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As mentioned before, there are a number of Intel P35 motherboards that offer support for DDR3 memory, and while we have a few of these boards on hand, such as the ASUS P5K3 Deluxe/Premium and the Gigabyte P35T-DQ6, we are deliberately excluding them from the comparison. At the moment just 2GBs of DDR3 memory will set you back around $400 which is quite ridiculous, making it pointless (for the time being) to buy a DDR3-capable motherboard given the price premium. That leaves us with the nine motherboards we are testing today that support DDR2 memory exclusively.

For this P35 round-up we have tried to include a high-end version and a budget version motherboard from each manufacturer. The boards will be put through the usual batch of tests, while we will also compare their overclocking abilities side by side. Before jumping into the benchmarks we will briefly list the features and go over the layout and design of each motherboard.


Initially we had planned to include a few MSI motherboards that were going to be supplied by the manufacturer itself. Unfortunately once we explained our plan for a comparison against competing boards, they got cold feet and pulled out. Not sure exactly what we should make of this, so make of it what you will. Because the news came somewhat last minute we did not have time to purchase these motherboards without delaying the article further, we apologize for the omission.

Tuesday, November 20, 2007

ASUS P5K-E – Features

The ASUS P5K Deluxe is a pricey motherboard at around $240 and many users will find some of the features such as the additional Gigabit LAN controller useless. Since this kind of feature do add to the overall cost and may not be of use to everyone, ASUS has released the P5K-E at around $155, placing it alongside the Abit board. However while the P5K-E maybe a cut down version of a much more expensive motherboard it still backs quite a punch.

When it comes to networking you still get a Gigabit LAN controller linked to the PCI Express bus. Once again for those that fail to get excited over wired solutions, you get ASUS' WiFi-AP Solo feature that allows users to create a complete wireless home network in either AP or wireless client mode. This feature can work even when the PC is in sleep mode. The P5K-E comes bundled with an external omni-directional antenna that can sit up on top of the computer case.

Storage wise the ASUS P5K-E features everything found on the Deluxe version. There are six SATA ports which are connected to the ICH9R southbridge chip supporting the Intel Matrix storage technology. Each port is capable of AHCI & RAID modes supporting RAID 0/1/5/10. ASUS has again included the JMicron JMB363 controller for an additional two SATA ports which are used to support external hard drives. These eSATA ports can be found on the I/O panel, but please note ASUS has not included any eSATA cables in the package.

The P5K-E supports a total of ten USB 2.0 ports, eight of which are supported right out of the box. The board also features support for two Firewire ports using an Agere FW322 1394a controller. While one of these Firewire ports can be found on a supplied expansion bracket the other is conveniently placed on the I/O panel. We found then that the P5K-E offers a broad range of connectivity and similarly to the Deluxe version, much of it is accessible from the I/O panel.

This affordable ASUS motherboard uses an ADI AD1988B audio solution. This is the most acclaimed audio codec ADI makes, featuring 10 DACs/6 ADCs, 3 stereo headphone ports, peripheral sensing, jack retasking and microphone array capture, along with S/PDIF in and out. The P5K-E is also a 8-phase design board.

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9-way Intel P35 motherboard round-up

Anyone looking at building a new desktop system should not look any further than Intel Core 2 processors, and when time comes to pick a platform you should have Intel's own P35 chipset in mind as it officially offers 1333MHz FSB support and will be compatible with upcoming 45nm processors. This translates in a fairly 'future-proof' platform, with some models currently available supporting DDR3 memory already.

But as new as this chipset is, deciding that you want a P35-based motherboard is not enough. Most major manufacturers have already launched several different models powered by the chipset, to give an example, ASUS currently offers a dozen motherboards models all based on the Intel P35.

We have rounded up some of the better examples available for one big article where we shall compare them side by side. Although we have nine motherboards to compare, they come from just four different manufacturers: Abit, ASUS, ECS and Gigabyte. These boards range from $90, all the way up to $230.