P55 Overclocking Showdown - ASUS, Gigabyte, and EVGA at the OC Corral (Page 6 Updated)

Some of you asked us for scores and benchmarks showing just how far we managed to push the top P55 boards in our sub-zero cooled benchmarking (amidst socket failures) test suite. So we are here today to show how these boards fared against each other when using the same components. Be warned the results are geared more towards benchmarking fanatics and are not in any way indicative of your everyday web browsing PC needs...

A quick summary of each board:

EVGA P55 FTW SLI E657

Our favorite board of the bunch for extreme benchmarking is the EVGA E657. In terms of ease of use and 'overclockability' this board wins on all counts. Our retail sample came with a TYCO AMP socket and survived everything we threw at it over the last six weeks of near 24/7 testing. At cold temperatures, this board boots up better than any other we’ve tested to date. You don’t have to boot up in safe mode or wait for temperatures to increase, it’s that simple.

Heavy load benchmarking stability is this board’s strength and at its price point there is no other P55 board that delivers on as many levels for the overclocking professional. EVGA is using TCYO AMP and LOTES sockets exclusively for all their P55 boards at this point, although there may be some early stock around still using Foxconn sockets.

ASUS ROG Maximus III Formula

While it worked our ASUS Maximus III Formula board was a pleasure to use. In terms of overall features, BIOS design, and general desktop performance this board is rated at the top of our list. Unfortunately, the board did not respond as well as the EVGA or Gigabyte boards in extreme overclocking conditions. Our experience with the large cascade was not trouble free as it refused to post once the evaporator head temperature was below -110 degrees.

The ROG Connect software is a novel design that we see a lot of promise in and a pleasure to use as a side bonus. The board was proving itself to be the all around choice (gaming/desktop/overclocking) until we experienced the now infamous socket burn syndrome.

As of press time for this article, ASUS is still investigating the socket burnout problems and has not told us if they will be following the lead of other vendors in moving over to other socket vendors for their high end boards.

Gigabyte GA-P55- UD6

The GA-P55-UD6 from Gigabyte was on a level playing field with the ASUS ROG for the most part in general performance and extreme overclocking results. It did trail the other boards in the 8-thread CPU tests, but showed second place performance everywhere else. The UD6 handled cold temperatures as well as the E657, but required us to shut the PSU off periodically between reboots in order for the board to properly repost.

Our test sample arrived with the revised Foxconn socket and managed to survive the onslaught of benchmarks without a problem. We understand that Gigabyte has moved production over to LOTES based sockets for their higher end boards, so expect to see these showing up in the retail channels shortly.

EVGA P55 Classified 200

When this board arrived in the labs we were intrigued to see what it brought to the table in comparison to less expensive P55 boards. At a $340 price point, there’s no room whatsoever for failure. Unfortunately, the only real strength that extra monetary outlay will buy you is the ability to run non-memory intensive 8-thread loads a few MHz higher than the superlative EVGA E657.

The other side bonus is for multi-GPU setups as you get dual x16 capabilities, though we wonder why you would even pick a P55 board at this price point for such a setup when there are X58 boards available to do the job better. While the board responded well in most cases, we had problems with higher memory speeds (over 2200MHz) as they were just not as stable on this board in comparison to the other boards in our tests, no matter what we tried. We’re not sure if this can be fixed without some kind of hardware change, as we tried every BIOS tweak the board has in order to try and squeeze a little more stability above DDR3-2200, but alas, no improvement.

Biostar TPower i55 – Super Middle Weight Contender

After our review of the MSI GD-65, it was clear that we had a very good board on our hands but one that was lacking the final layers of polish that segregate the really good from the very best. Needless to say there are other candidates available that may fit the bill or improve in areas where the MSI GD-65 is lacking. Biostar thinks one of those options is the TPower i55. The TPower i55 comes in around $180, which is around $25 higher than MSI’s GD-65. However, we think Biostar is aiming to upstage the top-end P55 boards by offering similar overclocking features, quality, and performance at a lower price. Of course, $180 is encroaching on the lower-end X58 price territory, so Biostar has a difficult sale on their hands. However, we think Biostar hit their target for the most part.

Overview/Conclusion

We’ve thrown our standard test suite at the TPower i55, testing gaming performance and day to day usability. In terms of overall compatibility, this board came out of the blocks well ahead of what you expect from a tier “B” supplier. All of our testing was performed on the current public BIOS and completed without a glitch. It’s the first time in a long time we’ve not had to request fixes for peripherals or BIOS issues/tweaks to complete a benchmark, a welcome change indeed! It not the perfect BIOS in every regard, but this is one extremely solid board when it comes to stability and compatibility.

