Great article, but I've got 1 question. Why in god's name are motherboards getting so expensive? £250 for a mobo, however good it is, is a liberty to what they used to be.
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Originally Posted by Article Moving around the board, there are six 3-pin fan headers thatb with the exception
Not for me for a couple of reasons (it's intel and it's a single CPU), but impressive none the less.
And evanbraakensiek, that's about what i paid for my Tyan K8WE wich is a dual Opteron mobo with onboard u320 SCSI and dual physical gigabit NICs. I agree, that price is outrageous!
If it had 4 or 5 PCI-E 16x (with 8x connections) rather then the 3 PCI-E 16x (with 16x + 8x connections) it currently has then I'd be keen. I couldn't live without my dual monitors so if I wanted SLI + nVidia physics + dual monitors I'd need four graphics cards It'd be nice if nVidia launched the Quadroplex for enthusiast systems cable of supporting SLI + nVidia physics from just one PCI-E 16x card in your system or even better if they allowed manufacturers to provide an external 16x port on the IO panel. That'd way you'd reclaim all the space lost in your system due to graphics cards ;)
Originally Posted by JADS I couldn't live without my dual monitors so if I wanted SLI + nVidia physics + dual monitors I'd need four graphics cards.
Well that's not strictly true - you can use the 2 DVI ports on the primary graphics card, or on the secondary one for a monitor (possibly even each), so you'd only need 3 graphics cards for a Quad-monitor setup with incredible physics too.
that heatpipe is impressive, im guessing they went so ott so its all still being cooled even with water cooling on the cpu.
i agree about the price too, but them and evga have the market with 680 boards right now so they can charge what they like, and as shown on a few sites people will happily pay it
tbh as nice as it looks ive had too many problems with asus mobo's to warrant me deciding against getting an EVGA board. but yeah 250 is a tad expensive
This is just Asus pushing the bounderies. They've really been dominating the mobo market recently, and so I guess they feel they can afford to see if people are willing to pay £260 on a mobo. Tbh if it cost £160 it'd still be overpriced. Ah well.
I believe the board is expensive at the mo, but it should come down to a more reasonable level when it eventually launches IMO. I think EVGA's board is priced pretty high at the moment too, for what it's worth. :)
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Wouldn't it be better to re-bench the motherboards graphically with the 8800GTX? That way it becomes CPU limited?
I think we're going to be sticking with 7900 GTX for a bit for dual card testing, since ATI doesn't have anything that can really be 'fairly' compared to GeForce 8800 GTX. After all, we're testing the mobo here, not the graphics performance necessarily. However, we might move the single card testing to a single 8800 GTX, since it's probably the choice right now.
Originally Posted by Krikkit Well that's not strictly true - you can use the 2 DVI ports on the primary graphics card, or on the secondary one for a monitor (possibly even each), so you'd only need 3 graphics cards for a Quad-monitor setup with incredible physics too.
Last time I checked enabling SLI disabled every monitor output apart from the primary output on the primary graphics card. If it follows a similar vein enabling physics will disable both outputs on the card. Thus even though you have three graphics cards only the primary output on the primary card can be connected to a screen. This is a mite crap.
WOW, nice board, i cant wait for you to tell us about your EVGA board experience, as i have one, would be interesting for me to compare my experinces to yours.
Originally Posted by Tim I think we're going to be sticking with 7900 GTX for a bit for dual card testing, since ATI doesn't have anything that can really be 'fairly' compared to GeForce 8800 GTX. After all, we're testing the mobo here, not the graphics performance necessarily. However, we might move the single card testing to a single 8800 GTX, since it's probably the choice right now.
But you want to see how the motherboard compares, it the best way to directly compare for future graphics.
This mobo seems pretty interesting and i like those heatpipes but I really hope you asked the Asus people one question: "Can the board be used in an upside down ATX configuration?" Because i know the evga can.
I'm working on my wish list for the up coming holiday season and i was wondering if there would be a variety of new 680i motherboards coming out so i actually have some selection?
I like the LCD at the back, the fact that it still has 2 PCI slots, the sound,... BUT, the location of the ATA133 connector HAS to be fixed! Other than that it looks like a sweet board - until you get to the price.
My e6300 wants a new mobo, but my wallet wants a rest :(
ive got a bit of a concern about the pci slots, now while most people wont be using 3 cards as theres no point now, and i know thin coolers will be possible at a later date.. high end cards always have dual slot coolers now, so 3 of them will wipe out every slot bar the 1 pci-ex1 slot which may aswell be a isa slot the amount of use they are
really an amazing mobo i just hope the price gets a little(a lot)lower so i can THINK on buying one do you know when they will become available on Portugal ?
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Either way that looks like a awesome mobo.
Not for me for a couple of reasons (it's intel and it's a single CPU), but impressive none the less.
And evanbraakensiek, that's about what i paid for my Tyan K8WE wich is a dual Opteron mobo with onboard u320 SCSI and dual physical gigabit NICs. I agree, that price is outrageous!
still think £260 is FAR too much for a mobo. Spending £145 on an Abit AW9D-MAX makes me think im overspending.
You can buy a full PC for that much.
i agree about the price too, but them and evga have the market with 680 boards right now so they can charge what they like, and as shown on a few sites people will happily pay it
p.s. thx Krikkit - missed that one :o
Last time I checked enabling SLI disabled every monitor output apart from the primary output on the primary graphics card. If it follows a similar vein enabling physics will disable both outputs on the card. Thus even though you have three graphics cards only the primary output on the primary card can be connected to a screen. This is a mite crap.
Sam
I'm working on my wish list for the up coming holiday season and i was wondering if there would be a variety of new 680i motherboards coming out so i actually have some selection?
My e6300 wants a new mobo, but my wallet wants a rest :(
Thanks for the preview ;)
Can there really be £95 worth of difference? ...