ASUS P5E3 Premium WIFi-AP @n Edition :: Introduction

Scores

• Features: 40
• Ergonomics: 10
• Compatibility: 23
• Support: 10
• Performance: 11
• Total: 94

With the release of the 45 nanometer Yorkfield and Wolfsdale CPUs from Intel, the need for high-end motherboards to support them has become apparent. The first official support for the new CPUs comes in the form of the X48 chipset, which is an update from the X38 chipset meant for the high-end computer enthusiast wanting the latest features and performance to match it.

ASUS builds motherboards, video cards and other computer components from a variety of manufacturers including Intel and NVIDIA. The latest motherboard in a long line-up of Intel based motherboards is the X48 based ASUS P5E3 Premium Wi-Fi-AP@n board on the test bench today. It should be interesting as it is the second X48 board on the test bench so let’s see what it’s all about.

ASUS Maximus Formula Motherboard Review :: Introduction

Scores

• Features: 40
• Ergonomics: 10
• Compatibility: 25
• Support: 10
• Performance: 8
• Total: 91

ASUS is one of my favorite motherboard companies, being a long time user since the ASUS P4E-800 days (Intel 865). Today ASUS is the number one motherboard manufacturer in terms of size and employees among the Tier-1 motherboard manufacturers and manufacture video cards, motherboards, laptop computers and other peripherals. Doc and I love Asus motherboards with the vast majority of our personal systems being based upon their motherboards.

Today I’m reviewing the ASUS motherboard the ASUS Maximus Formula based upon the Intel X38 chipset. While the X38 was released last year by ASUS, it is an excellent choice to show performance versus the NVIDIA nForce 780i SLI chipset as the board supports ATI’s Crossfire solution, meaning that you can put two ATI cards on the board to improve gaming performance.

ECS GF8200A Black Motherboard Review :: Introduction

Scores

• Features: 35
• Ergonomics: 9
• Compatibility: 25
• Support: 7
• Performance: 13
• Total: 89

ntegrated graphics have been widely regarded as a joke among hardware enthusiasts as they are generally underperforming, feature deficient and have drivers that don’t support the latest features in the case of the Intel integrated graphics not even having DirectX 10 drivers until a month or so ago. ATI has released the RS780 integrated graphics chipset which brings decent DirectX 10 performance to the integrated graphics market.

NVIDIA, along with ATI have brought their video card expertise to the integrated motherboard graphics and that has resulted in good integrated graphics in the form of the GeForce 2 MX graphics being nearly as powerful as the GeForce 2 MX discrete cards. The last generation integrated graphics from NVIDIA was the GeForce 6200 series which brought DirectX 9.0 graphics to the integrated world. NVIDIA recently launched the GeForce 8200 for the Athlon market to address the DirectX 10.0 market.