How to tell if a case can hold a bigger ATX mother board

JhonConners

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Jul 17, 2015
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Short and sweet, I bought a prebuilt which I have mostly upgraded.

It has an MSI 760GM-P34(fx) motherboard which is a micro atx board.

But that is AM3+
and AMD CPUs aren't exactly the greatest for performance, yeah, they're cheap, but that's about it.

So I was thinking of putting in a new cpu, and of course, would need a new mother board.

Based on just sizes of the case and stuff is there any way to tell if it can fit a regular atx board?
 
Solution
Usually you can eyeball it pretty easy, because of the large difference in size between micro ATX and ATX form factors. ATX chassis can take microATX, but not the other way around.
Here's a guideline on ATX sizes, board measurements and standoff spacings: https://img.atwikiimg.com/www19.atwiki.jp/vippc2/attach/12/87/ATX.png
If your case has the holes in the locations numbered A, G and K in the drawing, then you are in business. If not, then not 🙁
To be sure, send us a make and model number of your prebuilt PC.
Usually you can eyeball it pretty easy, because of the large difference in size between micro ATX and ATX form factors. ATX chassis can take microATX, but not the other way around.
Here's a guideline on ATX sizes, board measurements and standoff spacings: https://img.atwikiimg.com/www19.atwiki.jp/vippc2/attach/12/87/ATX.png
If your case has the holes in the locations numbered A, G and K in the drawing, then you are in business. If not, then not 🙁
To be sure, send us a make and model number of your prebuilt PC.
 
Solution


I don't know the make and model number. Thus why I came here 😛
 
With that in mind, what would you recommend as a good mother board that could fit in here?

I know it would completely depend on what CPU and such I will be getting, but just what is a good motherboard.
I've heard the X99's are good, but not too sure
 



That's what I was thinking. I have heard great things about Asus, Asrock, and Gigabyte, and heard some small talk about X99 mother boards, kinda making my relation to them being good.

Also, really, a 6 core would be best, but a simple 4 core is fine.
Even the 4 core will completely blow my 4300 out of the water in terms of performance(I know why that is I don't want to read/write a paragraph on why that is)

Assuming these are higher end mother boards, my hyper 212 evo should fit fine.

What cpu + mobo would you recommend?
 
#1 the mobo newegg link was invalid.

And #2 what do you think about the 9590 on my current am3+ mobo? 8mb cache. 4.7 gz. It says it's 8 cores but with how they're designed it's really just a quad core.

So on flat out statistics it looks better just want your opinion
 

You will need a water cooler for that CPU. Here is the motherboard link.
http://
 


Water cooler? It runs cooler than my 4300.
Or atleast that's what tests are showing
 

A 9590? It only comes without a cooler because it requries extreme cooling. A while back AMD sold them with a water cooler but think people want to use their own.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819113351

http://www.geek.com/chips/amds-new-5ghz-chip-runs-so-hot-it-ships-with-watercooling-1597608/
 


I'm just saying I've seen tests say it's cooler than my 4300.
Stock cooler on my 4300 it got to 70C and 80C on full load in a very short time. Which the test results showed. So I assumed the 9590 temperatures were correct in saying it sat around 50C
 

yes but that is on extreme cooling. Its a monster on power draw and heat creation.
 



Wouldn't that mean that the 4300 temperature results were under extreme cooling?
 
On the ASUS website for the mobo you recommeneded, it says "Dual DDR3 1866 (O.C.) support" Does that mean strictly 1866? Or can it support my ADATA 8gb 1600 Mz?
Granted, you can turn the main clock up, to increase the RAM's speed (While increasing the CPUs speed though) But is that recommeneded?
 

Yup thats why most of the quad cores own in games. They have the clock advantage.
 


Yup that is a max with overclocking. It can handle all ddr3 under that plus any with configs that can run lower.