GlobalFoundries optimizes 28nm HKMG process for ARM's new dual-core Cortex A9 chip

With a Technology Qualification Vehile (TQV) in place,GlobalFoundries is currently optimizing its 28nm HKMG (high-K metal gate) process, and is ready to start producing processors based on the ARM Cortex A9 design for customers

The TQV was jointly developed by ARM and GlobalFoundries, and is apparently designed to allow for maximum frequency analysis and small turnaround time, by emulating its product - a system-on-chip - in every way. It will contain identical cell libraries and cache design as the A9 chip, in fact, its entire physical IP suite. The TQV will also provide a range of Design for Testability features that will enable better bit-mapping and path-correlation while testing at gigahertz speeds.

Compared to its 40nm predecessor, the new ARM Cortex A9 SoC based on the 28nm process is expected to be much faster and more energy efficient, projected to deliver a 40% increase in computing performance, 30% decrease in power consumption, and 2 times the standby battery life.

ARM and GlobalFoundries’ 28nm collaboration will apparently extend to high performance and super low power chips as well, covering a wide range of applications.

A spokesperson from ARM summed up the future partnership between the chip design and fabrication houses: “As the industry adopts increasingly advanced process technologies, there is a growing need for close collaboration between design and manufacturing. Our partnership will enable customers to rapidly bring high-performance, low-power ARM technology-based designs to market on 28nm HKMG technology.”

ASUS unveils TUF Series: Sabertooth X58 heavy duty motherboard at Rs. 17,250

The new Asus Sabertooth X58 motherboard reportedly incorporates the latest Intel chipset and support for the fastest processors in the market, including the Intel Core i7-980X, as part of the TUF Series motherboards. It is claimed to be built for rugged use, provide uncompromising durability and the utmost reliability to users who demand round the clock usage without compromising on performance.

The TUF series motherboards are reportedly designed to offer durability and reliability under stressed conditions and hence find their applications in server and mainframes. The new Sabertooth X58 is to endure stressful working conditions, with due credits to its meticulous thermal design incorporating CeraMIX Heatsink Coating Technology. This technology is said to adopt revolutionary ceramic application to ensure unsurpassed heat resistance and dissipation on the motherboard surfaces and components.

The Sabertooth X58 from Asus reportedly uses heavy duty materials and parts to ensure greater stability, reliability, endurance, and value. The chokes, solid state capacitors and MOSFETs have apparently been tested under the most stringent conditions and harsh environments based on military standards, providing users with a proven heavy duty solution. It is also said that the motherboard is designed to endure humidity and heat even at peak operation.

UF Series SABERTOOTH X58Motherboard Specifications
CPU	LGA1366 socket for Intel® Core™ i7 Processor Extreme Edition/ Core™ i7 processors
Chipset	Intel® X58/ICH10R
System Bus	Up to 6.4 GT/s, Intel® QuickPath Interconnect
Memory	6 x DIMM, triple channel, max 24GB
	DDR3 1866/1800/1600/1333/1066 MHz
Expansion Slots	2 x PCIe 2.0 x16 slots (dual at x16/x16 mode)
	1 x PCIe x16 slot (at x4 mode)
	2 x PCIe x1 slots
	1 x PCI slot
Multi-GPU support	Supports NVIDIA® 2-way SLI™ & ATI® quad-GPU CrossFireX™technology
Storage	2 x SATA 6Gb/s with EZ Backup and SuperSpeed functions
	6 x SATA 3Gb/s with RAID 0, 1, 5 and 10
	1 x Power eSATA 3Gb/s
	1 x eSATA 3Gb/s
LAN	Gigabit LAN
Audio	8-channel high definition audio
IEEE 1394	2 x IEEE 1394a
USB	2 x USB 3.0
	12 x USB 2.0
Exclusive TUF Features	TUF ENGINEpower design
	- E.S.P. : Efficient Switching Power
	- TUF components: choke, capacitors and MOSFETs certified tomilitarystandards
	Ultimate COOLthermal solutions
	- CeraM!X Heatsink Coating Technology
	- ASUS Fan Xpert
	Safe & Stable Guardian Angel
	- MemOK!
Form Factor	ATX, 12 x 9.6 inches (30.5 x 24.4 centimeters)

