What's the best CPU the motherboard G7B630-N supports?

[crystal6tak]

Hey all!

 

I've been asked to see if I can upgrade a fairly old machine with quite a few restrictions. It's hooked up to a CBCT machine and I'm not allowed to change the software or motherboard.

 

This is the current specs:

G7B630-N

Windows XP 32 bit

4GB DDR2-667 mhz

Intel Core 2 Duo E6400

GTX 280

A hard drive

 

I'm thinking I can upgrade the CPU and storage to an SSD at least. I'd put more ram but the OS is 32 bit. I've found the specification page but I don't know much about older generation hardware. I'm completely out of my depth here. Looking it up, LGA 775 seems to support up to quad cores, but I'm seeing some threads saying how some motherboard are capped to Duo's? I really don't understand what to look for. My question basically is what is the best CPU this motherboard supports?

 

Also I'd like to upgrade the HDD to an SSD, likely buy an SSD, clone the HDD into it, and use that. However I can't find what SATA it supports? I think it's SATA 1, but I can't find any concrete specification saying so. 

 

Thank you for your time!

[Chronified]

Sweet, that's Core2Duo territory 

Best bet is a Core2Quad Q6600, they can be found on eBay for $8-$12 , easy drop in. 

Search up the bsel mod if you don't have an overclockable motherboard, you cover 1 pad on the CPU with tape and it bumps the FSB speed from 1033 to 1333, making the clock speed jump from 2.6Ghz to 3.0Ghz, no other tweaks needed. 

Here's a pic of the pad to cover, easily the best bang for your buck when upgrading old Core2Duo based machines! 

 

[crystal6tak]

4 minutes ago, Chronified said:

Sweet, that's Core2Duo territory 

Best bet is a Core2Quad Q6600, they can be found on eBay for $8-$12 , easy drop in. 

Search up the bsel mod if you don't have an overclockable motherboard, you cover 1 pad on the CPU with tape and it bumps the FSB speed from 1033 to 1333, making the clock speed jump from 2.6Ghz to 3.0Ghz, no other tweaks needed. 

Here's a pic of the pad to cover, easily the best bang for your buck when upgrading old Core2Duo based machines! 

 

Neat! One thing though, are you certain the motherboard supports quad cores? Looking at the Q965 chipset in the wiki, Core 2 Quad isn't listed. But I do see forum threads saying Core 2 Quad works on it. I'm utterly confused, is there any sure-fire way to know if the CPU would work before I order the chip?

[Chronified]

The board likely released near the beginning of the LGA 775 sockets lifespan when it was just the Pentium 4 , Pentium D and Core2Duo

A little bit of digging and I found this motherboard, which is a revision of yours, same chipset and has official support for the Core2Quad. https://www.bressner.co.uk/products/motherboards/mb-g7b630-nr

Product page for yours likely doesn't have the Core2Quad support listed because it didn't exist yet at launch, but like many Dell Optiplex systems I haven't come across a single LGA 775 Q95 chipset motherboard that I can't just plop a Q6600 into lol

[crystal6tak]

7 minutes ago, Chronified said:

The board likely released near the beginning of the LGA 775 sockets lifespan when it was just the Pentium 4 , Pentium D and Core2Duo

A little bit of digging and I found this motherboard, which is a revision of yours, same chipset and has official support for the Core2Quad. https://www.bressner.co.uk/products/motherboards/mb-g7b630-nr

Product page for yours likely doesn't have the Core2Quad support listed because it didn't exist yet at launch, but like many Dell Optiplex systems I haven't come across a single LGA 775 Q95 chipset motherboard that I can't just plop a Q6600 into lol

Amazing! Thank you! Btw, any reason to choose the Q6600 over the Q6700?

[abit-sean]

According to this https://manualzz.com/doc/en/52001435/dfi-g7b630-n-cpu-memory-compatibility-list-manual the X6700 should be fine. Not sure about the Q series.

[emosun]

Is there any reason the board and software can't be changed?

[crystal6tak]

Just now, emosun said:

Is there any reason the board and software can't be changed?

It's tied to the CBCT machine. From what I was told in both the software and hardware side. The company is long gone so there's no way to relink the two if something breaks.

[emosun]

14 minutes ago, crystal6tak said:

It's tied to the CBCT machine. From what I was told in both the software and hardware side. The company is long gone so there's no way to relink the two if something breaks.

how does the machine interface? If it's via one of the regular ports then more than likely the machine just has to run the program it uses and have that specific port on it. 

In any case you should consider duplicating the machine if it's at all important.