A difficult choise - Maximus Formula/P5Q Deluxe or P5K Premium Black Pearl

I am on the way of building a new box. I have narrowed the selection to the
above mentioned boards. Yes, I know about the newer technology, but that's
not all. I want the best possible board, which could possibly last later as
a local server, when the time for a new upgrade approches. Besides, I am not
interested in gaming at all. My main PC usage is Photoshop, video editing,
in short 2D graphics. Stability is the main thing for me. If it's possible
to get some extra speed by overclocking, it's fine, but I would prefer a
faster CPU, if it's necessary to sacrifice stability. Audio is not
important, as I have a separate PCI audio card.
Oh, yes, P45 chipset gives PCIe 2.0. What does it give in real life?
Probably, it's mainly for 3D and gaming? Does thenewer generation suffer
from any "child disease"?
TIA

> I want the best possible board, which could possibly last later as a local
> server

I disagree with that strategy mainly because things change so much each
year. It would be easy to blow $4000 building an ultimate gaming pc but I
always build around $400, maybe $500. The reason is next year's $400
machine is as powerful as last year's $4000 machine.

You buy the best board out there, and at the end of this year, there will be
announcements of new technologies, higher speeds, etc.

I prefer to build a new $400 machine rather than play the 'upgrade and try
to stay current' game.

--g

"geoff" <nospam@nospam.com> wrote in message
news:rxsak.157031$tY4.27477@fe06.news.easynews.com ...
>> I want the best possible board, which could possibly last later as a
>> local server
>
> I disagree with that strategy mainly because things change so much each
> year. It would be easy to blow $4000 building an ultimate gaming pc but I
> always build around $400, maybe $500.

Well... Thanks for a quick answer, but... About the prices all is well know,
but the question was somewhat different. (no offence) Perhaps I should have
not included this sentence. It's not exactly THE strategy, however when the
time for an upgrade comes, my last mobo+cpu were too good to almost be given
away, so they became employed alternatively. I upgrade my main PC once in
2-3 years, perhaps rather 3. No intention to buy the most expensive
components, just most stable and lasting. I had some experience about
stability, and we did hear sometimes about leaking capacitors, don't we? No
intention to build an ultimate gaming PC, as I am not interested in gamin at
all and I have stated it in my previous post, so probably someone didn't
read it. The text is becoming too long again ;-)

Then you need to rethink the question, you say you have no interest in
gaming, but 2D work, then you narrow the choice to maximus formula or p5q.

Maximus formula is a part of the ASUS ROG (Republic of Gamers) series.
Also, I read somewhere there was a youtube video of a person removing a
sticker from a maximus formula and the board had p5q on it (may be the other
way around). It seems clear the boards have much in common.

Narrow your selection to fast, non-gaming boards.

--g

In article <486a50d3$0$56784$edfadb0f@dtext02.news.tele.dk> ,
no@mail.com says...
> I am on the way of building a new box. I have narrowed the selection to the
> above mentioned boards. Yes, I know about the newer technology, but that's
> not all. I want the best possible board, which could possibly last later as
> a local server, when the time for a new upgrade approches. Besides, I am not
> interested in gaming at all. My main PC usage is Photoshop, video editing,
> in short 2D graphics. Stability is the main thing for me. If it's possible
> to get some extra speed by overclocking, it's fine, but I would prefer a
> faster CPU, if it's necessary to sacrifice stability. Audio is not
> important, as I have a separate PCI audio card.
> Oh, yes, P45 chipset gives PCIe 2.0. What does it give in real life?
> Probably, it's mainly for 3D and gaming? Does thenewer generation suffer
> from any "child disease"?
> TIA
>
>
>

ASUS P5Q LGA 775 Intel P45 ATX

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813131295

You've failed to explain why you need more motherboard than the one
above.

Bill

pardon me for jumping in.

1. what is the meaning of "5000hrs" vrm as in "100% High-quality Japan-made
Conductive Polymer Capacitors! (5000hrs VRM)" on
http://www.asus.com/products.aspx?mo...1&l3=709&l4=0? ?


2. if I want two arrays of Raid 5 Sata drives and 8GB of RAM, is P5Q still
the best choice for non gaming application that requires stability and
reliabitly?