Contact and price details:

Price: Rs.17,250/- (excluding taxes)

Contact: Mr. Vinay Shetty (ASUS India)

Phone: 022 – 67668800 / 18002090365

E-mail: reachus@asus.com

Website: www.asus.in

Warranty Period: 3 years

Gigabyte says USB 3 motherboards are compatible with UASP

Gigabyte said that its range of USB 3.0 motherboards now support USB Attached SCSI Protocol (UASP).  UASP is a protocol initiated by the USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF). It is said to speed up data throughput to SCSI devices by up to 20 percent, while also reducing CPU utilisation, data latency and user waiting time. 

Gigabyte has a range of USB 3.0 motherboards, with over 30 models that are claimed to span both Intel and AMD platforms. The company also claims to currently have more certified SuperSpeed USB motherboards than any other brand. 

Users can now experience UASP offers by downloading and installing the latest USB 3.0 driver from the Gigabyte website. UASP device vendors who are working with Gigabyte for USB 3.0 cross validation and testing include Buffalo, CyberSLIM, OCZ, Sharkoon and SuperTalent. 

Tim Handley, deputy director of motherboard marketing at Gigabyte said: “At Gigabyte we have made it our goal to be the leading USB 3.0 motherboard brand, and so we are pleased to announce support of UASP across all our SuperSpeed USB products. 

“As an increasing range of external USB 3.0 storage devices make their way into the market after Computex this year, we see great value and importance in UASP in driving the performance of SuperSpeed USB to reach its full potential.”

PCI Express And SLI Scaling: How Many Lanes Do You Need?

Are the most elaborate platforms really required to host the fastest GPUs, or can you get away with P55's lane-splitting scheme? As Nvidia’s latest graphics processors push 3D performance to new heights, we examine the interfaces needed to support them.
A mere seven months have passed since our most recent PCI Express scaling article showed modest performance differences between PCIe x8 and PCIe x16 slots. But it has been a very busy seven months!
The first salvo came when Nvidia’s much-delayed GeForce GTX 480 smoked AMD’s Radeon HD 5870 as the fastest single-GPU card on the market, and the mid-priced solution that followed showed the highest multi-GPU performance scaling we’ve ever seen.

Unfortunately, such an elevated degree of technological achievement is difficult to swallow for a motherboard reviewer, as it makes my earlier findings irrelevant to most users.

The focus of today’s question will center on you, the PC owner. Do you actually need an X58 platform to support the latest graphics technologies, or will something with fewer lanes suffice? MSI helped us to facilitate the answer with a single product, by producing an X58 motherboard that also has the x8 and x4 modes found on some P55 solutions.

We’ve already seen how X58 and P55 motherboards offer similar gaming performance when using a single x16 slot. And limiting ourselves to a single board allows us to focus exclusively on PCI Express lane width by eliminating every other variable. The name of that product is, of course, the Big Bang-XPower.

While it certainly doesn’t represent the P55 market’s moderate pricing, the XPower’s biggest liability becomes an asset for the purpose of today’s test. Its two PCIe 2.0 x16 slots are divided between up to three x16-length slots each, changing to x8-x0-x8-x8-x8-x0 modes when slots three and five are filled, and then to x8-x4-x4-x8-x4-x4 mode when slots two and six are filled. Thanks to MSI, we can now check x16, x8, and x4 transfer modes on a single motherboard, without using little fingers of tape to reduce the number of connections on the card itself.