It’s when you look past the BIOS related stuff that you’ll probably find a couple of things to groan about. Firstly, the lack of on-board fan headers; 3 in total, one of which is for the CPU, while one of the others becomes obscure as soon as you place a long GPU like the 4870X2 in the primary PEG slot. The remaining header will likely be used to cool the onboard heatsink array, leaving no additional options for case fans. .

Given how sensitive overclockers are about component/case operating temperatures, we find the limited fan header count an odd choice on BIOSTAR’s part. After all, high temperatures and overclocking generally don’t mix very well.

The second gripe is one you’ll only encounter if you change video cards or add-in cards often, so you could say we’re nit-picking. The PCI/e retention latches are a royal pain to unlock once a card is inserted in the slot. We found our 4870X2 was un-removable by hand unless we used a pair of long nose pliers to wedge the retention latch away from the card. It’s not a deal breaker, but there are better ways of latching cards into slots as ASUS has shown us recently. If you have to remove such a card when the board is placed in a case, we’re sure it'll be accompanied with a fair share of choice words.

Lastly, we were going to add the lack of a CMOS clear button on the rear I/O panel to the list of gripes but found we did not have to use the onboard jumper at all during the test period. BIOSTAR has done an incredible job at BIOS recovery in the event of a failed overclock or incorrect setting. Our test board recovered from everything we threw at it, coming back to post in safe mode so that the offending BIOS setting could be corrected with minimal trouble.

On the overclocking front, getting 2000MHz+ memory speeds is relatively straight forwards (with the right CPU and memory kit!) other than the fact we had to change tRFC manually to 80 as the BIOS defaults to a tight 74 when left to its own devices using our Corsair 2200 8-8-8-24 4Gb kit (could be down to the SPD). Our GSkill and Kingston DDR3-2133 8GB C9 kits operated fine with the tRFC at the default 74. Running 2000+ memory speeds always requires a little end-user leg work on these platforms, so simply changing four voltages and setting primary memory timings is certainly nothing to moan about.

The basic essentials like S3 sleep mode properly resuming, even with BCLK’s north of 215MHz, worked extremely well on this board. This is a big plus for those that like to utilize sleep states with the boards overclocked. Automated overclocking is also available for users who prefer one touch overclocking. Three presets are available, which raise BCLK by up to 12MHz (145BCLK effective with 24x Turbo Mode on the 750 that resulted in 3.4GHz speeds at full load) at the touch of a button. Not the most impressive increase but voltage ramping is very moderate and we found the presets to be completely stable on our test hardware without any compatibility problems.

If you are considering one of the top-end P55 boards from ASUS, Gigabyte, MSI or EVGA; we think you should take a hard look at the TPower i55 before you spend more money elsewhere. Other than the fan header count, it does not appear to give up anything to more expensive boards when faced with the rigors of daily use or when overclocking on air or water. Against mid-range boards, the BIOSTAR appears to be a little better suited for pushing hard by virtue of its over engineered power rails (something the lower priced boards tend to skimp on) and component quality. To sum it up, the TPower i55 is not quite perfect, but it’s close enough for most. Call us impressed.

MSI Big Bang -Trinergy

MSI Big Bang - Trinergy

What we really wanted to show you at this point was MSI's BIG Bang Fuzion, the eagerly anticipated motherboard based on Lucid's Hydra technology. Fuzion is not quite ready yet unfortuantely. In the meantime, we've been sent another board to review from MSI's Big Bang series called the P55 Trinergy. Not quite as exciting on paper, the Trinergy is basically the MSI P55 GD-80 on steroids. The testosterone in this case is supplied by a slew of tantalum capacitors and overclocking gadgetry topped off with NVIDIA's NF200 multiplexing features to provide additional PCI-E lanes for multi GPU setups.

MSI's angle for these additions is that they want to be seen as a high-end vendor, so they are ramping board features in a bid to be seen as a bona-fide entity that can deliver class leading products. One can't begrudge the aspiration, although high-end typically means high price too. In keeping with that tradition, the Trinergy has an MSRP of $349. Yes, that's right, $349 for a P55 board! That's the kind of money that will buy you a bells and whistles X58 motherboard that can do CrossFire X or Triple SLI natively. Not to mention that X58 boards in this price range tout similar overclocking centric features. We don't think much more needs to be said really.

Considering the Trinergy's intended audience, the primary focus of this review will be gaming performance in multi card configurations against other P55 boards, and of course the elephant in the room called X58. We're going to stick with the article format we first introduced in the MSI-GD 65 review. You get everything you need in terms of quirks and merits right here on the front page together with the final conclusion.

Overview/Conclusion

Those of you that read our MSI GD-65 review will recall a couple of things that Gary highlighted as needing improvement. First of all, sleep mode recovery at higher BCLKs not working on the GD-65 (190 BCLK and over). We're happy to say the Trinergy does not share this trait. S3 sleep mode recovered all the way to 215 BCLK (manual overclocking) for us on this board, which is as high as anyone will likely need it to work.

