enthusiast board could be much more effectively put towards high end GPU's which offer much higher performance gains. i'd be looking at that board for triple gpu setups (or crossfire 7970's) where they are actually starting to be bottle necked by the CPU. Anything socket 2011 is not for the average consumer worried about best bang for your buck and budgets like the one you have. With out knowing your current mobo and psu, a good socket 1155 board can be had for under $200, and a pair of GTX 580's for less then $1000. Your CPU would be more then adequate, and depending on your PSU, it could be as well, or replaced for $150.
With the rate at which interconnect specifications are increasing I doubt we will ever need the big high end platform for dual GPU anymore