Test System Configuration
CPU Intel Core i7-920 (2.66 GHz, 8 MB Shared L3 Cache), Overclocked to 4.00 GHz at 1.40 V, 160 MHz BCLK
Motherboard MSI Big Bang-XPower, BIOS V1.2 (06/09/2010), Intel X58 Express, LGA 1366
RAM Kingston KHX16000D3ULT1K3/6GX (6 GB), DDR3-2000 at DDR3-1600 CAS 7-7-7-21
GTX 480 Graphics MSI GeForce GTX 480 1.5 GB, 700 MHz GPU, GDDR5-3696
OS Hard Drive Western Digital VelociRaptor WD3000HLFS, 300 GB, 10,000 RPM, SATA 3Gb/s, 16 MB cache
Sound Integrated HD Audio
Network Integrated Gigabit Networking
Power OCZ-Z1000 1000 W Modular
ATX12V v2.2, EPS12V, 80 PLUS Gold
Software
OS Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit
GeForce Graphics Nvidia ForceWare 258.96
Chipset Intel INF 9.1.1.1020

Our Core i7-920 is overclocked to 4.00 GHz in an attempt to remove the “CPU cap” on 3D performance.

Thermalright’s MUX-120 keeps our overclocked CPU cool enough to pass stability tests.

With a mid-load efficiency of around 91% and an 80 PLUS Gold rating, OCZ’s Z1000 power supply provides optimal “full system” power testing. Because its efficiency curve dips to around 89% at its ends, readers can multiply today’s input power readings by 0.90 to calculate output power within ±1%.

Benchmark Configuration
3D Games
Aliens Vs. Predator Benchmark Alien Vs Predator Benchmark Tool
Test Set 1: Highest Settings, No AA
Test Set 2: Highest Settings, 4x AA
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 Campaign, Act III, Second Sun (45 sec. FRAPS)
Test Set 1: Highest Settings, No AA
Test Set 2: Highest Settings, 4x AA
Crysis Patch 1.2.1, DirectX 10, 64-bit executable, benchmark tool
Test Set 1: Highest Quality, No AA
Test Set 2: Highest Quality, 4x AA
DiRT 2 Run with -benchmark example_benchmark.xml
Test Set 1: Highest Settings, No AA
Test Set 2: Highest Settings, 4x AA
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call Of Pripyat Call Of Pripyat Benchmark version
Test Set 1: Highest Settings, No AA
Test Set 2: Highest Settings, 4x MSAA
Synthetic Benchmarks and Settings
3DMark Vantage Version: 1.0.1, GPU and CPU scores

3DMark does a great job of testing GPU and CPU performance, but we’re not yet certain how relevant its results will be in a bandwidth comparison.

The PCIe 2.0 x8 slot performs only around 1% slower than a 16-lane slot at the benchmark’s 1280x1024 “Performance” preset, while the x4 slot drops behind by another 3%.

The performance difference between x16 and x4 slots narrows to 2% at 3DMark’s 1920x1200 “Extreme” preset.

Experience tells us that Crysis is usually GPU-limited, and it appears that bandwidth limits are far less of a problem as resolution is increased.

The x4 slot suffers a 9% performance handicap at 1680x1050, while the x8 slot allows the GPU to reach 98% of its performance potential. That is to say, the mid-sized slot looks like an acceptable option for Crysis.

While most games show only modest differences between various slot configurations, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2’s unusually high variance accounts for 20% of our benchmark totals.

Builders can expect an average performance loss of 8% when going from a x16 to a x8 slot. That could be an important consideration when using a platform that has a limited number of PCI Express lanes, such as an LGA 1156 platform in SLI mode. But before we move on to the SLI tests, let’s see what effect these configurations have on power, heat, and efficiency.

Dropping PCIe lanes can reduce power consumption, but not enough to matter to most high-end PC owners.

We wouldn’t expect a difference in heat simply from using a different slot, so we weren’t surprised to find that none existed.

Losing moderate performance without a similarly-sized reduction in power is a recipe for an efficiency disaster, since the calculation compares performance to power.

Now that we know to expect an 8% average performance loss when moving a single GeForce GTX 480 from a x16 to a x8 PCIe 2.0 slot, let’s see how that difference translates to SLI. Do we really need more than sixteen PCIe lanes to support two high-end graphics cards?

We didn’t see much of a difference between the x8 and x16 slots in Alien Vs Predator from our single-card tests, so we don’t expect a big difference in SLI. It’s nice, however, to see how well SLI scales compared to a single card, with a peak SLI performance gain of 92%.