One of the more serious issues on the GD-65 was also the inability for OC Genie to work properly with some of our lab PSUs. It seems things have improved on this front too; repeated tests on the Trinergy have not shown any issues with our PSUs thus far. While we're on the subject of OC Genie, MSI's voltage defaults for automated overclocking routines came in very close to what we actually needed while using manual settings. Automated overclocking took our CPUs to 197 BCLK x 19 (3743MHz effective) with minimal fuss. This makes things quick and easy for those of you who don't like fiddling around with the finer sides of the BIOS; you just push one button and the board does the rest.

Our major concerns during the test period centered on MSI's bundled overclocking software misapplying and misreporting voltages. This is a situation that has plagued all of MSI's P55 boards to date. We finally received a fix early this week and are happy to report that the problem (on the Trinergy at least) has been isolated and "fixed".

Memory overclocking was another area needing attention; again we roll back to the GD-65 exhibiting similar issues. The problems mostly involved memory sub-timings failing to respond to manual changes and misreporting the actual value. MSI tells us they have managed to identify the problem and should have a BIOS fix for it shortly.

DFI P55 MI-T36: Little Cutie

DFI unveiled the P55 MI-T36 to the public a couple of months ago. It's an exciting little board based upon the P55 chipset, cut back to the most desirable essentials in order to facilitate a shrink down to the mini-ITX form factor.

What DFI are attempting to do is bring near enthusiast level performance to a form factor that is associated largely with web-browsing and HTPC use. Teamed up with a suitable GPU, the prospects of having a compact multi-purpose PC capable of delivering a high-end gaming experience is rather compelling.

Unfortunately, there's not exactly an abundance of suitable PC cases on the market catering for such builds. Right now, you're limited to a couple of ITX offerings from Silverstone, namely the SG-05 and SG-06 models, while Lian-Li have the PC Q07. Obvious limitations in going such a route are related to PSU requirements. Once you team a board like this up with a hefty GPU, cooling and power demands throw minimum case dimensions towards M-ATX sizing, which defeats the attraction of going for mini-ITX in the first place.

Nevertheless, products like these create demands for innovation and we're sure the MI-T36 has given PC case and PSU vendors something to think about for the future. So although the MI-T36 seems like a bit of an outcast in certain scenarios at this stage of proceedings, it's still interesting to see what DFI have managed to cram into the mini-ITX form factor.

Gallery: DFI MI-T36 Board Pictures

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We've spent the past week or so running various benchmarks on the MI-T36 to see how it fares against regular ATX sized P55 offerings. Of course, boards from DFI usually feature overclocking centric BIOSes, so we've taken the time to explore what's possible on that side of things too...

Overview/Conclusion

Our board arrived with the P55MIB02 BIOS, which worked well within the context of stock processor speed testing. Onboard peripherals work as they should for the most part, although we have seen reports of the board failing to work properly with USB wireless adaptors. Our issues/niggles during testing were primarily related to overclocking.

First of all, some of the memory sub-timings don't respond to manual changes, so you have to work with what you get. Although, we should add that the default settings are more than adequate in most situations, unless you decide to push the board harder than you should.

One of the other niggles is that you don't get any report of the applied operating frequency in the BIOS other than BCLK. Failed OC recovery tends to be hit and miss too; our board frequently froze on the post screen after OC recovery had kicked in, leaving us needing to reset CMOS to get back into the BIOS. We also found that the board failed to recognize our hard drives on occasion when loading saved BIOS profiles or when the board recovered from a failed overclock. Lastly, S3 resume seems to be limited somewhere between 150-160BCLK on the current BIOS. Any higher than this and the board gets caught in a reboot loop.

All of the above issues have been reported back to DFI who are working on fixes as we speak. The new BIOS will also cap over-current protection to around 90 amps with a maximum VID of 1.40V (currently set to 110 amps). The reason is that onboard power delivery for CPU VCore does not respond kindly to being pushed under heavy loads. We've seen one reported case of a reviewer pushing the board over 3.8GHz with a HT enabled 4 core CPU running stress tests like OCCT and burning out a couple of FETs. Just a heads up to those who are thinking of pushing the MI-T36: it's not designed for it. We'd say you're better off teaming a board like this up with a 750 CPU, and keeping operating speeds below 4GHz. Cooling the PWM FET's actively may help a little, but given the location of some of them, we don't think it is going to be practical or easy. It's something that DFI should have addressed prior to release.

