GA-970A DS3 build/upgrade advice please.

[stree]

Hello, new  here and first post.
I am going to upgrade my current setup so I can make better use of a Samsung SSD 830 series 128,  right now its an MSI C70 845 with a Phenom 11 black 965, middling ram and 500Gb WD sata all under XP home.  PSU is a BeQuiet 450W, case is an ANtec with lots of room and front and rear fans. Its a home build.All runs very nicely, as much as an XP machine can, no problems with it at all.
No games, no overclocking bar  a fiddle with whats in the MB software and bios maybe, mainly browsing, vids music and occasional GIMP and photoshop and photo editing.
As stated, I want to run the SSD as boot and with core progs on it, use the 500GB as storage but thats not perfect under XP, so I will get Win 7
The MB only supports up to SAta2 and really Sata 3 is best with the SSD, so and new MB is needed too.
So plan so far is to get a Gigabyte GA 970a DS3, use my Phenom11 965, SSD and 500GB WD hard drives, and run Win 7.
But of course My current setup uses DDR2 ram and I will need DDR3 . so considering Mushkin silverline 2GB x2 package, not a clocking ram, but hoping it will be stable, thats more important.....
As a newcomer to Gigabyte ( well very soon anyway) I was hoping to hear some thoughts on the proposed and if anyone can see any snags in it.
PS,  this is all on a tight budget so not really much room for manouvre.
Thanks in advance!

[Vezina]

Buy a board from UD3 series and you ll never look back to MSI ,thats what i ve done
You can choose the 970 one or the 990 chipset based ones price wise.

[stree]

Thanks for the reply Vezina

I wasn`t going to look back to MSI, not right away anyway, hence my choice of a Gigabyte board.
What would the UD3 series offer above what I selected?
Also, I did say that my budget was pretty inflexible, I can get the 970 DS3 for #50:00 but a quick look at the UD3 series shows that they are selling for almost twice that. So what extra would I get with a UD3?

[Vezina]

UD 3  has better Voltage regulators for the  CPU than the other version .
It s also better prepared for taking overclocking on long term.
If you really need a new motherboard and you can only afford the DS 3 there is no problem as a normal user , even this is better than the same chipset based from MSI ,it has the right price.
I would recommend you though to use Windows 7 with this 9xx boards to get everything from that SSD.XP may ware it quite fast.

[autotech]

What you picked is fine the only thing i would change is the ram. some cheap gskill are always good among others but you want at least 1600 mghtz and id go 8 gigs the performance increase and load times you will see will be worth it.

As for the SSD make sure to use the tweaks links below.

http://www.ocztechnologyforum.com/forum/showthread.php?63273-*-Windows-7-Ultimate-Tweaks-Utilities-*&p=442151&viewfull=1

http://forum.corsair.com/forums/showthread.php?t=82516.

I think you are on the right path and understand budget why only change would be amount of ram. My setup is the 890fx chipset with sata 3 , usb3, and i use a 500 gig platter for the back up and tweaks make sure you set bios to ACHI.

Just remember that board you picked doesnt have the old IDE channels so have to use sata dvd writers. Good luck let us know how it turns out and what adjustments you made if any. Welcome to gigabyte forum.

[autotech]

Vezina
If you look at his power supply i dont think he will need the extra Voltage regulators for the  CPU as  that PSU wont handle alot if any overclocking. But he is on a budget and i think its about 50. average for a good 12 volt single rail PSU.

So as much as i wished he could afford it he cant so i think his path is right for him and what he can afford. In no way am i discounting what you added as you are right but some of us are a bit on the poor side and cant always aford the best.

He also said in the first post that he was going to use windows 7 so it will handle trim and i agree he will like it.

[Vezina]

The power supply is ok even for some overclocking ,he is stating he doesn t play games so he doesnt have a hungry video card(i see none stated in his post) .Enough amps left in there if the power supply has 450W for real.

Overclocking would be more limited by the P2 CPU than by the power supply.Having in mind he gets an AM3 + we can also consider a future Bulldozer upgrade so a good CPU VRM should not be neglected.

For long term usage i would buy a UD3 rather than a DS 3 .

I have also stated that if the budget is tight the board is good enough for the moment also.


stree , what budget have you allocated for this upgrade  and what future upgrades would you also have in mind right now ?!

[stree]

First, thanks for the insights you two, Autotech and Vezina.
Autotech, yes, you have it about right, apart from the ram.I see a lot of folk have had issues with anything over 1333 being seen as oc`d by the system probably the voltage regulators I hear. But no need for me anything over 1333, its fine.
Yes you are rigt i do understand about win 7 and ahci and trim thats what this whole rebuild is about!
As for Oclocking , as Isaid, just a tinker with the auto settings thats all, nothing serious.
I have 2 PSUs to choose, both 450, both modular, both true double rails, and neither from the cheap end of the range, the BeQuiet I mentioned and also a Targan.
I doubt I will upgrade the CPU on this, this rig will do until its time for a whole new build, maybe 3 years or so, another generation of CPU altogether.

