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  • granulated - Friday, December 4, 2009 - link

    I want to know how why the AMD board murders the rest in two games when it's in it's more usual 'bringing up the rear' position in the rest.
  • ta2 - Monday, November 30, 2009 - link

    Seems like you've been using a pretty crappy i5 chip. For it to top out as 4.1GHz is incredibly bad. I manage 4GHz on a GA-P55-UD4 with ALL voltages at stock except VCore at 1.30V. You have not really pushed the BCLK on this board and for you to need 1.36V for 4.1GHz is pretty terrible. I consider myself a novice overclocker, but either you're using a very bad chip or this board isn't so hot.

    "We could run our memory at DDR3-2152". This board is officially rated up to 2600MHz for memory... so we haven't even tried to get close to the spec speed.
  • Rajinder Gill - Tuesday, December 1, 2009 - link

    It's an average 750 CPU. There are plenty out there that top out early.

    With regards to 2600 MHz memory, I don't know of any CPU's that can hold 2600MHz speeds fully application stable. That's a benchmarking claim for users who run processors with sub zero cooling or like to post suicide shots. This article is focused on daily PC use. A BCLK of 215 is perfectly respectable for everyday usage scenarios (especialy with S3 resume working).

    later
    Raja
  • lopri - Friday, November 27, 2009 - link

    The board looks really awesome. I mean, the fact one of the main gripes is the lack of clear CMOS button in the rear I/O panel says a lot. I like that Biostar used the Intel ethernet PHY to take advantage of ICH10R's built-in network controller. So many times I see CPU usages going 20~30% when there is heavy network trafficking, and I wondered why my experiences are so different from what I see in the reviews. Granted different packets show different performance characteristics and anti-virus is probably half of that CPU load, but the CPU usage wasn't as severe on my BadAxe 2 (which I use for WHS) so I do believe the Intel NIC/PHY is superior to that of Realtek.

    Another welcome news is the flawless S3 functionality under overclocking, and I applaud it very, very much. Board's layout looks extremely clean and logical as well. For me the downside of this board are the lack of fan headers and the price tag which can be (hopefully) rectified in the future.

    Thank you for a thorough review (for a split second I thought Gary was the author, but please don't take offense ;) ) and I just might have found my next motherboard.
  • lopri - Saturday, November 28, 2009 - link

    Well, actually I do have one more gripe. I am not a fan of daisy chained heatsinks, and on this board the heatsink with 'Biostar' written on it kinda sticks out. I'm guessing what's underneath are those 4 PCIe blocks often found bare on other boards. (?) How hot do they get and do you think it's justified to having a heatsink over it based on that? If not, I'd prefer to have more room for CPU HSF installation and video card installation.
  • Rajinder Gill - Saturday, November 28, 2009 - link

    Hi,

    The BIOSTAR logo sink does not really cover anything other than to add mass to the enitire assembly. Stock operating conditions, you could get away with passive use. If overclocking and raising PWM switching frequency(for whatever reason), while runnign a 'hot' GPU in the first slot, you'll probably want to cool the HS assembly depending on what kind of case you have. The lack of fan headers obviously does not help.

    regards
    Raja
  • lopri - Tuesday, December 1, 2009 - link

    Thank you for the clarification. That said, since the board is kind of heavy on use of heatsinks, maybe they can use real screws instead of plastic push-pins? Faced with the Almighty AnandTech editors' advice, who knows? Biostar might listen. *wink* *wink*
  • yuhong - Friday, November 27, 2009 - link

    "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!"
    Yep, remember this:
    http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.aspx?i=3471">http://www.anandtech.com/showdoc.aspx?i=3471
  • Joepublic2 - Thursday, November 26, 2009 - link

    Rajinder, is there any way to differentiate the new foxconn sockets from the old (serial/part numbers, a visual difference between the two)?
  • Rajinder Gill - Thursday, November 26, 2009 - link

    Hi Joe,

    None that I know of I'm afraid. If I do find anything out, I'll update.

    regards
    Raja
  • NumericalMethods - Thursday, November 26, 2009 - link

    In your great overclocking section I see you have once again exceeded the 1.21v Intel recommended Vtt specification (by a fair amount). Is this something you would be comfortable with for 24/7 running or is this just to demonstrate the limits of the board?

