Expensive and Large – Intel D5400XS Motherboard (Cont’d)

For its on-board sound chip, Intel chose the Sigmatel STAC9274 also found on several other Intel motherboards. This chip is considered one of the best on-board sound solutions. The D5400XS also features an optical digital output.

In addition to the power and reset switches, the motherboard also sports a Port-80 diagnostic display, a system speaker and a blue HDD-LED.

Board – No Room for High-End Graphics Cards

Intel’s D5400XS motherboard features four PCI-Expre x16 slots for graphics cards. Thus, buyers can create multi-card configurations using either Nvidia’s SLI or ATI’s Crossfire. Sadly, the spacing between the ports was poorly chosen, accommodating either up to three dual-slot cards or four single-slot cards. This is quite disappointing for a motherboard from the high-end price bracket. While it is true that there neither graphics chip company currently offers support for four-card configurations today, the Skulltrail represents the ideal performance basis for just such a setup – and the same should hold true for the expandability and upgrade options. Sadly, this is not true of the current design.