An oddity occurs as resolution is increased, with the dual x8 slots outpacing the dual x16 slots at 2560x1600. We can’t even begin to guess why that might happen, aside from some inefficiency attributable to SLI in this title. But maybe it's the motherboard instead.

DiRT 2 is slightly CPU-bound when using dual GeForce GTX 480’s at medium resolutions, gaining “only” 72% from the use of two cards at 1680x1050. Once again, GPU dependence increases as resolutions are increased, so the SLI advantage accelerates to 91% at 2560x1600.

DiRT 2 wasn’t very bandwidth-dependent with a single card, so the fact that the dual-x8 slot configuration trails the dual-x16 configuration by only 2-5% is no surprise here, either.

Everyone who has followed today’s scaling article to this point should be completely aware of the pattern that has emerged. Testing the GeForce GTX 480 in SLI has not yet made sense at medium resolutions, because the 4.00 GHz Core i7 CPU hasn’t been able to keep up with the cards at anything less than 2560x1600. S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat is proving to be an exception, only because the cards can’t keep up with the game at that resolution.

We still see the performance gain for SLI shoot up from 75% at 1680x1050 to 94% at 2560x1600, yet because the game isn’t completely playable at our highest test settings (with a 16 FPS minimum frame rate not shown), most users will be forced to sacrifice resolution, details, or anti-aliasing to regain a more fluid experience.

Our list of SLI-based benchmarks showed excellent scaling, but only at the highest-tested 2560x1600 resolution. A serious CPU “bottleneck” is the most likely cause for decreased SLI scaling at lower resolutions. For most games, it doesn’t even make sense to test a pair of GeForce GTX 480 graphics cards at anything less than 2560x1600, and one benchmark was completely crippled by the performance of our 4.00 GHz CPU, even at 1920x1200. Let’s see what effect this CPU limit had on our overall scaling performance:

While two cards outperform a single card by up to 90% in most games, that only happened at our highest test resolution. Poor scaling at lower resolutions dropped our average gain to only 63%. Moreover, the one game that was most bandwidth-dependent in our single-card tests was the same game that became almost completely CPU-bound in SLI, obliterating the 8% performance difference previously noted in our single-card PCIe evaluation.

While the performance gain of SLI exceeded the increased power consumption of today’s system, we again note that it happened only at high resolutions. A net loss in SLI power efficiency can be attributed exclusively to the inclusion of 1680x1050 in today’s tests.

One other peculiarity of today’s test was that our x8/x8 SLI configuration required the card coolers to be adjacent to each other, while the x16/x16 configuration had one empty space between cards. Yet, we never saw a card overheat. How much of a problem did shoving the cards together create?

Nvidia puts a hole in the back of its GTX 480 graphics card, behind the fan, so that the fan can take air in from both sides. The result is that we didn’t see a big difference in temperature between cards that were placed closer together. We expect this design to be less effective for the center card in three-way configurations, and we plan to scale our tests to even greater heights in future articles.

The big question today was whether or not we needed more than 16 lanes to feed multiple high-end graphics card in SLI, and the answer is a solid “perhaps not.”

OK, let’s call it a conditional "no.”

While we did see a fairly large difference between x8 and x16 slots when a single card was used, adding a second card shifted our limit to CPU performance. That is to say, for most of today’s tests, a faster CPU would be far more important than dual x16 slots in achieving the ultimate SLI performance.

That answer presents its own set of questions, since our high-flying Core i7 CPU was already pushed to 4.00 GHz. Most builders simply can’t go much higher with a daily-use gaming machine.

Another part of that conditional answer pertains to test resolution. GPU dependence increases with resolution, to the point that two cards eventually become a “bottleneck” far tighter than the CPU. Yet, that level of GPU dependence outweighs even PCIe x8 bottlenecks.

