What Motherboard for AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 955 Black Edition "125

[Deekz]

Hi im just wondering what motherboard i should get for a 'AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 955 Black Edition "125W Edition" 3.20GHz (Socket AM3)'.


Im looking to spend around £60 on the motherboard and i would like to use 6400 DDR2 800mhz memory with it.

Just wondering what options i have.

Thanks for any help you can give me

Deekz

 

[Terry1212]

Why do you want to use DDR2. Why not DDR3?

 

[clarkjd]

Hi im just wondering what motherboard i should get for a 'AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 955 Black Edition "125W Edition" 3.20GHz (Socket AM3)'.


Im looking to spend around £60 on the motherboard and i would like to use 6400 DDR2 800mhz memory with it.

Just wondering what options i have.

Thanks for any help you can give me

Deekz

I believe any AM3 socket motherboard will require DDR3.

Sorry!

 

[Deekz]

Well i recently bought 4 gig of ram and a radeon 6850, but my cpu is bottle necking my who pc in games, so now i need to buy a new cpu, and dont want to spend more than £200 on cpu and motherboard.

So looking for a decent quadcore CPU/motherboard

 

[Terry1212]

Well i recently bought 4 gig of ram and a radeon 6850, but my cpu is bottle necking my who pc in games, so now i need to buy a new cpu, and dont want to spend more than £200 on cpu and motherboard.

So looking for a decent quad core CPU/motherboard

You bought DDR2 memory?

 

[Deekz]

Im think the motherboards do support DDR 2 Example

Asus M4A78LT-M AMD 760G (Socket AM3) PCI-Express DDR3 Motherboard (Details below)

The motherboard supports DDR3 memory that features data transfer rates of 1800+(O.C.)/1600(O.C.)/1333/1066 MHz to meet the higher bandwidth requirements of the latest operation system, 3D graphics, multimedia, and Internet applications. The dual-channel DDR3 architecture doubles the bandwidth of your system memory to boost system performance, eliminating bottlenecks with peak bandwidths of up to 25.6 GB/s. Furthermore, the supply voltage for the memory is reduced from 1.8 V for DDR2 to just 1.5 V for DDR3. This voltage reduction limits the power consumption and heat generation of DDR3 which makes it an ideal memory solution.

 

[Deekz]

Terry yes for my existing CPU which is a dual core E6300 1.86mhz as i wasnt planning on replacing it, but it turns out its killing my pc in newer games like black ops thats unplayible and unreal 3 is a tad sluggish.

 

[rolli59]

These are the boards I would look for but I cant find them on scan.co.uk or ebuyer.com http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813130265
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131618

 

[Deekz]

Does that board support 6400 DDR2 800mhz ???

 

[Deekz]

Terry something else i found

Today AMD is releasing two new processors, the Phenom II X4 955 and 945, which are based on the same “Deneb” architecture though with a few notable changes. The most prominent change is that these are AM3 processors, and therefore can be used with either DDR2 or DDR3 memory. AM3 processors are also completely backwards compatible with AM2+ motherboards
.

 

[clarkjd]

Im think the motherboards do support DDR 2 Example

Asus M4A78LT-M AMD 760G (Socket AM3) PCI-Express DDR3 Motherboard (Details below)

The motherboard supports DDR3 memory that features data transfer rates of 1800+(O.C.)/1600(O.C.)/1333/1066 MHz to meet the higher bandwidth requirements of the latest operation system, 3D graphics, multimedia, and Internet applications. The dual-channel DDR3 architecture doubles the bandwidth of your system memory to boost system performance, eliminating bottlenecks with peak bandwidths of up to 25.6 GB/s. Furthermore, the supply voltage for the memory is reduced from 1.8 V for DDR2 to just 1.5 V for DDR3. This voltage reduction limits the power consumption and heat generation of DDR3 which makes it an ideal memory solution.

See this :http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090308170417AA8zdLG

there were some AM2/AM2+ MBs that had slots for both DDR2 and DDR3(Not at the same time, one or the other), but for the AM3 socket MBs, they only provide slots that DDR3 will fit in.

 

[rolli59]

Does that board support 6400 DDR2 800mhz ???