In particular I do intend to use 2 or 3 displays for large destop work area
for heavy multi tasking: software development and some virtual machines. I
may have Vista 64, even MS Windows 2008 hypervVisa later only

3. a rather naive question: does crossfire technology imply I should not use
GPU of NVidia chipsets?

gg wrote:
> pardon me for jumping in.
>
> 1. what is the meaning of "5000hrs" vrm as in "100% High-quality Japan-made
> Conductive Polymer Capacitors! (5000hrs VRM)" on
> http://www.asus.com/products.aspx?mo...1&l3=709&l4=0? ?

This would be my translation of the Chinglish, into Geek. I downloaded a
capacitor catalog, and "VRM" was not used as a technical term in the catalog.

5000hrs VRM =

"We are using solid conductive polymer capacitors in the Voltage Regulator
Module (VRM) or Vcore circuit. The capacitors have a rating of 5000 hours
of operation at 105C. Since the circuit never operates at 105C, the circuit
has a much longer operating life, perhaps in the hundreds of thousands of
hours, as predicted by an Arrhenius chemistry reaction kinetics equation.
Your mileage may vary, according to the computer case temperature maintained
over the life of the product."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arrhenius_equation

In reality, the better capacitors are only being used, to put as much
distance as possible, between motherboard makers and the "capacitor plague"
which affected aluminum (wet) electrolytic capacitors. The drive to
use them, was done by Marketing, rather than by Engineering. Careful
purchase and test of aluminum electrolytics, would have allowed them
to continue to be used.

The solid caps can still be damaged, and like anything, there are always
circuit conditions that should be avoided. One site mentioned them not
tolerating large inrush currents well, but for the most part, circuits in
a PC don't do that anyway.

HTH,
Paul

In article <mxOak.1330$1o6.299@edtnps83>, gg@Edm.noMail.net says...
>
> pardon me for jumping in.
>
> 1. what is the meaning of "5000hrs" vrm as in "100% High-quality Japan-made
> Conductive Polymer Capacitors! (5000hrs VRM)" on
> http://www.asus.com/products.aspx?mo...1&l3=709&l4=0? ?

Paul answered that better than I could.

>
>
> 2. if I want two arrays of Raid 5 Sata drives and 8GB of RAM, is P5Q still
> the best choice for non gaming application that requires stability and
> reliabitly?
>

Honestly, I doubt anyone here could give a "best choice" blessing on
any of the P45 boards; they're too new. What operating system were
you going to run? and I honestly couldn't tell you if you can run "2"
Raid 5 arrays using just the onboard chipsets. Perhaps someone with
more knowledge of the Intel ICH10R will chime in.



> In particular I do intend to use 2 or 3 displays for large destop work area
> for heavy multi tasking: software development and some virtual machines. I
> may have Vista 64, even MS Windows 2008 hypervVisa later only
>
> 3. a rather naive question: does crossfire technology imply I should not use
> GPU of NVidia chipsets?

Crossfire is ATI only.

Bill

>> does crossfire technology imply I should not use GPU of NVidia chipsets?
>> <<

No - Crossfire spec'd means that it will run 2 x ATI vidcards in same mobo
to increase performance
Likewise, SLI means that it will run 2 x NVidia vidcards in same mobo to
increase performance

If you only use 1 vidcard, an ATI or NVidia card will work in any mobo.
==================
"gg" <gg@Edm.noMail.net> wrote in message
news:mxOak.1330$1o6.299@edtnps83...
>
> pardon me for jumping in.
>
> 1. what is the meaning of "5000hrs" vrm as in "100% High-quality
> Japan-made
> Conductive Polymer Capacitors! (5000hrs VRM)" on
> http://www.asus.com/products.aspx?mo...1&l3=709&l4=0? ?
>
>
> 2. if I want two arrays of Raid 5 Sata drives and 8GB of RAM, is P5Q still
> the best choice for non gaming application that requires stability and
> reliabitly?
>
> In particular I do intend to use 2 or 3 displays for large destop work
> area
> for heavy multi tasking: software development and some virtual machines.
> I
> may have Vista 64, even MS Windows 2008 hypervVisa later only
>
> 3. a rather naive question: does crossfire technology imply I should not
> use
> GPU of NVidia chipsets?
>
>