Conclusion
The Asus Maximus Formula’s miniscule performance advantage could make it the choice for anyone who doesn’t plan to overclock, even though it’s already slightly overclocked at default speed. On the other hand, Gigabyte’s clear overclocking stability advantage could make it the choice for system tuners. Which would we chose? It depends on which member of the Tom’s Guide team you ask!
The X38 Express isn’t the performance monster the P35 had been at its release, but the two are closely matched today. The X38 will finally shine when future graphics cards are released using faster PCI-Express 2.0 transfers, and true x16 pathways to both graphics card slots make it the perfect choice for next-generation ATI graphics cards in CrossFire configuration.
We didn’t focus much on Foxconn’s new X38A in our final analysis because the board we received simply didn’t behave like a retail product should. We’re sure Foxconn is working feverishly on a BIOS update, and the board already shows enough potential that it might eventually take the lead. Unfortunately, we could wait no longer to complete our tests, as development issues that concerned all of the motherboard makers had already delayed this comparison by several weeks.
Author’s Note
I’m an overclocker, so the majority of readers can probably guess which board I’d chose. Unfortunately, the balance of features, default-speed performance and overclocking capabilities made it impossible to determine an "awardable" winner for this month’s comparison.
- Hardware,
- x38 ,
- comparison ,
- DDR2
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Given that the only reason why anyone would ever buy a DDR2 X38 board rather than P35 is the potentially superior Crossfire performance, where are the Crossfire gaming numbers?
I like the foxconn combo DDR2/DDR3 board as it allows for future upgrade. But why do they offer 2xDDR3 slots 4XDDR2? It would be better the other way around as most current games are happy with 2 gig of ram but by the time DDR3 becomes a more reasonable option it may be 4 gig of ram will be required so you would have to use 2x2gb DDR3 modules. Trouble with that is that certainly with DDR2 the 2gb modules are of more limited availability and generally restricted to the mid range speeds.
DDR2 2gb are not limted, i had no problems getting them, i hate to have to buy DDR3 2gb sticks, ram companys are rakeing it in
Sorry Leexgx but that is not correct - there is far less choice of 2gb DDR2 modules than there is of 1gb modules and those that are available are in the mid range speed bracket and not the top performers.
I understand what you say about the price of DDR3 but my point was that they will come down in price and become a realistic option at which point it may be that 4gb of ram will be the required amount. It's just a pity that the combo boards in those circumstances would restrict you to buying 2gb modules which may have the same "problems" (for want of a better word) as the DDR2 series.
not very true nicoslab! I will get an x38-ddrII card and that for sure not because of crossfire support. I will use my 2 nvidia cards on it which do require 2 x16 (not as sli but for multiple displays)
No nVidia cards *require* PCIe x16. I have run two 8800s in a 975x board at x8, and in an ASrock 775-Dual-Vista at x4.
Not all 2GB DDR2 modules are slow, I'm running 4*2GB OCZ Reaper HPC modules at DDR2-800 4-4-4-15, not bad timings.