In the end, we simply needed a faster CPU to apply everything we learned about single-card bandwidth to multi-GPU configurations. This finding should come as some comfort to owners of “high-end” P55-based systems who might be considering an SLI upgrade for their GeForce GTX 480 graphics cards. If you have a high-performance processor in that motherboard, and you're overclocking to 4 GHz+, the extra CPU horsepower will have a more profound impact than an upgrade to an X58-based machine. Making X58 truly worthwhile requires an even faster processor and resolutions beyond 2560x1600.

PCI Express And SLI Scaling: How Many Lanes Do You Need?

Are the most elaborate platforms really required to host the fastest GPUs, or can you get away with P55's lane-splitting scheme? As Nvidia’s latest graphics processors push 3D performance to new heights, we examine the interfaces needed to support them.
A mere seven months have passed since our most recent PCI Express scaling article showed modest performance differences between PCIe x8 and PCIe x16 slots. But it has been a very busy seven months!
The first salvo came when Nvidia’s much-delayed GeForce GTX 480 smoked AMD’s Radeon HD 5870 as the fastest single-GPU card on the market, and the mid-priced solution that followed showed the highest multi-GPU performance scaling we’ve ever seen.

Unfortunately, such an elevated degree of technological achievement is difficult to swallow for a motherboard reviewer, as it makes my earlier findings irrelevant to most users.

The focus of today’s question will center on you, the PC owner. Do you actually need an X58 platform to support the latest graphics technologies, or will something with fewer lanes suffice? MSI helped us to facilitate the answer with a single product, by producing an X58 motherboard that also has the x8 and x4 modes found on some P55 solutions.

We’ve already seen how X58 and P55 motherboards offer similar gaming performance when using a single x16 slot. And limiting ourselves to a single board allows us to focus exclusively on PCI Express lane width by eliminating every other variable. The name of that product is, of course, the Big Bang-XPower.

While it certainly doesn’t represent the P55 market’s moderate pricing, the XPower’s biggest liability becomes an asset for the purpose of today’s test. Its two PCIe 2.0 x16 slots are divided between up to three x16-length slots each, changing to x8-x0-x8-x8-x8-x0 modes when slots three and five are filled, and then to x8-x4-x4-x8-x4-x4 mode when slots two and six are filled. Thanks to MSI, we can now check x16, x8, and x4 transfer modes on a single motherboard, without using little fingers of tape to reduce the number of connections on the card itself.

Test System Configuration
CPU Intel Core i7-920 (2.66 GHz, 8 MB Shared L3 Cache), Overclocked to 4.00 GHz at 1.40 V, 160 MHz BCLK
Motherboard MSI Big Bang-XPower, BIOS V1.2 (06/09/2010), Intel X58 Express, LGA 1366
RAM Kingston KHX16000D3ULT1K3/6GX (6 GB), DDR3-2000 at DDR3-1600 CAS 7-7-7-21
GTX 480 Graphics MSI GeForce GTX 480 1.5 GB, 700 MHz GPU, GDDR5-3696
OS Hard Drive Western Digital VelociRaptor WD3000HLFS, 300 GB, 10,000 RPM, SATA 3Gb/s, 16 MB cache
Sound Integrated HD Audio
Network Integrated Gigabit Networking
Power OCZ-Z1000 1000 W Modular
ATX12V v2.2, EPS12V, 80 PLUS Gold
Software
OS Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit
GeForce Graphics Nvidia ForceWare 258.96
Chipset Intel INF 9.1.1.1020

Our Core i7-920 is overclocked to 4.00 GHz in an attempt to remove the “CPU cap” on 3D performance.

Thermalright’s MUX-120 keeps our overclocked CPU cool enough to pass stability tests.

With a mid-load efficiency of around 91% and an 80 PLUS Gold rating, OCZ’s Z1000 power supply provides optimal “full system” power testing. Because its efficiency curve dips to around 89% at its ends, readers can multiply today’s input power readings by 0.90 to calculate output power within ±1%.

