 |
 |
 |
||
|
|
||||
 |
|
|
| Intro and the P5E3 Premium | ||||||
In preparation for the impending arrival of Intel’s more affordable 45nm quad-core Yorkfield and dual-core Wolfdale processors, motherboard manufacturers have been readying a slew of new products to properly support the CPUs. Many of these motherboard products are based on Intel’s recent chipset offerings, including the X38 and brand new X48. We’ve already shown you a few X38-based motherboards and explained what the X48 brings to the table in previous articles. Today we’ll be taking a look at a couple of new motherboards based on these two chipsets, courtesy of Asus. Asus is no stranger to the enthusiast community, so we’ll spare you the company history lesson here. As usual, Asus’ newest, cutting edge motherboards offer everything you’d expect as power users. The X38-based Maximus Extreme and X48-based P5E3 Premium motherboards we’ll be showing you in this article are family members of two different series of products by Asus – R.O.G. and Ai Lifestyle – and as such they each offer a different mix of features and integrated peripherals. First up is the P5E3 Premium, pictured below. This motherboard is virtually identical to the X38-based P5E3 Deluxe, save for the updated chipset and a couple of additions to its bundle. Take a look...
The new X48 chipset-based P5E3 Premium ships with a wide assortment of bundled accessories and software. The Asus P5E3 Premium’s bundle includes detailed user manuals for the board, its integrated 802.11n WiFi NIC / AP, its AI Remote Control, and a multi-language quick-start guide to help get the board installed as quick and painlessly as possible. |
| P5E3 Premium: Board Layout |
The P5E3 Premium currently represents Asus' premiere desktop motherboard for Intel processors. As such, the board is very feature rich and sports an oversized cooling solution comprised of multiple copper heatsinks linked together via a complex heat-pipe system to appease harcore enthusiasts.
The area around the CPU socket on the P5E3 Premium is surrounded by copper heatsinks on all four sides. One of the heatsinks is mounted atop the X48 Northbridge, while the other three are mounted to various components in the board’s voltage regulation circuitry and power array. This heatsink arrangement may pose a problem for some oversized aftermarket CPU coolers, so take note. There is also a fourth heatsink affixed to the ICH9R Southbridge on the board. It, however, is a low-profile design that won’t interfere with any expansion cards.
Other than the board’s heatsink arrangement, the P5E3 Premium has a good layout. All of the board's various sockets, ports, and headers are color coded and easy to identify, and strategic connectors like the IDE port and four SATA ports are mounted to the board at right angles to make them easier to access when a long, double-wide graphics card is installed. Power connectors are all situated around the edge of PCB, which prevents the thick power cables from hindering air circulation over hot running components. As you can see, the P5E3 Premium has a trio of PCI Express x16 slots, a pair of PCI Express x1 slots, and a single standard PCI slot. The blue PEG slots on the board both have a full 16 lanes of PCI Express connectivity, while the black slot is powered by only 4 lanes. If you look close, nestled between the second blue PEG slot and its adjacent PCI slot, you can see a small card mounted vertically that houses a bit of flash memory. This card is where the Express Gate OS resides. More on that on the next page.
Thanks to the P5E3 Premium’s ICH9R Southbridge, the board supports multiple RAID modes and it has six internal SATA ports. There are another two eSATA ports in the board’s external I/O cluster, along with six USB 2.0 ports, analog and digital audio jacks, a PS/2 keyboard port, dual GigE LAN jacks, dual WiFi antenna jacks, and a single Firewire port. The P5E3 Premium’s audio support comes by way of an ADI1988 HD coded and Firewire by way of an Agere controller. Finally, an Ralink RT2770F chip powers the integrated 802.11n WiFi NIC. |
| P5E3 Premium: BIOS and Overclocking | ||||||||
Like the X38-based Asus P5E3 Deluxe, the X48-based P5E3 Premium features an embedded Linux-based operating system that’s available upon initial power-up. The feature is dubbed “Express Gate”, but it is based on the SplashTop platform technology developed by San Jose-based company DeviceVM. When the board is first powered up, a menu is displayed that gives users the option to boot the OS, enter the system BIOS, power down the system, or launch the Express Gate applications. If you choose to boot the OS, enter the BIOS, or recycle power, the P5E3 Premium behaves just like any other motherboard. If you launch the Express Gate applications, however, which are comprised of a web browser and Skype at this time, the embedded Linux-based OS is launched from a ROM and seconds later it’s available for use. We found the Express Gate technology easy to use and quite handy. Say, for example, you need to download a driver or BIOS file and the hard drive-based OS isn’t functioning properly. With Express Gate you can now access the web and integrated peripherals even if the system’s full blown OS has a problem and won't boot. Very handy indeed.
