Systemax Sabre Intel Core 2 Extreme Gaming PC

BIOS Details of the Systemax Sabre Intel Core 2 Extreme Gaming PC Full Retail BIOS with all the Trimmings

The Systemax Sabre comes loaded with a fairly robust, tweakable BIOS that offers a good selection of advanced options.  As the system is shipped, the BIOS is set to default settings, but those looking to tweak the system's performance should find the BIOS satisfactory.  The majority of performance options are located under the Advanced Chipset Configuration menu.  Here lie the overclocking options along with memory and PCI Express configuration.  To access the overclocking features, this board had a menu screen that equates to a disclaimer stating if you break it, you break it.  First we had to click the Default Configuration Override and then acknowledge the warning.  Once in, a number of advanced options appeared.  The first was the Processor Ratio Multiplier which ranged from 5x to 40x with the default being 14x.  The CPU VID, when set to manual, could be set from 1.2750v to 1.6000v in increments of .0025v.  The FSB Frequency Override allowed for settings from Default, 533, 800, 1067 and 1333MHz.  There was also a Front Side Bus Voltage Override that was adjustable from Default, 1.395, 1.333 and 1.271v.

Also under the Advanced menu was the Memory Configuration menu that offered a host of performance options.  By default, the system memory is configured for SPD which runs the memory at 800MHz with timings of 5-4-4-18 (tCL-tRCD-tRP-tRASmin).  When set to Manual, memory frequency can be set for 333, 400, 533, 667, and 800MHz.  tCL ranged from 5, 4 or 3 while tRCD and tRP ranged from 2, 3, 4 and 5.  Lastly, tRASmin was adjustable from 4 to 15 in increments of 1.  Oddly, the SPD settings were 5-4-4-18, yet the tRASmin was not manually adjustable to 16, 17 or 18.  Either way, that is a fairly conservative number that most users would not require the manual setting.  Rounding out the critical memory settings was the DDR2 Voltage adjustment which defaults to Automatic but could be manually set for 2.2, 2.1, 1.9 and 1.8v.  

Test Systems Specifications Parade of Power

To give a complete picture of how the Systemax Sabre Intel Core 2 Extreme Gaming PC performed, we compared our benchmark results to a host of other systems in its performance class.  Performance data was compiled from several recent reviews in an effort to paint a clear performance picture.  Every effort was made to configure each system as closely as possible, however, variation in driver versions and other hardware differences should be considered when making comparison.  With commercially available systems such as the Systemax Wildcat and Voodoo Omen, testing was performed with systems as they came configured from the manufacturer.