I considered GSkill Ripjaw and PNY, but reading the manufacturesr blurb on each it seems thay are developed with a strong leaning towards Intel boards and CPUs so decided on AMD/Patriot 2x2GB performance. Not sure what RAM I will see under Win7, I was stuck with about 3 Gb on XP Considering W7 64 bit as well which I think will  allow me more ram.l
As for the budget? about 120 quid for MB, RAM and Win 7
So far, 53 for the GB board, 24 AMD ram,and I have win7 32/64 lined up for about 59 euros. so just about there.
The budget does not include the SSD I already have the Samsung 830 series 128
Video card? I have a couple of low mid end radeons, fine for what I do.

[autotech]

Dont worry about ram saying it is for intel. The ram i bought was said that way  but after reading reviews i bought them and has worked out great. Even if i dont buy there i go to newegg.com and read the reviews on them so i know what im getting into. This is the ram i settled on.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231429

Now it says amd but when i got it it was intel only.
Good luck with your build you sound like you arte on the right track.
Windows 7 64bit alows you to see more than 3 gigs so good choice.

[stree]

Yes perhaps I was a little too cautious about the ram, but stability is more important than speed to me really, so its OK.
Just had a look at that Targan PSU today, probably the one I will be using, and its actually 580 watt, so that should be plenty.
The video card is an Asus Radeon 4350 silent 512MB so very little demand from that with passive only cooling.
Also ordered Win7 32/64 bit today its the ultimate version, not that I need more features than Home premium, but the price was the same.
So everything arrives next week and I will start the build.
Oh, hard to believe, but today I found 8GB (2GB x 4) matched DDR3 1333 in my computer bits drawer!.I bought them a year ago for a build that never happened and just put them away........Also found a 2GB stick of DDR, with timings I have not seen before.....3 3 3 8. Wonder what thats from?

Autotech, you mentioned earlier that you had a 500GB platter for storage, just to say thats what I will be using too, SSD for boot Sata HDD for data.

[stree]

Just a quick update,

build went fine, nice board to work with.... Noticed that the boot drive likes to be on Sata 0 though, sometimes failed to load OS if in any other. No mention in the manual of this that I saw.
I say the build went fine, but there was one troubling episode... all built, double triple checked and fired up. Nothing.... Check the fiddly power PWR connection, easy to get wrong,  and it was good. Tried again, got hold of case to swing round a bit to have a better look inside and.. definite tingling....
Turned of and immediately thought I had shorted the board to the case and fried everything.  Its either my incompetence or the PSU then..Took it out  so I had  room to get the PSU out , ( Antec solo so no chance with MB in situ)and tried a proven MSI board while I had the opportunity.,  just the same. Whoops! Two fried boards ? So out with PSU  A Dark Power Pro  550... 4 years old and looks brand new, hardest work its ever done is Dual core 6300 and a 512mb ATI card.....Tried another psu, an old Targan  lovely kit but a bit crackle and poppy because its long in the tooth....... Booted fine.. so its the Dark Power thats duff. and a year out of warranty.............and yes I tried anyway at BeQuiet , but they could do nothing its a year and more past its warranty....
But I needed the Targan  for another build, my workshop machine,,,,,, The MSI board and a Sempron 145. ( I know I know, get a quad get an intel blah. Its fine , Its all I need , honest .)
So I looked for another Dark Power ( still a damn fine unit, has not put me off, but if you recall my OP, its a budget build and BQ are not really budget......... Hoping for B grade or open box. but none around.... BUT had some advice from someone who`s job it is to know...His job is in the PSU and silent PC business.......who was surprisingly frank and what he said would not be of any gain to hime or his business.....
Because it was cost limited he recommended a Xilence 450.. Strongly, said he could not have said that a few years ago but the rev 3 units are very different quality and capability. Anyway, got one fitted running very sweet and exceptionally quiet . Just waiting for my Win7 Ult now.
Oh and upped the multiplier to 16.5 ish and got  3.6 on the PH2x2 555BE  no more cores alas, but never mind, its sweet.

Oh and a novel SSD mount... Had a very old ONE GB Seagate, still working, but sacrificed. the main body of it is a solid billet of alluminium, 6 mm thick amd machined to 4 mm for the internals to mount then a tin can case over. so just used the ally lump with its built in bay mountings. Seagate must have thought that much ally would act as a heatsink I suppose. Works well though.....