Asus P5E3 Premium - The BIOS It's All Right There Like most of their other motherboards, the Asus P5E3 Premium is equipped with an AMI derivative that is very complete and relatively easy to navigate. From within the BIOS users have the ability to configure, enable or disable all of the board's integrated peripherals, and monitor voltages and clock speeds. The P5E3 Premium also has a very complete set of memory timing options that offer excellent flexibility for fine tuning memory performance.
Overall, other than the color scheme, they are very similar to the BIOS derivatives used on most other high-end motherboards today, but navigating through Asus' BIOS menus does take some getting used to if you've never experienced them before.
Asus P5E3 Premium - Overclocking As Good As They Get Within the "Extreme Tweaker" section of the Asus P5E3 Premium's BIOS you'll find most of the board's performance tuning options. From within the "Extreme Tweaker" section of the BIOS, users have the ability to alter clock frequencies and voltages for virtually every major on-board component. The CPU and PCI Express frequencies can be altered in 1MHz increments, and the CPU multiplier and memory ratio can also be manipulated manually. There are also extensive voltage options for the CPU, Memory, chipset, and PLL. And what's interesting is that the BIOS is designed to allow users to key in voltages and frequencies directly without having to tunnel into a menu option. We found this type of interface easy to use and hope Asus incorporates the ability to key in settings directly in all of their motherboards. Overclocking Report: We also spent some time overclocking with the Asus P5E3 Premium with excellent results. We began by increasing our processor's core, the northbridge, and the memory voltages by .1v. Then we dropped our processor's multiplier, lowered the memory speed, and increased the front side bus frequency until our test system was no longer stable. In the end, we were able to increase the FSB to an impressive 528MHz with stock cooling and a couple of minor tweaks. We should note, that Asus included a document with the P5E3 Premium that showed a front side bus overclocked speed of 668MHz using a dual-core processor and exotic LN2 cooling for the chipset and CPU. The more adventurous among you should find this board to be an extremely competent overclocker. |
| Maximus Extreme: Specs and Bundle | ||||||
Next up we have Asus' flagship motherboard in the R.O.G. (Republic of Gamers) series of products, the Maximus Extreme. Although the Maximus Extreme is based on the X38-chipset, it supports front side bus speeds up to 1600MHz and DDR3 speeds up to 1800MHz, just like the X48. Through BIOS tuning and selective binning of the chipsets, Asus' Maximus Extreme offers an essentially identical feature set to the X48, as you can see below.
Lke the P5E3 Premium, the X38-based Maximus Extreme ships with a wide array of bundled goodies. Along with the board itself Asus throws in six SATA cables, a single SATA power adapter, floppy and IDE cables, and a case bracket with additional USB and Firewire ports. In addition to these items, we also found an electro-luminescent custom, I/O shield, three thermal probes, a pack of foam stand-offs, a baggie with wire ties, another baggie with fittings and clamps for all types of liquid-cooling systems, a user’s manual, a pack of Q-Connectors, a couple of optional fans that can be mounted to the board’s cooling apparatus, and a driver and utility DVD complete with copies of Asus' PC Probe II and AI Suite, 3DMark06, and KAV (among other things). Asus also includes a SupremeFX II audio riser card which is powered by an ADI 1988B 8-Channel HD audio CODEC, an "LCD Poster", and a copy of the excellent game S.T.A.L.K.E.R.
The LCD Poster is an interesting addition to the bundle. While it doesn't do anything extraordinary in comparison to most other LCD POST code error reporters, it is far more convenient to use. The Asus LCD Poster is unique in that it connects to the board via a long cable and can be placed right on a desktop. There is no need to bend down and peer into a system to read the LEDs mounted on the PCB itself – with the Maximus Extreme, the error codes are clearly visible right on the LCD’s screen, wherever a user decides to mount it. |
| Maximus Extreme: Board Layout |
As the current flagship of Asus' R.O.G. - Republic of Gamers - series of motherboard, the Maximus Extreme is loaded with integrated peripherals and sports a gigantic hybrid air / water cooling apparatus.