Benchmark Configuration
3D Games
Aliens Vs. Predator Benchmark Alien Vs Predator Benchmark Tool
Test Set 1: Highest Settings, No AA
Test Set 2: Highest Settings, 4x AA
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 Campaign, Act III, Second Sun (45 sec. FRAPS)
Test Set 1: Highest Settings, No AA
Test Set 2: Highest Settings, 4x AA
Crysis Patch 1.2.1, DirectX 10, 64-bit executable, benchmark tool
Test Set 1: Highest Quality, No AA
Test Set 2: Highest Quality, 4x AA
DiRT 2 Run with -benchmark example_benchmark.xml
Test Set 1: Highest Settings, No AA
Test Set 2: Highest Settings, 4x AA
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call Of Pripyat Call Of Pripyat Benchmark version
Test Set 1: Highest Settings, No AA
Test Set 2: Highest Settings, 4x MSAA
Synthetic Benchmarks and Settings
3DMark Vantage Version: 1.0.1, GPU and CPU scores

3DMark does a great job of testing GPU and CPU performance, but we’re not yet certain how relevant its results will be in a bandwidth comparison.

The PCIe 2.0 x8 slot performs only around 1% slower than a 16-lane slot at the benchmark’s 1280x1024 “Performance” preset, while the x4 slot drops behind by another 3%.

The performance difference between x16 and x4 slots narrows to 2% at 3DMark’s 1920x1200 “Extreme” preset.

Experience tells us that Crysis is usually GPU-limited, and it appears that bandwidth limits are far less of a problem as resolution is increased.

The x4 slot suffers a 9% performance handicap at 1680x1050, while the x8 slot allows the GPU to reach 98% of its performance potential. That is to say, the mid-sized slot looks like an acceptable option for Crysis.

While most games show only modest differences between various slot configurations, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2’s unusually high variance accounts for 20% of our benchmark totals.

Builders can expect an average performance loss of 8% when going from a x16 to a x8 slot. That could be an important consideration when using a platform that has a limited number of PCI Express lanes, such as an LGA 1156 platform in SLI mode. But before we move on to the SLI tests, let’s see what effect these configurations have on power, heat, and efficiency.

Dropping PCIe lanes can reduce power consumption, but not enough to matter to most high-end PC owners.

We wouldn’t expect a difference in heat simply from using a different slot, so we weren’t surprised to find that none existed.

Losing moderate performance without a similarly-sized reduction in power is a recipe for an efficiency disaster, since the calculation compares performance to power.

Now that we know to expect an 8% average performance loss when moving a single GeForce GTX 480 from a x16 to a x8 PCIe 2.0 slot, let’s see how that difference translates to SLI. Do we really need more than sixteen PCIe lanes to support two high-end graphics cards?

We didn’t see much of a difference between the x8 and x16 slots in Alien Vs Predator from our single-card tests, so we don’t expect a big difference in SLI. It’s nice, however, to see how well SLI scales compared to a single card, with a peak SLI performance gain of 92%.

An oddity occurs as resolution is increased, with the dual x8 slots outpacing the dual x16 slots at 2560x1600. We can’t even begin to guess why that might happen, aside from some inefficiency attributable to SLI in this title. But maybe it's the motherboard instead.

DiRT 2 is slightly CPU-bound when using dual GeForce GTX 480’s at medium resolutions, gaining “only” 72% from the use of two cards at 1680x1050. Once again, GPU dependence increases as resolutions are increased, so the SLI advantage accelerates to 91% at 2560x1600.

DiRT 2 wasn’t very bandwidth-dependent with a single card, so the fact that the dual-x8 slot configuration trails the dual-x16 configuration by only 2-5% is no surprise here, either.

Everyone who has followed today’s scaling article to this point should be completely aware of the pattern that has emerged. Testing the GeForce GTX 480 in SLI has not yet made sense at medium resolutions, because the 4.00 GHz Core i7 CPU hasn’t been able to keep up with the cards at anything less than 2560x1600. S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat is proving to be an exception, only because the cards can’t keep up with the game at that resolution.