    I have no real concept of why the Vtt spec has changed from Bloomfield but if I were running a P55 system overclocked 24/7 I suspect I couldn't expect to reach a 4+GHz overclock - it would be limited by 'safe' voltage.
  • Rajinder Gill - Thursday, November 26, 2009 - link

    The Intel voltage specifications are given out in relation to stock operating frequencies. Increase freqeuncy and you increase power, so if you're really following Intel guidelines, then you need to observe stock operating frequencies too.

    There is no definative answer to what kind of degredation a CPU will experience due to elevated voltage/current long term. One can assume that the degredation will be faster, but whether or not that will be a factor for the end-user is another matter. Of course, too much voltage is certainly asking for trouble. We generally run stuff just to show what the board can do. At least it answers the question for people who like to push hard. At the same time, if the board is stable at higher operating frequencies, the more sensible stuff is ceratinly possible.

    regards
    Raja
  • Absolution75 - Thursday, November 26, 2009 - link

    I always find that the most relevant information to me is left out of every motherboard review.

    Benchmarks for motherboards are always very similar, in fact, they are so similar that in my opinion, aren't worth mentioning. If there is a strange issue with USB speeds being low (which I've seen before), then that probably is the only benchmark that really needs any type of graph. Do people really care if the board A gets a 1KBPS higher score on the network test than board B? I'm sure this is well within the margin of error of the test anyway. This may be what you're getting at when you guys have switched the conclusion to the first page of the review, which I thought was a good decision.


    Relevant information that always seems to be missing:
    1) Are the fan headers able to be controlled by bios? If so, how and how well? Can they all be controlled or just a few? Sometimes it specifies, but it fails to provide any real details.
    2) The audio chip. Realtek did a wonderful job at creating 'optional' features on a few of their codec’s. I bought the MSI P55-GD65 board on launch date and assumed it could do real time DDL encoding (like my old gigabyte P45-UD3P which uses the same audio codec), little did I know, that this optional feature is disabled. Apparently 'true blue ray audio' doesn't really mean much. A simple paragraph about the audio chip's capabilities would be nice. Especially since some motherboards use VIA's codec’s which tend to be even more confusing than Realtek's.
    3) Strange things such as mentioning who makes the chip for the NIC and other random things would be nice. For some reason, I have a good bias towards Marvell NICs. This information seems to be included more often lately :D
    4) Information about how board features are integrated into the motherboard. Is that gigabyte NIC running off a PCI-E lane or PCI?
    5) Useful information about strange features such TPM headers (which you made no mention of in the MSI P55-GD65).


    Specifically for this review, it is said that this board is trying to compete with the MSI P55-GD65 and you say it has an advantage even though it is more expensive ($25-$45 more). How though? It is never really said. Both boards perform identically (in fact, probably any P55 board will perform identically to another. . .) and both have similar layouts. The MSI board has 1 more PCI-E slot along with an open slot PCI-E x4. How is this not an advantage? Both have dual NICs, 2 more SATA2 ports (with the MSI board having a better solution imo - the single blue slot on the board is useful for a disk drive leaving the entire 6x SATA2 ports on the P55 chipset for some type(s) or RAID) and digital audio.


    Also, a complete guess, but board designers probably still include the floppy drive header just because its included in the chip they use for IDE and additional SATA (maybe jmicron doesn't make a chip that is just IDE/SATA instead of IDE/SATA/floppy), or maybe they just cost the same. . .
  • ereavis - Wednesday, December 9, 2009 - link

    "Test Setup" is a big missing for me. What are you calling an "Intel P55" on these charts or all the Intel P55 motherboards from $90-$240 the same performance?
  • g725s - Wednesday, December 2, 2009 - link

    Cool conclusion on first page. Keep it up!
  • Rajinder Gill - Wednesday, December 2, 2009 - link

    Some seem to like it while others are not impressed (check the firs page of comments). I'll probably do some kind of exec front page summary in the future.

    later
    Raja
  • treesloth - Monday, December 7, 2009 - link

    FWIW, I like it. Interestingly to me, it's essentially the same layout and format that I use for my testing an analysis at work, so I actually feel sort of vindicated. :-)
  • treesloth - Monday, December 7, 2009 - link

    FWIW, I like it. Interestingly to me, it's essentially the same layout and format that I use for my testing an analysis at work, so I actually feel sort of vindicated. :-)
  • dia - Thursday, November 26, 2009 - link



    The fan header information is on page 3

    "Fan control is only offered for the CPU fan header, offering full temperature range and speed control which is great. Unfortunately the SYS fans cannot be controlled independently from the CPU FAN header. "

    There is also reference to software level control via TOVERCLOCK/TPOWER.