One of the Maximus Extreme's more interesting features that first appeared on Asus' Blitz line of motherboards is dubbed Crosslinx. Crosslinx is essentially a PCI Express switch that takes the some of the boards PCI Express lanes and splits them to two PEG slots in an x8 / x8 configuration when dual graphics cards are installed. With the CrossLinx switch, the Maximus Extreme is capable of running its trio of PCI Express x16 slots in either a PCIe 2.0 x16 / x16 / PCIe x4 configuration, or a PCIe 2.0 x16 / PCIe 1.0 x8 / x8 configuration.
The I/O backplane on the Maximus Extreme houses six USB 2.0 ports, a single Firewire port, two Gigabit LAN jacks, Coaxial and optical audio digital audio outputs, a single PS/2 keyboard port, two eSATA ports, and a convenient clear CMOS switch. Take the overclocking a little too far and you simply have to reach around to the back of your system to clear the CMOS - no more fumbling with jumpers inside the machine. The board's audio capabilities are handled by an ADI 1988B HD codec. Its GigE LAN functionality is handled by a Marvell 88E8001 PHY and Firewire support comes by way of a VIA chipset. |
| Maximus Extreme: BIOS and Overclocking | ||||||||
Like the P5E3 Premium, the Maximus Extreme is equipped with a Phoenix/Award BIOS derivative that is very complete and relatively easy to navigate, but there are some differences. As you'd expect from an enthusiast-class motherboard, from within the BIOS users have the ability to configure, enable or disable all of the board's integrated peripherals, and monitor voltages and clock speeds. And the Maximus Extreme also has an extensive array of memory timing options that offer excellent flexibility for fine tuning memory performance.
If you click through the images above and below, you'll see that the Maximus Extreme easily has one of the most tweaker-friendly BIOS offerings available, regardless of the platform. The shear number of options available from within this motherboard's BIOS should clue you in that this is not a product desiged for novices. There are a ton of knobs and switches to throw in this baby.
;) ;) ;) ;) ;) ;)
Overclocking Report: We followed the same procedure outlined a few pages back to overclock the Maximus Extreme. We began by increasing our processor's core, the northbridge, and the memory voltages by .1v. Then we dropped our processor's multiplier, lowered the memory speed, and increased the front side bus frequency until our test system was no longer stable. Ultimately, we were able to increase the FSB to 512MHz with stock cooling and a couple of minor tweaks to the BIOS. With more extensive tweaking and better cooling, the Maximus Extreme could surely go higher than this. Regardless, an FSB greater then 500MHz is very good. |
| Our Test Systems and PCMark Vantage | |||||||||||
|
For our first round of benchmarks, we ran all of the modules built into Futuremark's PCMark Vantage test suite. Vantage is a new benchmarking tool that we've incorporated into our arsenal of tests here at HotHardware. Here's how Futuremark positions their new benchmarking tool:
We tested all of the Intel-based motherboards represented here with a Core 2 Extreme QX9650 processor and 2GB of Corsair DDR3 RAM. The AMD powered systems were based on the recently released 790FX chipset and used 2GB of Corsair DDR2 RAM.
Memories 1 - Two simultaneous threads, CPU image manipulation and HDD picture import
If we tunnel deeper into PCMark Vantage's test suite, we see all of the Intel powered systems once again performing at nearly identical levels, which is to be expected considering we used the exact same CPU, RAM, and hard drive with each motherboard.
TV and Movies 1 - Two simultaneous threads, Video transcoding: HD DVD to media server archive, Video playback: HD DVD w/ additional lower bitrate HD content from HDD, as downloaded from the net
We saw more of the same from Vantage's 'TV and Movies' test.
Gaming 1 - GPU game test
PCMark Vantage's 'Gaming' test also reported similar performance from all three of the Intel-powered test systems. |
| PCMark Vantage (Continued) | ||||
|
We continue our test coverage with a few more modules from the comprehensive PCMark Vantage suite of benchmarks.