They do they are classified as AM2/AM2+/AM3 boards!
Not all AM2+ boards support AM3 CPU´s but most do

 

[1000FPS]

I had an Asus motherboard. It was the M4A78L-M and it was great! I used 4GB of DDR2 800 (like you), and I also used a Phenom II x4 955. It was a great little board, and it only cost me £50. DO NOT GET THE "LE" version though, because it only supports 95w CPUs. Dont worry, DDR2 RAM is hardly any worse than DDR3 at all. I highly recommend this board.

 

[Deekz]

So if i get a board that is AM2/AM2+/AM3 that would accept the processor 'AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 955 Black Edition "125W Edition" 3.20GHz (Socket AM3)' and would work with my DDR 2 ram????

 

[1000FPS]

So if i get a board that is AM2/AM2+/AM3 that would accept the processor 'AMD Phenom II X4 Quad Core 955 Black Edition "125W Edition" 3.20GHz (Socket AM3)' and would work with my DDR 2 ram????

You need an AM2+ board. AM3 will not work with DDR2.

 

[scott13183]

Go to Newegg.com, select Computer Hardware - Motherboards. Filter by CPU Socket Type: AM2+/AM3. They do have a category for AM3/AM2+/AM2, but I'm not sure if those are too old to support the new power stepping (C3) on the more recent AM3's or not - that's where you need to do extra checking on.

BIOSTAR TA790XE AM2+/AM3 AMD 790X ATX AMD Motherboard
From one of the feedbacks on there -
"Pros: board fired up right out of the box.
system: 965 black edition cpu, 8800 GTS graphics card.
8 gigs of crucial dual channel. Goodboard for those who would like to safely try overclocking. Good basic board for someone who wants to upgrade without changing everything at once."

Also, when I checked some feedback on the CPU itself on their website-
"Other Thoughts: AMD X4 955BE C3 Stepping @ 3.8ghz, 1.425v Stock Cooler
Gigabyte MA78G-DS3HP F5e bios
4GB GSkill DDR2 Pi Series 4-4-4-12
EVGA 8800GTX (I wish it was ATI but I got it for free)
Win 7 X64 Ultimate, Fedora 12"

The CPU stepping refers to the lower wattage 125 chip you mentioned. Seems like there's a decent amount of boards that would support this setup from the sounds of it. Make sure it supports a 125 watt C3 step AM3 CPU, had DDR2, and you'll be golden. Clarkjd is wrong in his comment - they do have boards that support it, just not as many out there now.

However, you may be future proofing your purchase by buying a motherboard that will more sooner be out of date than going with DDR3. If there's better performance from DDR3 down the road, I think it would suck to have to buy a new motherboard to get that. Possible a dedicated AM3 board would have more support for future AM3 chips versus a combo board. *Edited to read better...

Read more feedback on some of the components and you'll find something that meets your needs.

 

[bdcrlsn]

Im think the motherboards do support DDR 2 Example

Asus M4A78LT-M AMD 760G (Socket AM3) PCI-Express DDR3 Motherboard (Details below)

The motherboard supports DDR3 memory that features data transfer rates of 1800+(O.C.)/1600(O.C.)/1333/1066 MHz to meet the higher bandwidth requirements of the latest operation system, 3D graphics, multimedia, and Internet applications. The dual-channel DDR3 architecture doubles the bandwidth of your system memory to boost system performance, eliminating bottlenecks with peak bandwidths of up to 25.6 GB/s. Furthermore, the supply voltage for the memory is reduced from 1.8 V for DDR2 to just 1.5 V for DDR3. This voltage reduction limits the power consumption and heat generation of DDR3 which makes it an ideal memory solution.

That motherboard does not support DDR2, it's just clarifying that DDR3 RAM uses less voltage than DDR2 RAM. Any board that is AM3 only will not support DDR2 RAM. There are still some AM2/AM2+ boards available that support DDR2 RAM and your processor such as these:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=100007625+600007945&QksAutoSuggestion=&ShowDeactivatedMark=False&Configurator=&IsNodeId=1&Subcategory=22&description=&Ntk=&CFG=&SpeTabStoreType=&srchInDesc=