New X48 motherboard model...
When the time came to embrace ATI's latest video cards, we quickly narrowed our motherboard options down to two X48 choices: the ASUS P5E Deluxe and Gigabyte's GA-X48-DS5. Both boards have excellent reputations, and we ended up choosing the ASUS board mostly because of BIOS features which we thought might make our lives easier (they perform the same, and have very similar feature sets.)
When we made the choice, however, one fact eluded us which is now prompting us to shift to the Gigabyte board. The ASUS P5E Deluxe, like so many of ASUS' high-end motherboards, places its on-board sound circuitry on a "riser card", which plugs into what appeared to be an ordinary PCI-E 1x slot. What we didn't know until recently was that this 1x PCI-E slot can ONLY be used for the riser card. This effectively removes one expansion card option from the equation as compared to other motherboards if you choose to go with a 3rd party sound card, which many of you do. As you can see from the picture below, this fact becomes a potential problem when configuring a PC with two dual-slot video cards, like the HD 4870 X2:
The problem is that the only remaining PCI-E slot is then wedged in-between the two 4870 X2's, which can overheat Creative's new X-Fi Titanium sound card. Thus, if you want a Reactor with a pair of 4870 X2's, you can't get the newer sound card. The Gigabyte X48 board doesn't have this problem:
Here we have that extra PCI-E slot available on the top, which allows for a lot more flexability, especially if you want to throw in a Killer NIC and a wireless card too. Another bonus is the addition of two more SATA ports for future expansion.
This change affects both the Reactor and the Ion, but does not change the price of either.
When we made the choice, however, one fact eluded us which is now prompting us to shift to the Gigabyte board. The ASUS P5E Deluxe, like so many of ASUS' high-end motherboards, places its on-board sound circuitry on a "riser card", which plugs into what appeared to be an ordinary PCI-E 1x slot. What we didn't know until recently was that this 1x PCI-E slot can ONLY be used for the riser card. This effectively removes one expansion card option from the equation as compared to other motherboards if you choose to go with a 3rd party sound card, which many of you do. As you can see from the picture below, this fact becomes a potential problem when configuring a PC with two dual-slot video cards, like the HD 4870 X2:
The problem is that the only remaining PCI-E slot is then wedged in-between the two 4870 X2's, which can overheat Creative's new X-Fi Titanium sound card. Thus, if you want a Reactor with a pair of 4870 X2's, you can't get the newer sound card. The Gigabyte X48 board doesn't have this problem:
Here we have that extra PCI-E slot available on the top, which allows for a lot more flexability, especially if you want to throw in a Killer NIC and a wireless card too. Another bonus is the addition of two more SATA ports for future expansion.This change affects both the Reactor and the Ion, but does not change the price of either.
posted by Thomas Glen at
8:09 AM
0 Comments
Links to this post