Vantage Music suite includes the following tests: Music 1 - Three simultaneous threads, Web page rendering – w/ music shop content, Audio transcoding: WAV -> WMA lossless, HDD: Adding music to Windows Media Player
PCMark Vantage's Music benchmark showed no variation between the Intel powered systems, which all finished well ahead of AMD's offerings. Vantage Communications suite includes the following tests: Communications 1 - Three simultaneous threads, Data encryption: CNG AES CBC, Data compression, Web page rendering: graphics content, 1024x768, windowed
Same deal in the Communications test where the Intel-based rigs put up near identical benchmark scores. Vantage Productivity suite includes the following tests: Productivity 1 - Two simultaneous threads, Text editing, HDD: application loading
More of the same in the productivity test as well. Only 9 points separated the Intel-based systems here. The Vantage HDD suite includes the following tests: HDD 1 - HDD: Windows Defender
PCMark Vantage's HDD test suite showed the Intel-powered rigs with a slight edge over the AMD powered systems, presumably due to efficiencies built into the more up-to-date ICHR9 Southbridge over the aging AMD SB600. |
| LAME MT and Sony Vegas | ||||||||
In our custom LAME MT MP3 encoding test, we convert a large WAV file to the MP3 format, which is a popular scenario that many end users work with on a day-to-day basis to provide portability and storage of their digital audio content. LAME is an open-source mid to high bit-rate and VBR (variable bit rate) MP3 audio encoder that is used widely around the world in a multitude of third party applications.
Our custom LAME MT MP3 encoding benchmark showed absolutely no variation between the three Intel-powered test systems.
Sony's Vegas DV editing software is heavily multi-threaded as it processes and mixes both audio and video streams. This is a new breed of digital video editing software that takes full advantage of current dual and multi-core processor architectures.
Our Sony Vegas video rendering benchmark showed very little variation between the Intel-based systems. The X48-based P5E3 Premium technically finished 1 second faster than the X38s, but we've seen variations larger than that from test run to test run. |
| POV Ray and Kribibench v1.1 | ||||||||
POV-Ray, or the Persistence of Vision Ray-Tracer, is an open source tool for creating realistically lit 3D graphics artwork. We tested with POV-Ray's standard included benchmarking model on all of our test machines and recorded the scores reported for each. We shoudl also note that we used the latest 64-bit beta build of the program. Results are measured in pixels-per-second throughput.
We know, we're beginning to sound like a broken record by this point, but once again the Intel powered test systems performed at virtually the same levels, which was significantly higher than even today's fastest products from AMD.
For this next batch of tests, we ran Kribibench v1.1, a 3D rendering benchmark produced by the folks at Adept Development. Kribibench is an SSE aware software renderer where a 3D model is rendered and animated by the host CPU and the average frame rate is reported.
We saw more of the same from Kribibench, regardless of which model we used for the benchmark. The Intel rigs all performed within a fraction of a single frame per second of one another, and put up scores much higher than the AMD-powered rigs. |
| Cinebench R10 and 3DMark06 | ||||||||
|
Cinebench R10 is an OpenGL 3D rendering performance test based on Cinema 4D. Cinema 4D from Maxon is a 3D rendering and animation tool suite used by 3D animation houses and producers like Sony Animation and many others. It's very demanding of system processor resources and is an excellent gauge of pure computational throughput.
Becuase we used the exact same RAM, CPU, and hard drive on the Intel-based rigs (the AMD rig required DDR2 RAM), they all performed almost exactly the same in the Cinebench R10 benchmark.
3DMark06's CPU performance module reported only a 5 point spread between all three of the Intel-based systems. |
| Gaming: Crysis and F.E.A.R. | ||||
For our last set of tests, we moved on to some in-game benchmarking with the Crysis SP demo and F.E.A.R. When testing processors with Crysis or F.E.A.R, we drop the resolution to 800x600, and reduce all of the in-game graphical options to their minimum values to isolate CPU and memory performance as much as possible. However, the in-game effects, which control the level of detail for the games' physics engines and particle systems, are left at their maximum values, since these actually do place some load on the CPU rather than GPU.
We saw almost no variation in the framerates between the three Intel-powered systems we tested. Crysis reported framerates for the three Intel motherboards that were within .5 FPS of each other. F.E.A.R. reported a 5 frame per second spread between the three Intel boards, but that equates to a roughy 1.7% delta, which is within the margin of error in that test. |
| Our Summary and Conclusion | ||||||||
Performance Summary: There are two performance comparisons that should be made in this article, the comparison between the X48 and X38 chipsets, and the comparison between the newer P5E3 Premium and Maximus Extreme and the more mature P5E3 Deluxe. For all intents and purposes, the X48 and X38 performed at virtually identical levels in all of the benchmarks we ran. The X48 is really just a speed-binned X38 that's guaranteed to run with a 1600MHz FSB anyway, so we really weren't expecting any major differences. In comparison to the more mature X38-based P5E3 Deluxe, we also found that the newer P5E3 Premium and Maximus Extreme performed right in line with expectations.
Asus P5E3 Premium:
|
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
;)