The alternative is to wait and see what the upcoming H55/H57 platform and processors bring to the table. The IGP makes it a more ideal candidate than P55 for mini-sizing, while the reduced core count of Clarksdale processors should allow for reasonable overclocking headroom without being too demanding of power delivery. We haven't heard of any upcoming M-ITX boards from other vendors yet, although we're sure it's a work in progress now that DFI have laid down the gauntlet with the MI-T36. A beefier VRM from the likes of Volterra would see a board like this upstaging everything priced above it for overclocking. FET's delivering up to 45 amps a piece are readily available, and can deliver buckets of current within a small footprint so long as cooling is taken care of properly. Don't be surprised if you see someone running with the concept.

What DFI have done is to pave the way for future products by giving vendors a glimpse of what needs to be addressed and catered for to make the mini-ITX form factor attractive for such use. As it stands right now on the current shipping BIOS, the MI-T36 has a bit of an identity crisis. You've got overclocking features on tap that are usually reserved for boards costing twice as much, while onboard power delivery imposes limitations before you'll really make use of them. Being able to deliver both would have been nice, but we guess compromises were made to work within a reasonable target price. We applaud DFI for pushing the boat out regardless. The execution may not suit everyone, but we think the MI-T36 deserves consideration if you're looking for a little work horse. Just be prepared to work within its limitations.

Choosing the Best H55/H57 Motherboard - Part 1

January 3, 2010 saw the lift of Intel's embargo on the Clarkdale family of processors and supporting H55/H57 series chipsets. Boards featuring these chipsets have been in our labs for a few weeks now, and we have been busy testing them to figure out which one makes the most sense to buy. After a solid two weeks on the merry-go-round, leaving us with eye-bags larger than potato sacks and eyeballs redder than a Baboon's backside, we are finally in a position to deliver part one of our coverage.

Before we continue further, it makes sense to start with a couple of H55 and H57 chipset diagrams for a refresher and overview:

Intel Chipset Pricing
Chip set	Pricing (1000 units)
Intel Q57	$44
Intel H55	$40
Intel H57	$43
Intel P55	$40

The diagrams lay out the topology simply enough; what they don't make clear is that Clarkdale CPUs are confined to single GPU configurations by Intel when used in conjunction with H55/H57 motherboards. That does not mean to say that you can't run dual GPU configurations on H55/H57 altogether though; you can if you use a Lynnfield series processor, if the motherboard vendor has taken the trouble of placing the appropriate lane switches onto the board.

The only way to get dual GPU capabilities from Clarkdale CPUs is to use them in a supporting P55 motherboard. Weird, no? The segregation would make sense if Intel offered the H55 and H57 chipsets to vendors at a substantially reduced price in comparison to P55. Clearly, that's not happening at present, as the H57 costs $3 more than the P55 before you've even put a component on the motherboard.

So where does this leave H57? The only thing it has to offer Clarkdale is a few extra PCI-E lanes, two extra USB ports, and RAID. If you're going to use the IGP, you don't really need the extra PCI-E lanes, which essentially means that you're paying for the option to run RAID on the H57 PCH. We also fail to see the attraction of running a Lynnfield processor in an H57 board; the H57 boards would need to come in at least $20 cheaper than entry level P55 boards, or offer some form of performance enhancement for it to start making sense.

In light of this, we're expecting vendors to bring H55 boards at a maximum of $130 (hopefully less), while H57 boards should be offered at a price reflecting the difference in chipset and associated parts costs only. The $150~$200 bracket is best left to mid/upper tier P55 motherboards and entry level X58 offerings, rather than have H57 competing in these segments.

Our focus for this two part series is to look primarily at the sub-$150 H55/H57 motherboards. A $200 board did make it into the test lineup before the dual GPU information was made clear to us by Intel and the board vendors. We've kept it in the running for now, just to see what H57 offers over H55 in terms of performance and overclocking.

Today's full lineup of test subjects is the ASUS P7H55D-M EVO, ASUS P7H57D-V EVO, the ASRock H55M-Pro, and the MSI H55M-ED55. Don't be alarmed if you don't see your favorite vendor in the current test list; two boards from Gigabyte have just touched base in our labs, while boards from BIOSTAR and ECS are currently en route. We'll be looking at all of those in part two of our coverage, where we'll also offer up our final verdict on the best choice.

We've got plenty of fat to chew over in part one first, so let's move on to our user experience summary of each board before we focus on the finer elements of today's test samples.

Choosing the Best H55/H57 Motherboard, Part 2

It's finally ready: part 2 of our H55/H57 coverage. After battling it out with eight motherboards, we decide which ones we'd be happy to live with on a daily basis. If you missed part 1, we'll take this opportunity to re-direct you.

