Wingolf

In general, is there any reason to go for a P870TM (OR KM) over a P870DM2? I'm having trouble finding any TM/KMs available for sale in the US at a decent price, but I've got a line on a DM2 for pretty cheap. Seems like as long as you're willing to BIOS mod it, all the models are roughly equivalent. For reference, I'm planning to toss an 8086k and probably the 300HZ 1080P screen into it. Would I see any loss of performance going with the DM2?

What are the differences between the different models of the P870? I'm looking to pick one up, it seems like it's just P870DMx z170 Chipset P870KM z270 Chipset P870TM z370 Chipset Improved CPU Cooling Bracket All of them seem to have the same case, keyboard, touchpad, IO, CPU(with BIOS mod), GPU and storage options. Not 100% sure but all seem to be compatible 128GB RAM with some caveats(loss of Thunderbolt port) although 64gb would be more than plenty for me. (Aside - Can you board swap this to a higher board, I.E. turn a DM2 into a TM with a motherboard swap?) For reference, I'd be tossing an 8086k into it, and likely running Linux and Windows side by side. I'd be using 2 NVME drives, and would prefer to maintain thunderbolt compatibility if at all possible. Am I missing any differences? Does the newer chipset actually offer a performance uplift or are they all pretty much equivalent.

Honestly I have not seen an X170 in person. I saw the P870 a few years back and it is absolutely massive, even making my Alienware 17R1 look small by comparison, I just assumed it would be around the same size.

@Developer79 Do you have any plans on doing a similar modification for the X170KM? Not sure how suitable it is but it does have a two generation CPU advantage over the P870(unless your mod for the 13/14th gen CPUs comes to fruition) Also, does this work with a P870DM2-G, or just the TM-G? I can't see why one would work better than the other but I am not as intimately familiar with it as some are here. I have a line on a pretty cheap DM2-G and am debating going for it. Do you sell kits for this? How much would they cost(I can DM you or you can DM me if you'd rather keep any and all of these answers more private) (Quick aside for whatever mod approves this, how do I get properly approved to not have to have every post approved by a mod? I've been posting on and off for a while and just kinda assumed that would fall off on its own after a certain account age or similar. Feel free to DM me if you don't wanna clog up the thread)

I feel like those panels are really widely varied, should be a pretty easy pick based on preference 300HZ 1080P wins on refresh rate by a factor of 5, and games will run at a higher framerate / less power consumption if locked @ 60FPS. 60HZ 4K is sharper, might be better for productivity due to being able to fit more text on screen, but running games at 4k/60 is more demanding than 1080/60. IMO, at 17", 1080p is more than sufficient for most applications, so I'd personally pick the 300HZ panel. That being said, if I had the 4k panel, I wouldn't complain either 😄