  • jackylman - Friday, November 27, 2009 - link

    It's still unclear to me. The quoted section only seems to refer to the BIOS setting. The screenshot shows a fan RPM tab for TPOWER, but I don't see any reference to whether it actually controls the fans or just reports RPM's (I suspect the latter).

    The question we really want answered is whether the non-CPU headers support PWM and can be controlled with SpeedFan (e.g.). If not, it would really be a shame to see another good board skimping on cheap PWM hardware.
  • Rajinder Gill - Saturday, November 28, 2009 - link

    Both TPOWER and TOVERCLOCKER can change fan speed and offer monitoring. The SYS FANS cannot be controlled at all, so they are 'full on' all the time.

    I've changed the page 3 comment to reflect this.

    regards
    Raja
  • jackylman - Saturday, November 28, 2009 - link

    Raja,
    That is much better. Thank You.
  • Rajinder Gill - Thursday, November 26, 2009 - link

    In terms of overclocking, the BIOSTAR handles 8GB memory better than the MSI GD-65 (memory clocking in general is easier). Sleep mode is also a little more robust, allowing recovery from higher BCLK's. Other than that, one of the marks against the Gd-65 was the incompatibility of OC GENIE with several PSU's.

    As for the rest, thx for the feedback - I'll add what I can within the timeframe of test. there are some things we miss on due to oversight. It's not possible to keep everyone happy unfortunately, as with all things.

    regards
    Raja
  • marc1000 - Wednesday, November 25, 2009 - link

    No conclusion page on this review? Am I wrong or the conclusion is on the first page this time? =D
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  • ElderTech - Thursday, December 3, 2009 - link

    Raja
    Contrary to others, I find the new layout most efficient and a desireable journalistic change. As you point out, read the first page (or two) and determine if you want/need additional info. Also, your heading for the conclusion/summary section is clear and succinct. However, it doesn't surprise me that some may find it confusing, as there is a tendency to settle into a complacent pattern with much of life when we're able. But you'd think the younger average age of your readers would portend flexibility, but that's obviously not the case!
  • treesloth - Monday, December 7, 2009 - link

    I first used the internet when the main protocol was IP over smoke signals, so keep your fancy "flexibility" off my lawn!

    Seriously, though, good points. I also have to compliment Anandtech on basing their article layouts on visitor convenience, as opposed to the many sites that seem to try to herd as many visitors as possible into as many page views (and ad impressions) as possible.
  • Rajinder Gill - Thursday, November 26, 2009 - link

    Yes, the summary/conclusion is on the first page. For the exact reason that Bull Dog mentions. We've had a lot of requests from people that want 'bare all' on the first page, so here it is. Saves you having to trundle through every page picking up tidbits here and there of what the board can or cannot do. We know it won't appease everybody, but then appeasing everybody is impossible anyway..lol

    regards
    Raja
  • poohbear - Thursday, November 26, 2009 - link

    I think it doesnt make sense. who says u hafta "trundle" through every page to get to the conclusion?? u just click the drop down menu & go to the conclusion. A site for computer enthusiasts & the readers can't even figure out how to use a drop down menu????
  • Devo2007 - Thursday, November 26, 2009 - link

    I agree - the new layout is confusing.

    What I'd suggest is a small summary of the article (either Pros/Cons, or small highlights of the product being reviewed. That way, people can get a quick overview of the product, and delve into the article more if they wish.

    Putting the full-fledged conclusion on the main page just doesn't seem to fit right.
  • Rajinder Gill - Thursday, November 26, 2009 - link

    I'll try and find a happy medium that does not confuse people too much..lol
  • treesloth - Monday, December 7, 2009 - link

    Put the conclusion right in the middle-- page 10 of a 20-page review. Oh, and since programming languages can't seem to settle whether indexing should start at 0 or 1, we'll compromise and start at .5.

    Seriously, though, I think people will get a little confused exactly once, figure it out, and never have another problem. I like the new way.
  • sonci - Thursday, November 26, 2009 - link

    Its called abstract,
    its used on medical articles..
  • Rajinder Gill - Thursday, November 26, 2009 - link

    Whichever way you look at it; you click on the review, read the first page for everything relevant and then if it interets you to lo at the figures, read on. Can't get much simpler than that.

    later
    Raja
  • Bull Dog - Wednesday, November 25, 2009 - link

    First/second page conclusion.

    Kinda wierd but I like it over the standard "go through 11 gazillion pages of nearly meaningless numbers."

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