The short recap is that we found a couple of good candidates in part 1, namely the ASRock H55M-Pro and the P7H55D-M Evo. The late January BIOS releases for both of these boards delivered good all round performance and functionality, with only a couple of things needing improvement or change. For ASUS, we felt their board was a touch too pricey at $134; ASUS have since dropped the MSRP of the H55 Evo $119. In a typical Newegg maneuver, the board retails at $124 with a shipping cost of $2.99, while boards from other vendors are shipped at MSRP + $7.87 with the same delivery deal—strange.

Meanwhile, ASRock managed to add a touch more overclocking headroom for 8GB memory configurations by adding support for Quick Path Interconnect multiplier changes, delivering a great all around performer at an asking price of $95. The other two boards from part one are the ASUS P7H57D-V Evo and the MSI H55M-ED55. ASUS' H57 is simply too expensive at $200 in our opinion; we'd put $100 towards a discrete GPU rather than fork out the extra money for a full size ATX board offering SATA 6G at this stage (at least until SATA 6G peripherals are affordable). MSI's H55M-ED55 hasn't received a new BIOS since our last test (nor can we find it on sale in the States), and remains a little finicky to set up in comparison to boards from ASUS and Gigabyte.

Part two's line-up consists of two very attractively priced boards from Gigabyte, the H55-USB3 and H57M-USB3 models coming in at ($110 and $119), together with ECS's super cheap stock runner called the H55H-V1.0 ($80). Finally, we just about managed to squeeze BIOSTAR's TH55XE ($115) into the fray after it arrived late in our labs this week. All of these boards have a head-start of sorts over the boards we tested in part 1, as they had an extra four weeks for vendors to get to grips with the H55/H57 chipsets and tackle some of the common issues that plague chipset launches. And it's the subject of issues that leads us nicely into our summary section before we delve deeper into the workings of each board.

Board Summary and Overview

BIOSTAR TH55XE

BIOSTAR have a tough sale on their hands; you've got product from ASUS and Gigabyte straddling the $115 mark while offering USB3 as a key feature. That means BIOSTAR have to do something a little bit better to justify their price-point. We looked hard, but have yet to find it. PCI-E slot layout is an oddity, because the PCI-E x4 slot sits too close to the x16 PEG connector, limiting upgrade options if you choose to go with a discrete GPU. Overclocking performance is not class leading in any department either. High memory speeds are possible, but S3 resume is limited somewhere between 160~165 BCLK if you try to keep a grip on memory controller performance. Boards from all other vendors do better in this department, with most cruising over 180 BCLK with high QPI speeds intact. In its current state, we think ASRock's H55M-Pro is a better all round buy if you don't need USB 3.0, and it's hard to ignore boards that are priced similarly to the TH55XE with more features.

ECS H55H-V1.0

No budget oriented motherboard roundup is complete without taking a look at a board from ECS. The H55H-V1.0 is the kind of board that suits a person who is not interested in overclocking and wants bare-bones functionality and low cost. At $80, that's exactly what you get, from package contents to onboard features—it's all "light". There are a couple of areas we think ECS skinned the H55H-V1.0 too far. Firstly, there's no HDMI output connector; you'll need to buy a DVI-to-HDMI adaptor for HTPC use. Analog audio output is limited to 2 channels, so HDMI audio out is a must for multi-channel setups. Secondly, you only get two DIMM slots when it would not have cost ECS much to provide four. Overclocking is also limited by a very basic BIOS that can be rather frustrating to use at times. When you look at what ASRock are offering at $95, it makes the $80 that ECS are asking for the H55H-V1.0 seem expensive.

Gigabyte H55M-USB3

Gigabyte were already on the F3 BIOS releases when the H55M-USB3 touched down in our test labs. We flashed over to that BIOS straight away expecting good all-round functionality. We hit a snag pretty quickly though, finding that setting SATA ports to AHCI mode for the Intel H55 PCH resulting in our DVD drive failing to be recognized as a valid boot device unless all ports were set to IDE. Our Pioneer DVR-215BK works fine with AHCI mode selected on all other vendor boards, so it was a simple case of Gigabyte needing to update their BIOS (again). Another point of contention was firstly pointed out to us by an AnandTech reader who discovered that Gigabyte's bundled Dolby Home Theatre package would not work with Windows 7. It turned out that Gigabyte had forgotten to enter the BIOS string to unlock the Dolby software package. It's the kind of stuff that shouldn't make it out of the test lab really—assuming vendors properly validate BIOSes before public release.

The F3 BIOS was pulled and replaced with F4 a couple of days later fixing the Dolby software and AHCI optical drive issues. The F3 BIOS release did have a couple of redeeming qualities, in that memory clocking on the H55M-USB3 seemed to be the most consistent of any H55 board we've tested to date. F4 and later releases continue this trend, and now that the other fixes are in place, this board is the strongest contender out of today's test subjects.

