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| ASUS P5W DH Deluxe vs Gigabyte GA 965P DS3 Conroe Motherboard Shootout |
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At present, you're faced with 2 main chipset options to use with your brand new Core 2 Duo CPU. Either Intel's flagship Crossfire enabled 975X aimed at enthusiasts or the cheaper 965P chiipset which caters for the mainstream market.
We recently reviewed 2 motherboards sporting the different chipsets - the 965P based Gigabyte GA 965P DS3 and the ASUS P5W DH Deluxe which uses the 975X chipset.
If you can't decide which side of the chipset fence to jump, this mini motherboard shootout might just help. To settle this score, we decided to run a few tests, to decide which one was better...
We recently reviewed 2 motherboards sporting the different chipsets - the 965P based Gigabyte GA 965P DS3 and the ASUS P5W DH Deluxe which uses the 975X chipset.
If you can't decide which side of the chipset fence to jump, this mini motherboard shootout might just help. To settle this score, we decided to run a few tests, to decide which one was better...
Testbed and methodology
First of all here's a list of tests we decided to run:- 3D Mark 06 (Default settings)
- 3D Mark 2001 SE (Default settings)
- AquaMark 3 (Default settings)
- Super Pi 32M (Realtime priority)
- F.E.A.R. Multiplayer Demo version 1.02 (Computer - High ; Graphics - custom : 1152 x 864, Everything on maximum, no soft shadows, 4 x AA, 16 x AF)
All tests were run at default settings bar 2 - Super Pi was run with priority set at "realtime" through the task manager. Even the smallest background apps can cause a sizable difference in calculation times.
F.E.A.R. was run at 1152 x 864, with all settings at maximum. Soft shadows were disabled and 4 x AA and 16 x AF was enabled. By running the test in this manner, we would ensure that the CPU was not the bottleneck. This would enable us to show you what differences to expect in day to day gaming at typical resolutions.
Each test was run at 2 different speeds:
- Stock - 266 x 7 (1862 MHz), DDR2 667, 3-3-3-10
- Overclocked - 400 x 7 (2800 MHz), DDR2 800, 4-4-4-10
- ASUS P5W DH Deluxe and Gigabyte GA-P965-DS3 motherboards
- Intel Core 2 Duo E6300 ES (Allendale 2 MB L2 Cache)
- 2 x 1 GB Team Xtreem PC2 5300 RAM 3-4-4-8
- 256MB Connect 3D X1800XT
- Maxtor DiamondMax10 80 GB HDD
- NEC ND 3500 AG DVD-RW drive
- Antec Truepower 2.0 550W EPS 12v PSU
Stock cooling was used on both the CPU and the graphics card. The graphics card was run at stock speeds for each test, and the drivers used were ATi official catalyst 6.6
