Product Reviews

Asus's MB P5K Deluxe/WiFi-AP motherboard is the first board we've seen to use Intel's P35 chipset. This chipset, codenamed Bearlake, has been designed to support Intel's latest range of Core 2 Duo processors with a frontside bus (FSB) speed of 1,333MHz. The processors' model numbers will end in 50, such as the E6650. Gigabyte's GA-965P-DSP (Rev 3.3) also supports these faster throughputs, but it's a tweak to the older P965 chipset.

The P5K Deluxe/WiFi-AP has four DDR2 RAM slots, which can take DDR2 800MHz memory. However, Asus also sells a DDR3 version of the board (P5K3 Deluxe/WiFi-AP), which can take 1,066MHz memory. DDR3 is still expensive and hard to come by, though, and early tests have shown that it's currently not significantly quicker than DDR2.

If you're into tweaking then you'll be happy with the P5K's BIOS settings. As well as some predefined settings that give a set percentage overclock, there's complete manual tuning. The FSB can be tuned from 200MHz (800MHz quad-pumped for the processor) up to 800MHz (2.4GHz quad pumped) in 1MHz steps. Memory is similarly easy to tweak and can be tuned

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from 667MHz up to 1,333MHz in 1MHz increments.

The big advantage of having a motherboard that's designed to run with an FSB of 1,333MHz is that you can use it to overclock the current range of 1,066MHz processors and you'll know that the motherboard is going to remain stable. Should you run into any problems, Asus's CPU Parameter Recall option lets you reset your settings and get your PC back to a stable state. Despite the motherboard's potential for overclocking, it is still passively cooled by a series of heatsinks linked by a heat-pipe, so it's silent.

The P5K is one of the most feature-packed boards that we've seen, with six USB2 ports at the rear and headers for a further four. It's also one of the few motherboards we've seen to have built-in wireless in addition to dual Gigabit Ethernet ports. The 802.11g plug-in module has a removable antenna and can also be used as a wireless access point using Asus's software.

The P5K supports CrossFire, so you can run two ATI graphics cards together. Only the primary PCI-E x16 slot runs at full speed, though, and the secondary slot runs at x4 speed. Plugging in two double-slot cards will block all but one PCI slot, although you'll still leave the two PCI-E x1 slots free for expansion cards.

The P5K isn't cheap, but its range of features and overclocking options make it a good choice for anyone looking to build a powerful PC and use the latest processors. If you are holding out for DDR3 memory, though, we'd wait a couple of months for those prices to fall and then choose the P5K3 board instead. Those on a tighter budget who are looking for 1,333MHz processor support should go for Gigabyte's GA-965P-DS3P (Rev 3.3) instead.