Gigabyte H57M-USB3

When this board touched base with us, we felt it was going to be the board to beat. We think Gigabyte nailed everyone on pricing by offering H57 and USB3 features at $119—a perfect fit for Clarkdale. Unfortunately, the H57 hasn't received the same level of BIOS attention as Gigabyte's H55M-USB3 and is still prey to the AHCI optical drive issue we experienced on the H55 model when using the latest F4 BIOS release. Our Pioneer optical drive won't boot our Windows installation disk when we set AHCI mode in BIOS. The only way to get the drive to boot is to select IDE mode for all SATA ports, which makes installing an operating system painful if you want to take advantage of AHCI features for SSDs/HDDs. The fix is probably a five minute affair for Gigabyte, but it's not here yet.

Moving on to other areas, although stock operation with memory and processors is fine, the H57-USB3 needs some attention for 8GB memory overclocking. It doesn't seem to handle higher memory frequencies with the ease displayed by the H55M-USB3 when using the same components and BIOS settings. If overclocking is important to you, we'd advise you to consider the H55M-USB3 or boards from other vendors until these areas are improved.

Zotac H55-ITX Review - The World's First mini-ITX H55 Motherboard

For most of us, Zotac isn't the name that comes to mind when thinking about your next motherboard. Instead, brands like ASUS, Gigabyte or MSI are closer to the tip of your tongue. For HTPC users however, that all started to change with the release of several mini-ITX motherboards based on NVIDIA's GeForce 9300 and ION chipsets. Despite its initial teething problems, the Zotac ION ended up being the perfect motherboard for a DIY low powered HTPC capable of full 1080p video playback.

If you needed more CPU power, Zotac offered the LGA-775 socket GeForce 9300-ITX-WiFi. You got the same mini-ITX form factor, but support for Core 2 CPUs instead of the on-board Atom that its ION boards were limited to. With the release of Intel's first 32nm dual-core processors earlier this year, Zotac wanted to offer an updated platform for SFF or HTPC users who didn't want to sacrifice CPU performance. Based on Intel's H55 chipset and supporting the entire line of Core i3, i5 and LGA-1156 i7 CPUs, Zotac sent us its latest mini-ITX board: the H55-ITX WiFi.

There are a couple of possible directions you can take with the H55-ITX. First, you could choose to turn this into a low-watt HTPC by utilizing a Core i3 and relying on Intel’s HD graphics for your video needs. On the other hand, you could install an i5 or i7 and populate the PCIe slot with a dedicated graphics card for a nice mid-range gaming system. Cases such as the Silverstone SG-06 and the upcoming Lian-Li PC-Q08 would complement a system such as this perfectly.

With these two different directions in mind we have decided to test the H55-ITX with both integrated and dedicated graphics. Decide for yourself which direction works the best for you.

On a side note, even the performance computing market is seeing a transition away from the more traditional full-sized motherboards. In fact, ZOTAC markets only one full-sized ATX board in the US.

 

Intel DH57JG “Jet Geyser” - Intel's First Mini-ITX H57

It’s been a few years since we’ve written a full review featuring an Intel motherboard. The reason for that is simple; we just didn’t see some of the Intel boards as being competitive in terms of features, performance and pricing when compared to products from third party vendors. Probably not a good decision on our part because appearances can be deceptive... Take a look at our H55/H57 coverage and you’ll see that sub-vendors often struggle to get the basics right - here and here.

In hindsight, we should have added an Intel motherboard or two to those articles, because it would have been interesting to see how Intel measures up in the areas that truly matter. Better late than never we suppose, over the next month, we’ll be providing you with full reviews of three Intel boards; two are P55 chipset based, while the third and most exciting (if you like mini-ITX) is the DH57JG - formerly known as “Jet Geyser”. It’s the DH57JG that we’ll be looking at today; it should be on retailer shelves in a couple of weeks priced at around $125:

Gallery: Intel DH57JG Motherboard Gallery

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At present, Intel’s main rival in the mini-ITX segment is Zotac who released the H55-ITX last week. We’ve already got a review up on Zotac’s board here. It’s not a bad effort at all on Zotac’s part, our only gripe would have to be the asking price of $145, especially when you consider what’s available on m-ATX for less outlay.

Still, there’s a lot to be said for boards that work as advertised out-of-the box without the need for copious debugging from end-users. That’s probably a good precursor for this review, because Intel are only too keen to point out that these are the areas where they get things right. With that in mind, we lead you into our user-experience summary below...

Summary/Overview

There’s only one public BIOS release for the DH57JG so far, and it appears that Intel’s pre-launch validation process is capable of delivering a motherboard that’s almost retail ready. In truth though, there’s little on the DH57JG that can give rise to issues - Intel played it safe, or at least within the comfortable confines of their design. For starters, overclocking is limited on Clarkdale CPU’s by the absence of voltage control for processor VCore. BIOS options are basic; there is no direct control of CPU/IGP clock ratios and DRAM timing options are limited too. This all adds up to keep Clarkdale processors south of 3.8GHz unless you have a lucky sample that overclocks well at stock voltage.