We still see the performance gain for SLI shoot up from 75% at 1680x1050 to 94% at 2560x1600, yet because the game isn’t completely playable at our highest test settings (with a 16 FPS minimum frame rate not shown), most users will be forced to sacrifice resolution, details, or anti-aliasing to regain a more fluid experience.

Our list of SLI-based benchmarks showed excellent scaling, but only at the highest-tested 2560x1600 resolution. A serious CPU “bottleneck” is the most likely cause for decreased SLI scaling at lower resolutions. For most games, it doesn’t even make sense to test a pair of GeForce GTX 480 graphics cards at anything less than 2560x1600, and one benchmark was completely crippled by the performance of our 4.00 GHz CPU, even at 1920x1200. Let’s see what effect this CPU limit had on our overall scaling performance:

While two cards outperform a single card by up to 90% in most games, that only happened at our highest test resolution. Poor scaling at lower resolutions dropped our average gain to only 63%. Moreover, the one game that was most bandwidth-dependent in our single-card tests was the same game that became almost completely CPU-bound in SLI, obliterating the 8% performance difference previously noted in our single-card PCIe evaluation.

While the performance gain of SLI exceeded the increased power consumption of today’s system, we again note that it happened only at high resolutions. A net loss in SLI power efficiency can be attributed exclusively to the inclusion of 1680x1050 in today’s tests.

One other peculiarity of today’s test was that our x8/x8 SLI configuration required the card coolers to be adjacent to each other, while the x16/x16 configuration had one empty space between cards. Yet, we never saw a card overheat. How much of a problem did shoving the cards together create?

Nvidia puts a hole in the back of its GTX 480 graphics card, behind the fan, so that the fan can take air in from both sides. The result is that we didn’t see a big difference in temperature between cards that were placed closer together. We expect this design to be less effective for the center card in three-way configurations, and we plan to scale our tests to even greater heights in future articles.

The big question today was whether or not we needed more than 16 lanes to feed multiple high-end graphics card in SLI, and the answer is a solid “perhaps not.”

OK, let’s call it a conditional "no.”

While we did see a fairly large difference between x8 and x16 slots when a single card was used, adding a second card shifted our limit to CPU performance. That is to say, for most of today’s tests, a faster CPU would be far more important than dual x16 slots in achieving the ultimate SLI performance.

That answer presents its own set of questions, since our high-flying Core i7 CPU was already pushed to 4.00 GHz. Most builders simply can’t go much higher with a daily-use gaming machine.

Another part of that conditional answer pertains to test resolution. GPU dependence increases with resolution, to the point that two cards eventually become a “bottleneck” far tighter than the CPU. Yet, that level of GPU dependence outweighs even PCIe x8 bottlenecks.

In the end, we simply needed a faster CPU to apply everything we learned about single-card bandwidth to multi-GPU configurations. This finding should come as some comfort to owners of “high-end” P55-based systems who might be considering an SLI upgrade for their GeForce GTX 480 graphics cards. If you have a high-performance processor in that motherboard, and you're overclocking to 4 GHz+, the extra CPU horsepower will have a more profound impact than an upgrade to an X58-based machine. Making X58 truly worthwhile requires an even faster processor and resolutions beyond 2560x1600.

Computex 2010: Motherboards Review

ECS are desperately trying to break into consumer markets, so we were set upon with their new P55 board. As part of the ECS Black series, the PCB comes in pure black and white, and offers three PCIe x16 Gen 2.0 slots spaced for tri-GPU setups, 
4 USB 3.0 slots, 2 SATA/eSATA 6Gb/s ports, dual Gigabit Ethernet ports, and 7.1 channel HD audio. Extra PCIe lanes come in the form of a PLX chip, located between the first and second PCIe slots.

What is most unusual about his motherboard is a 4-pin molex connector situated beside the DDR3 slots. Depending on the purpose of this molex connector (it seems in a weird position to provide extra power to the GPU layout or the CPU) this may or may not inconvenience users, depending on case and cable management.

Biostar TH55XE

The TH55XE from Biostar is an oddly coloured H55 micro-ATX board also on display at Computex. Using a black PCB with orange, white, and yellow components, this is board aimed at the HTPC market.

