P45 Motherboard Reviews/Previews

[Super Nade]

O.K folks, it is that time again. We are waiting for the P45 boards to break into the overclocking scene. So, let us have one thread to rule 'em all...


Expreview have a summary of the various "previews" floating around the net.

http://en.expreview.com/2008/05/03/intel-p45-mobo-going-wild/

The common theme seems to be multi-phase VRM schemes for the NB and the memory.

 

[nd4spdbh2]

very intresting!

that foxcon board as much as i hate foxcon has an intresting idea... making there less distance between the cpu - nb - ram data lines will in theory reduce latencies! but its a foxconn no thnx.

 

[meionm]

Abit Boards
http://prohardver.hu/tema/abit_ip45_pro_lapok/hsz_1-50.html

Gigabyte
GA-P45-DQ6

MSi boards
http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/2008/04/18/early_look_msi_p45_and_nforce_780a_mobos/1

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/cebit-msi-p45-motherboards,4982.html

 

[MadMan007]

P45 is going to make x38 boards a tough sell.

I'm tired of Asus. There was a preview of the Gigabyte P45-DQ5 with some intense DFI-like BIOS options on xtremesystems, the DQ6 has some serious waste-o-money options like quad LAN, that's even more ott and useless than Asus' wifi.

I'm looking forward to DFI boards I've never had one and am interested in trying one out. I just hope they aren't 2 months after the others like they were for P965 and to a lesser extent P35/x38/x48.

 

[Super Nade]

Foxconn are upping the ante by providing dedicated VCore and VDIMM read spots...lol. The 16 phase VRM from ASUS seems like a colossal waste.

 

[meionm]

I just wonder how will this stack up against p35, x38 and x48. Usually newer is better even when not number higher.

 

[MadMan007]

Foxconn are upping the ante by providing dedicated VCore and VDIMM read spots...lol. The 16 phase VRM from ASUS seems like a colossal waste.

Yea I was thinking that too. It seems a lot like a marketing bullet point rather than serving any real purpose. Well, maybe there is a purpose and you can probably comment on this, I read an article a while ago on techrepository about phases in CPU power design and one of the advantages of additional phases is that they are cheaper to make because they can get away with less expensive components. Maybe that's the advantage and the 16 phase lollerskatepwnage marketing is just a side benefit.

 

[Neuromancer]

Foxconn avenger looks nice. The have really made some improvements lately with their high end boards yes?

I would love to see some enthusiast level EATX motherboards, for better thermal management. As well as more ease when dealing with fully configured rigs.

You know what I mean, tuniq or larger heatsink, 4 dimms, 4+ hdds, 2+ video cards, sound card, case headers etc gets a little tight trying to add or remove things from mobo.

 

[freeagent]

Yea I was thinking that too. It seems a lot like a marketing bullet point rather than serving any real purpose. Well, maybe there is a purpose and you can probably comment on this, I read an article a while ago on techrepository about phases in CPU power design and one of the advantages of additional phases is that they are cheaper to make because they can get away with less expensive components. Maybe that's the advantage and the 16 phase lollerskatepwnage marketing is just a side benefit.

well, in the first link, it shows the gigabyte has 12 pwms for the cpu, how come no one is saying anything about that? maybe asus just designed it for cleaner power then the "other" guys, im just guessing here.

 

[Rich'[ard]]

damn, i just got my new X38 chipset Asus P5E. dont' tell me these new boards are gonna be better than them. when are they being release?

 

[Blazing fire]

I just wonder how will this stack up against p35, x38 and x48. Usually newer is better even when not number higher.

Yeah, what's the diff between X48 and 45?

 

[Kuroimaho]

I like that foxconn board, even more than the Blackops hope it won't be as late as the Blackops.

 

[Super Nade]

With more phases, a higher PWM frequency is used, which means smaller valued components can be used (cheaper). The advantage of an n-phase VRM is that it provides more stable power, i.e DC with only higher frequency harmonics (lower amplitude though), but efficiency takes a bit of a dive if all phases are operational. I don't think you will see any noticeable difference between an 8 phase and a 16 phase VRM. But, it looks like ASUS may be turning off some of the phases if power demand is low.

Again, I don't see any benefit in all of this, because additional OFF-ON cycles introduce switching noise.

 

[ghost_recon88]

So basically the difference is just power management. Or is this gonna clock like the P35 boards did, except with 2 16x 2.0 lanes instead of the 16/4 configuration? Is 550MHz FSB + dual 2.0 16x lanes realistic at this point?

 

[core2due]

This could be a good chance to upgrade from my dfi with 975x chipset. What do you guys think? A dfi board would be nice.

 

[Super Nade]

So basically the difference is just power management. Or is this gonna clock like the P35 boards did, except with 2 16x 2.0 lanes instead of the 16/4 configuration? Is 550MHz FSB + dual 2.0 16x lanes realistic at this point?

Yep, just power management. You may see better performance with Quad cores, but I seriously doubt it is worth the price premium. Notice that manufactures are throwing in everything and the kitchen sink on their boards to justify the ridiculous prices.

 

[Blazing fire]

And the sink does not cost that much right?

 

[Automata]

And the sink does not cost that much right?

Well, it doubles the price.

 

[Blazing fire]

Marketing tatic... So dirty...

 

[Shiggity]

Asus Maximus II Formula P45 Chipset

This board is going to be pretty expensive at launch (~300$), but the features on it make it better than an X48.

It has a few new features that make it really cool.

"Speeding HDD – If you install two newly formatted drives into the Silicon Image 5723 SATA ports, the system will automatically stripe the drives (RAID 0) without the need for drivers. A switch in the BIOS or the enclosed software utility allows for RAID 1 operation. The beauty of this setup is that the SI 5723 performs all array calculations in hardware and does not require special OS driver support. The OS sees the arrays as standard ATA devices. Performance is on par with the ICH10R in our testing."

Automatic Raid0 direct hardware

"CPU Level Up – This feature is still being tuned in the BIOS. It is automatic overclocking of the CPU at a basic level. The interesting feature is that you choose a processor speed to overclock to in the BIOS and it will adjust all required BIOS setting to reach that setting provided the processor and other components in the board are capable of overclocking. Proper cooling is required for the more extreme overclocks. This should simplify overclocking for the beginner who does not understand FSB and Memory ratios but does understand processor speed.
It also provides a quick sanity check for the intermediate user who does not want to spend a lot of time changing a variety of BIOS settings before figuring out the processor limits. Our Q6600 sample was running at 3GHz in about 15 seconds when using this system. Granted, more advanced users will want to tune the BIOS, but for beginners it is an easy to understand system for overclocking."


This literally makes overclocking so easy anyone can do it. You basically tell what speed you want and it does everything for you


This board also has 2 bios's, so if you mess one up / bad flash, you still have a backup to go to.


It also has a new and improved onboard audio codec that supports EAX 4.0.

600 FSB's with this chipset pls


Source - http://www.anandtech.com/weblog/showpost.aspx?i=455