Lynnfield processors will work in the DH57JG, and you get a tiny pocket of overclocking headroom that is capped by current/temperature monitoring and stock VID. We managed to get the board to post at 21X150 BCLK, but found processor core frequency throttles down to 3GHz or so under full load to ensure safety for the CPU VRM. Curiously, we did manage to change CPU core multiplier ratios on our i7 860 CPU by disabling SpeedStep – something that does not work on Clarkdales at all on the current BIOS. We’ve asked Intel for clarification on this matter and await a response. 

Another area which often gives rise to problems on third-party motherboards is bundled software, there’s not much for Intel to get wrong in this department because the DH57JG doesn’t feature any kind of OS level overclocking tools or power saving software as part of the package.

Board layout is similar to Zotac’s H55-ITX, in that the CPU socket is placed very close to the PCIe slot and also the memory slots. This leaves little room for tall/wide heatsinks, although we don’t think you need anything other than the stock Intel cooler on this motherboard given the limited range of overclocking at your disposal.

On the overclocking front, our i3 540 retail processor topped out around 3.5GHz on the DH57JG, while our i5 661 ES sample managed to retain stability at 3.85GHz on stock VID. It’s not quite the 4GHz we’d have preferred to see, but we should add that the real-world gains in performance between 3.5GHz and 4GHz aren’t huge anyway.

That leaves the all important plug and play features of the chipset to experiment with, and it’s an area we don’t have anything negative to report on. All of our peripheral devices worked fine as did resume from long S3 sleep states - even when overclocked.

For an in-depth look at performance and board layout, read on...

ASUS M4A89GTD Pro - A Core Unlocking 890GX for $140

Although we gave AMD’s 890GX/SB850 a lukewarm reception last week, there’s no denying that a sub $150 price point for a feature laden board such as the ASUS M4A89GTD Pro is deserving of closer inspection.

While most of the boards within a certain price bracket follow a common component formula, ASUS and ASRock have managed to segregate themselves by breaking rank and offering hardware level core unlocking for budget dual/tri-core AMD processors. That means that you can buy a sub $100 CPU and unlock it at your leisure to enjoy 4 core number crunching. The feature itself is not new per se, it’s just that AMD decided to drop support for ACC on series 8 chipsets, leaving vendors to do things on their own accord. ASUS’ workaround is almost certain to have upset AMD, but we think they made the right choice - if moving to the 8-series chipsets meant giving up core unlocking, many enthusiasts wouldn't.

If you take a look over at the blue corner (Intel), you’ll see that sub $150 expenditure almost exclusively limits you to the micro-ATX and mini-ITX form factors on the H55/H57 chipsets. While such motherboards are perfect in the context of small HTPC builds, there are times when users need increased levels of plug-in flexibility and future-friendly upgrade paths, and that’s where a full sized ATX motherboards start to make sense.

Gallery: ASUS M4A89GTD Pro Motherboard Gallery

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We’ve got a couple of AMD board reviews lined up for you this month, kicking-off today with the M4A89GTD Pro, as subjected to our standard test suite. Do note that we’re still in the process of bringing you a meaningful SATA 6G performance comparison – we should have a dedicated article up on this shortly.

Summary/Overview

One of the things that came to light during our first look at the AMD 890GX platform was an issue with our Sharkoon USB QuickPort. After a lot of back and forth, it’s been discovered that the problem lies with Sharkoon’s QuickPort firmware (the controller is made by Lucidport) and not ASUS’ M4A89GTD Pro.

ASUS have since acquired six Sharkoon QuickPort units and have discovered three different firmware releases have been used by Lucidport/Sharkoon at random, while our lab unit contains a fourth. Sadly, none of these firmware versions sit well with the AMD chipsets due to a ‘USB hand-off issue’. ASUS have reported to us that USB 3 drives from BYTECC and KINGWIN work fine with the AMD chipsets, although our advice would be to hold off for a few weeks while we find out which controllers these units contain and if Sharkoon’s problem can be fixed via a firmware update.

That leaves us with a few things on the M4A89GTD Pro that need attention, the first relates to S3 sleep resume. We used the Corsair TX 950 for our testing and found a hit and miss scenario because there are instances where pressing the power button to instigate resume does not work after the board has been in S3 state for 2~3 hours; the only way to get the board to post again is to switch off at the mains, let residual power drain from the PSU and then turn back on. It’s not something that manifests all the time, so tracing it down could prove a little tricky, although we’re told ASUS is working around-the-clock to find the problem.

