Recommended motherboard for Q9400 775

[iNVADER84]

I recently purchased an HD 5850 and a Q9400 quad to replace my 8800GTS 512 and an E6600 on an Asus P5B motherboard.

The 5850 works fine but with the Q9400 fitted (latest BIOS supposed to support it) it will not POST - no beeps. It's not the GPU as it will not POST with the 8800 fitted either. PSI is 550watt buy meets all requirements so don't think
it is that, though more wattage wouldn't hurt in the future.

I think it must be the mobo, but I'd like to get a decent one with OC potential that doesn't cost too much (sub £70 - pref £50)

Any ideas on ones that will meet these requirements.

 

[chefboyeb]

Have you checked to see if your current bios supports the new cpu?

 

[iNVADER84]

Yeah. Latest BIOS which I have supports it. I checked beforehand to see if it was compatible and a fair few have the same config. I wand a pci-e 2.0 board anyway so it's no loss. Any good models spring to mind?

 

[chefboyeb]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131347
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131393

 

[iNVADER84]

I just bought the P5Q SE PLUS for £70 inc. delivery.

I had a thought as to why it may not have worked initially though - my Core 2 E6600 is overclocked to 3.2GHz (355 x 9) which I believe was still in effect when I put the Q9400 in as, when I replaced the E6600 after the Q9400 "fail" it was still running at 3.2Ghz.

I don't know if I can be bothered to rip everything out and try it at default settings, as the new mobo will be here tomorrow.

Any idea what this mobo will enable me to OC the Q9400 to? And also, I have an Asus tower cooler (can't remember the model for the life of me), that I purchased witht he E6600 - will it still be man enough for the Q9400? Being 45nm it *should* be cooler, but not finding much about it - the stock cooler looks very similar to the E6600one but who knows?!

 

[chefboyeb]

The cooler should work... Just monitor the temperature and see if it does a good job cooling the new cpu first, before you consider switching... Most motherboards should be able to overclock the Q9400 fairly to very well... And though it might seem like a hustle, i wouldn't mind using the cpu on the old board just to see how it works... Might help you figure some things out along the way even with the new board... Good Luck...

 

[iNVADER84]

If I get time I will do tonight.

On another subject - I notice that my BIOS boot times are taking a while longer now maybe 20 seconds to get past the logo, it used to take ony 5-10 secs

Also, for some reason, its increasing the load times of Battlefield Bad Company 2 - used to get in within 10-20 seconds, now its more like 30-40; I noticed I heard more of the music than I ever had.

Do you think this would be the GFX card causing this? Seems strange if so.

Hopefully its just the board being an arse and it will be solved tomorrow with the new one.

 

[iNVADER84]

Sorry, wires may have been crossed. E6600 is fitted with the HD 5850 and works fine on the old P5B board but since doing so I have encountered BIOS boot slowness and an increased load time in BC2. I don't have the time to put the Q9400 in tonight so probably won't try it until I get the new mobo tomorrow.

 

[iNVADER84]

New mobo came in today, fitting in a bit after a brief walk along the seafront, lol. Will let you know how I get on but thanks all for the advice. Been out of PC building for a while and don't have the free cash like i did when I was 18!