With support for Core i3/i5/i7 processors, 4 DDR3 DIMM slots and Realtek ALC888 8+2 Channel HD Audio, Biostar believe the motherboard could make a perfect combination for an in-home entertainment system. However, as seems to be the case constantly with Biostar, the combination of PCI and PCIe slots may not be to anyone’s taste. The PCIe x16, PCIe x1, PCI, PCI arrangement will frustrate users wanting an x1 audio card and a double slot or large passive GPU - we'd much rather like an PCIe x1, PCIe x16, PCI, PCI arrangement.

ASRock X58 Extreme3: An Enthusiast X58 Motherboard at a Budget Price?

ASRock's current X58 line-up consist of the SuperComputer ($275), Deluxe3 ($225), Deluxe, and the Extreme3's predecessor, the Extreme (AT review, $170). 
The Extreme3 is available today for $190. Other products in this price range that the Extreme3 is competing with are the Gigabyte EX58-UD3R at $189, the MSI Pro-E for $190, the MSI Pro-E USB3 for $200, and the Foxconn FlamingBlade at $180.

The ASRock X58 Extreme3 is available (at time of writing) for $189.99, one dollar above the EX58-UD3R. For your extra dollar, a plethora of extra features over the Gigabyte board are available on the ASRock board - a full set of 6 DIMM slots for DDR3 memory, USB3 compatibility, SATA 6Gb/s connectivity, three PCIe slots (x16, x16, x4), Power/Clear CMOS/Reset buttons, and support for DDR3 ECC memory. The main question is whether this board performs as well as the UD3R, given any of these extra features, or even above the ASRock Extreme, which is $20 cheaper.

What we want to see in a budget board is finesse and capability - a BIOS that works, compatibility with components, and something that runs happily above stock. While the best budget boards undoubtedly won't have all the bells and whistles of a premium enthusiast board, if it runs decent and we can play around without too many issues, and the price is right, then it will sell. Off the bat, the ASRock Extreme3 is a happy little runner, with a few issues. We've had this board running for a couple of weeks now, with an overclock, in a variety of situations, and it's a board worth considering if USB3 and SATA6Gb/s are two features you're dying to have with a Socket 1366 processor on a budget.

In this review, We’re pitting the Extreme3 against the board that has been the stalwart of my PC cavalcade - the Gigabyte EX58-UD3R, revision 1.0. The EX58-UD3R appeared on the market in Q4 2008, and is still one of the best budget X58 boards available in terms of capability and performance. ASRock have known their competition for over a year, so they have to show that their product can provide a distinct improvement over the competition. The marketed additions of USB3 and SATA 6Gb/s is a start, but ASRock is having trouble applying BIOS polish to the motherboard, which we will explain later.

Overview/Summary

People in the market for just such a board are interested in getting the most out of a Core i7 920 or i7 930 for as little cost as possible, to spend on other areas, such as graphics, memory, or a speedy SSD. So using a high end air cooler/low end water cooler, 3-6GB of memory, two mid-range DX11 GPUs in SLI/CFX, a small boot SSD and storage HDD would make a pretty neat enthusiast system on a relatively tight budget. So it would be nice to know if you've got a motherboard up to the task.

Our board arrived pre-flashed with the public v1.2 BIOS. On the first boot, after changing the processor voltage options, would not allow the changing of other voltage settings, such as ICH, IOH CSI and CPU PLL. These were changeable after a subsequent boot, however. Users who frequent BIOS options will be frustrated at ASRock's effort - some sections of the BIOS allow numbers to be typed in (such as BCLK), but others require using the +/- keys. Some options, on pressing enter, open out into a submenu whereby you can select the setting you want - however, most do not. This early BIOS version also gave trouble by refusing to wake out of C3 unless the C State Package Limit setting was moved from Auto to C3 - this is to some extent still an issue on the v1.6 BIOS (latest at time of writing).

Other than the fiddly BIOS options that could do with a little polish, the ASRock X58 Extreme3 is very well placed in terms of cost and performance in the X58 market.