The other area of operation that needs some tuning relates to how the M4A89GTD Pro handles Elpida Hyper based memory modules for overclocking. When used in conjunction with ASUS’s ‘Core Unlocker’ feature; a failed overclock can result in the need to clear CMOS before the board will post again with 4 cores active. In fact, we found that the Hyper based modules are more stable at CAS 6, than they were at CAS 7 or 8 on this motherboard. We were sent a beta BIOS late last week that improves memory compatibility and although things are a little better, the Elpida Hyper issues are persistent - there’s clearly a need for more work.

Once you work out how to circumvent some of these quirks, the M4A89GTD Pro does overclock quite well – get it dialed in properly and the board is comfortable holding 8GB of memory stable whilst maintaining high memory controller frequencies in tandem. We managed to squeeze a perfectly respectable 4GHz from our Phenom X2 555 processor, unlocked to 4 cores with 8GB of memory running DDR-3 1600MHz 6-7-6-18 timings at a 1T Command Rate using our Corsair Dominator GT modules.

ASUS have also put a lot of work into promoting their automated overclocking routines to us over the past few months so we put this feature to the test. ASUS offers two ways to instigate automated overclocking, the first method is via BIOS, and the second is by using the supplied Turbo V overclocking utility within the OS.

The BIOS level utility was a little hit and miss for us depending upon which memory modules we were using. With Elpida Hyper modules the board has a tendency to select CAS 8 based timing sets which does not sit well with the current BIOS releases, resulting in an unstable overclock. Using more conventional and affordable memory like the Corsair 1600MHz Dominator kits, we obtained an easy 3.6GHz overclock with CAS 9-9-9-27 timings at a 2T Command Rate. 

It’s the OS level Turbo-V utility where ASUS have really nailed automated overclocking, there are a variety of tuning options which can result in overclocks right on the hilt and beyond where we’d setup our components manually. ASUS have done a great job in simplifying what can be a complex process for many users.

Had the random S3 resume issue not have been present, we’d have been hard pushed not to give this board an award for catering to every type of user and providing a feature set that belies its price. What we'll do for now while ASUS polishes the M4A89GTD Pro, is encourage you to put it at the top of your shortlist as one to watch...

Intel DP55KG and DP55SB - Two P55s Reviewed

It’s been few months since AnandTech featured a P55 board review, but while Intel is expanding on their high-end with $1,100 Core i7 980X CPU’s, their low-to-mid-range P55 platform is still the one on most people’s radars.  Today we’re looking at two Intel P55 boards that fall under Intel’s “Extreme” series, the DP55KG and DP55SB.

The “Extreme” series has historically produced one board per chipset so that Intel has an offering for those consumers with overclocking high on their agenda. This time round, Intel has gone for a couple of boards, their separating feature being the form factor – one ATX and one MicroATX.

Overview/Conclusion

In the DP55KG and the DP55SB we have two almost identical boards, separated only by the visual and physical difference of their form factors. The extra expansion slots and SATA/E-SATA ports of the DP55KG are very much tacked onto the same foundation of the DP55SB board and unsurprisingly, there is little to separate the two in terms of performance, power consumption or price. This is very much a case of one design filling two spaces in the Intel product line-up.

The vast range of ATX-based P55 boards proves to be tough competition for the DP55KG. While the layout of the BIOS is good in general, it lacks experience in the overclocking section. The board misses out on certain features as well as the quality of components that rival boards offer in direct comparison. On sale at $199, its direct competition includes EVGA's excellent P55 FTW and even looking $20-25 cheaper, the Asus P7P55D Deluxe and Biostar’s TPOWER i55 both make stronger cases. Move away from P55, and you‘ve got the option of running with H57 instead, specifically at the $200 mark, ASUS’s P7H57D-V EVO, offering SATA 6G and USB 3 capabilities and excellent overclocking potential. 

The DP55SB comes in ~$5 cheaper than the DP55KG at $195 which puts it right at the top of the M-ATX price bracket with only the ASUS Maximus III Gene as competition. Unfortunately, the Gene offers a lot more in terms of features and overclocking potential so you're left wondering where you money is going. While both the driver install and BIOS updating procedures are so simple that a 5-year old could manage it in their sleep and the on-board Intel NIC is a positive addition, it's not enough to paper over the cracks.

In our testing, both boards ran into problems with automated overclocking, memory overclocking on the 2:10 ratio and S3 resume over 170 bclk. While these are all problems that could be argued to be ‘bonuses’ on Intel’s standard desktop boards, when you step up into the $150-200 range of overclocking-focussed boards, it doesn't cut the mustard. EVGA’s E-Leet, Asus’ Turbo-V and ROG Connect and even MSI’s OC Genie make Intel’s IDCC look distinctly average.