Is 8 enough power phases?

[xXCrossfireXx]

Hey, I'm shooting for a good overclock, 4.7 GHz at least on the 4790k. Anyway, I bought an MSI Gaming 5, which I believe has 8 phase power. Anyway, first of all is this a good motherboard, in terms of IO panel, PCI-E slots, and anything else? But back to the real question, if I wanted to hit a good overclock on the 4790k, would this be a good board for it?

I'm using a Noctua D15 cooler, so I doubt I'll hit over 4.8 GHz

 

[gondo]

That's a half decent board. 8 phases is plenty. Enjoy.

 

[xXCrossfireXx]

That's a half decent board. 8 phases is plenty. Enjoy.

Sweet! Thx

 

[DonkeyOatie]

The problem is that the board does not really have 8 phases. It has four separate phases, each of which is multiplexed by a doubler into two phases at half the frequency, and they are PWM hybrid phases too.

The Gigabyte Z97X - Gaming 5 generally costs the same and is better with eight true phases, and fully digital too.

None the less, it will give a decent overclock of an i5 4790K unless you get a below average chip, in which cases the power phases might not be enough. (and a really low chip won't work well on any board). About 10% of the time, the difference between the Gigabyte and MSI will matter, and if you are primarily gaming, the difference will not be much.