Trying to get back into building a computer only trouble is I have been living in the mountains away from overything for almost 4 years now. Enough rambling, I want to put together a mid ranged pc to game on... trying to cut this short but I plan on getting a i5-3570k (Already have a 650W antec PSU, 4GB of DDR3 Gskill, and a 660TI) and for motherboard.... well thats were I have been having a lot of trouble. I migh want to get a Mini-ATX but I want something to last a while and be able to overclock on. All help is appreciated!
I have a 3570k on a evga stinger itx board and a fractal design node 304 and its a very nice itx build.
Should I go with a 3570k or a haswell chip?
It really doesnt matter you might have more choice on haswell itx boards since there are a lot of boards being released but the 1155 itx boards are good too you can go both ways there is not a huge difference in performace if you can get them aroung the same price you might as well get haswell.
Haswell does preform slightly better than the ivy bridge. What's your budget and what will you do with the computer (ex. Games, editing, streaming, overclock, etc)? Also, depending on what you do or will be doing, going with an amd fx8320 or 8350 would be a better choice.
Im mainly going to be gaming and do some slight overcloking (nothing carzy). One thing im worried about getting a new Intel chip is that I have to delid the chip.
WarGlush, if youre gonna be playing new games that come out on the ps4 and xbone than it would be better to go the route of amd because the games will be amd optimized. If youre gonna play cames which can't/won't utilize the extra cores of the 8320/8350, (such as mainly older games) than it would be better to go with an intel i5 for its better single core preformance. And IF you do go intel, you won't HAVE to delid it, because you will still be able to overclock, just to not as high.
Alright if I do go the AMD path do you think it would be better to go with a full sized atx or mini?
Full ATX has its advantages and disadvantages, same goes for m-atx. M-atx is good if you dont mind losing a few things like ram slots and pcie lanes, while you get to use a smaller case. If size of case doesnt matter to you, and you want a lot of motherboard features, go with an atx board. If you want to use a small or small-ish case (such as the bitfenix prodigy) and dont mind losing pcie lanes and ram slots and other features, go with m-atx. Another advantage of m-atx mobo's are they are usually cheaper than atx mobos. In the end, its all up to what you need, and what you want.
How does overcloking compare with the two different motherboards (ATX vs M-ATX)
Also I forgot to mention but I curently have a Nvidia GTX 660Ti, Nvidia GTX 470, 650W Antec PSU, 4GB DDR3 1600Mhz Gskill Ram, 500GB WD HDD, and Intel SSD 128GB.
" Power Phases
In general, a motherboard with more power phases is able to deliver cleaner and more stable power to the CPU and RAM... allowing the them to hit higher overclocks. Having more power phases also means less load on motherboard transistors, prolonging their lifespan.
If you intend to overclock your CPU and RAM on a Micro ATX motherboard, it should at least have a 4 + 2 power phase (6 + 2 is better). 4/6 here is the number of phases for the CPU while 2 refers to the number of phases for the memory (RAM) controller.
All the power phases in the world is not going to matter if you don't have a high quality VRM (Voltage Regulator Module) to begin with. To avoid substandard VRMs, stick to reputable motherboard manufacturers: Asus, Gigabyte, Asrock, MSI. "
- See more at: http://www.buildcomputers.net/micro-atx-motherboard.html#sthash.PYR6awny.dpuf
So basically, it doesn't matter if you get a micro atx motherboard, or an atx motherboard for overclocking, what matters is their VRM's and power phase. A 6 + 2 power phase can get you a decent overclock, if, you get/have an unlocked cpu (such as intel's "K" series or basically any AMD CPU), and the motherboard has good VRM's.