ASUS P5E64 WS Evolution and MSI P45D3 Platinum
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Date: 28.08.2008 |
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Layout and Features
Both the motherboards stand out for their massive cooling systems, impressive expansion options, as well as high-rated power converters for the memory and the north bridge. However, the difference in class is evident to the naked eye: on the ASUS motherboard, there are 4 PCI Express x16 slots, and merely 2 on the MSI board.
Note that the main power connectors are positioned over the boards' edges.
Besides, MSI P45D3 Platinum has an additional Molex connector near the north bridge.
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It is inconvenient to plug cables to it. Besides, it is almost impossible to plug in a fan to the SYSFAN4 connector with a video card installed in the first PCI Express x16 slot. We also note that with a video card fitted into the first PCI-E slot there is no way to remove or install memory modules on both the boards. Coming back to the cooling system, we note that all the radiators on the boards are interlinked with heat pipes:
Each motherboard has four 240-pin DIMM slots each for DDR3 memory modules, with the overall supported memory capacity being 8 GB.
Now let's take a closer look at the expansion slots. The north bridge of Intel P45 allows arranging 2 PCI Express x16 ver.2.0 slots, with 8 bus lanes allocated to each. That's just the way the engineers at MSI have done, plus they added two more PCI Express x1 and two "regular" PCI slots.
  As regards ASUS, engineers of this company have installed an additional PEX8518 bridge made by PLX Technology. Therefore, the number of PCI Express lanes has gone up, which allowed installing two additional x16 slots which run in the PCI Express x4 mode. On the motherboard, there is also a PCI Express x4 slot whose rear wall is cut up. That is, you can fit a video card on it, but the video card should be very short. Like on the MSI board, ASUS P5E64 WS Evolution uses two "regular" PCI slots. Also, PCI Express lanes were used to plug in Gigabit LAN controllers. The ASUS' board uses two such controllers: Marvell 88E8056 and Marvell 88E8001, but only 88E8056 uses the PCI-E х1 bus (88E8001 is plugged in to the PCI bus).
The MSI board uses only one Gigabit Ethernet controller - Realtek 8111С - which uses only one PCI Express bus lane.
Despite the different south bridges, the boards offer support for six SerialATA II ports located near the south bridge.
Besides, the boards use additional controllers to support ParallelATA and SerialATA II. In particular, on the ASUS' board there is one Marvell 88SE6145 chip (one PATA; four SATA II):
Two SATA ports of this controller are positioned near the south bridge (black), with two more SATA ports brought over to the board's rear panel. The MSI board uses one JMicron JMB363 and one JMB362 chips:
  The first controller supports two links, with the respective ports positioned near the south bridge. The second controller also supports two SATA links, but on our board only one is implemented, with an external eSATA on the rear panel. Note that the JMB362 chip is hidden deep under the radiator of the cooling system. Therefore, the user can plug 11 hard disks (9 SATA II + 2 PATA) to the MSI board, and 12 disks (10 SATA II + 2 PATA) to the ASUS board. Then, both the south bridges support 12 USB2.0 ports. On the MSI board, 6 ports are positioned on the rear panel with 6 more plugged in with brackets (there is one bracket for two ports in the bundle). On the ASUS board, the configuration of the ports is the same (there is also a bracket for two ports). Besides, the boards support the Firewire bus. For that, there is an additional controller. On the ASUS board, that is the VT6308S chip made by VIA, and on the MSI board - the JMicron JMB381 chip.
  Despite the different chips, the motherboards support two ports each, with their layout being similar: one mounted on the rear panel, with the other one connected with a bracket (available in the package bundle of both the boards). The motherboards implement the Intel High Definition Audio subsystem: on ASUS P5E64 WS Evolution, there is an ADI AD1988B chip, and on MSI P45D3 Platinum - an ALC888 chip.
The board's rear panel is of the following configuration:
The ASUS board supports optical and coaxial SP-DIF outputs, while the MSI - only optical. Also, on the rear panel of both the motherboards, there is a Firewire port and a SATAII port (on the ASUS board - two SATA II ports). You can also notice a complete lack of LPT and COM ports. However, each of the boards support one serial port (COM) but implemented with a bracket (is available in the package bundle of the ASUS board). A few words on the boards' special traits. First of all, the ASUS' board implements a more or less functional system of POST diagnostics: the board comes bundled with a G.P. module having a 7-stage POST indicator, a matching chip, and a couple of "Power" and "Reset" buttons.
As you can see, part of the rear panel on the MSI board is left to the radiator of the cooling system, and under the radiator there is a button to clear the CMOS. Besides, MSI P45D3 Platinum uses a couple of buttons to start up and reset the system.
Here is a schematical drawing of the motherboards:
There is a couple of important jumpers on the MSI board: JB1 and JB2 which are meant for forced installation of the FSB starting frequency and are located near the PCI Express x1 slots. For all the LGA775 processors, except 1600 (QPB) MHz, there is no need to touch these jumpers - the motherboard recognizes the CPU and sets the required frequency. But if you have CPU with the 1600 MHz bus, then the starting frequency can be set from within the BIOS and also without these jumpers. Now on to the BIOS settings.
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