Originally Posted by Fraz 
Weird that they can go from producing a board as all-out awesome as the IP35 series to this.
Tbh I don't think that it's quite as bad as gilgamesh makes out.
The firewire header is in a bad place if you want to run a cable to a port on the front of the case but it's fine if you want to add a second/different type to the rear via PCI slot plate*.
& how many people actually use firewire - far, far fewer than USB.
The fact that the extendor heatsink floats isn't necessarily a bad thing - but it could have been improved.
I imagine that the nb heatsink is narrower toward the CPU end to allow for clearance with more HSFs. Placement of the fan isn't really a problem because whether it blows or sucks through it's still largely going to draw it's air from the same area.
Afaik the board is reading from a sensor in the CPU not 1 in the mobo socket so it should just need a calibration offset.
So really the main complaints are the bundle & BIOS.
Everything I've read/heard about the bundle suggests a cock-up rather than planned not to have the usual USB/2 different firewire sockets PCI slot plate* & also the fan mounts mentioned in the manual.
BIOS: tbh I think that we all expected it to be immature on release as abit just don't get the time to play with stuff pre-launch that Asus & Gigabyte do.
Even though the Gigabyte's X38 has been around longer from what I read on other forums it's BIOS still is distinctly immature too.
I've seen reviews of other X38/DDR2 mobos where P35s outclassed them too - at least on DDR2 X38 performance isn't compelling.