X48 Mobo Release Date Suspended

[Cosworth]

Well I was looking forward to buying my new MOBO next week but that idea has been dashed now.
It now looks like the board won't launch now until March probably around the 18th. Grrr!

[DR]

* looks across the room

hmm

[this_is_gav]

Just grab a X38 board. As far as I'm aware they're exactly the same, but the X48 are just speed-binned ones that will allow a higher clock speed - something which will likely be limited by the CPU anyway.

[hermeticist]

I think Intel made a silly mistake: Before Christmas there were rumours that both P45 & X48 would be launching in January. As X38 had only recently been released & did not seem much of an improvement over P35, I was loathe to buy one. Who wants to buy something that the company feels needs replacing a couple of months after it launches? Then I hear they`re not being launched until March (probably not available until April). Saw a good deal on an Abit p35 Pro & bought that. Don`t regret doing so, but If they`d just launched X38 and not gone on about X48 so soon after, I`d have probably bought a more expensive `board. I can`t help but feel they shot themselves in the foot - then again, they still sold me an Intel chipset!

[shaithis]

I went with x38 purely for the extra PCI-E lanes.

Although if your only using 16 lanes, a P35 is just as good IMO.

[this_is_gav]

X38 is useful if you want high-end crossfire graphics, and there's probably something else that can make use of a second 16x lane. P35 is fine otherwise - other than PCIe 2.0 (of little or no benefit yet), there's no real difference that I'm aware of.

[Bhavv]

I might end up running Crossfire on my P35. I initially never planned on using it, but then I thought 2x 3870's will fit a lot better and actually cost less then 1x 3870 X2.

I'm going to waiting for the 4870 before I consider crossfire though. Getting one 3870 then I will sell it and upgrade to a 4870, and add a second later on.

I should have gotten an X38, but they cost more then double what my P35 cost me. The X38's seem to have problems with overclocking. Some overclock ok, but others wont even go past 400 mhz. The X48 seems to address these overclocking problems.

[hermeticist]

I was really only interested in the better overclock potential, as Bhavv said: It would have cost me significantly more.

[Cosworth]

Just grab a X38 board.

I agree and they are cheaper, but unfortunately there aren't too many X38 boards out there to choose from and my preference I admit would be to return to old faithful - Gigabyte. I did originally want the Gigabyte GA-X38-DQ6 but unfortunately it has been already discontinued leaving only it's little brother the DS5 available, which I don't think is quite as good as the DQ6 version .

One thing in the X48's favour is it's new power saving scheme. This scheme was/is on offer to the X38 as well, but only too a few select model numbers, none of which I can find for sale over here in Blighty.

I even, cautiously, looked at some by Asus but have now decided against them as I think Asus and American Megatrends BIOS are pants!

[Bhavv]

Yea I really liked the Gigabyte GA-X38-DQ6 when I looked up all the X38 and X48 boards yesterday, however, it still uses a primitive jumper to clear the CMOS, and its location means that if you use 2 cards, you would need to remove one in order to clear your CMOS.

That would be too painful when my cheap MSI P35 has a button that I can press with a screwdriver.

I also hate the MSI X38 and X48 boards. The roller-coaster circupipe thing looks awesome, but if you install two GFX cards you lose access to your only PCI slot, so I couldnt use my X-fi elite pro! No way I would buy the MSI one, so its between Abit and Asus if I did choose to buy one of these boards.

Its a shame really that little things like the jumper based CMOS reset and no usable PCI slots with dual; GFX cards cant be adressed by now.

ASUS and Abit also both have an external CMOS clear button, and a usable PCI slot with dual cards installed. it seems that they are well ahead of the others when it comes to motherboard design.

Ive mentioned this in like a few threads now, but people should be aware of these features when buying a £200+ motherboard.

[this_is_gav]

ASUS and Abit also both have an external CMOS clear button, and a usable PCI slot with dual cards installed.

The Maximus Formula has both. CMOS button on the I/O shield and PCI slot above the first 16x slot.

[Cosworth]

The Maximus Formula has both. CMOS button on the I/O shield and PCI slot above the first 16x slot.

Yes indeed. As I do run two GPU's the Maximus Formula but Special Edition was one of the ones I was looking into, but after my current exposure to Asus with the P5W DH Deluxe I have to say that been put off them and am left definitely sceptical about buying another . I can't wait to bin this load of rubbish.

[this_is_gav]

I've no idea what I was on, but plainly I was 'reading' (term used loosely) while dreaming of caffeinated peppermints or something. Could have sworn I'd quoted Bhavv saying that that neither had a clear CMOS button or usable PCI slot with dual graphics... :\

[Bhavv]

But the Asux X38 and X48's do have the best layouts of the lot!

I would happily buy the asus version of the X48, while I would only consider the MSI and Abit versions of the P35.

The best board in each category is never made by the same company, and I want whichever is the best for the money I pay. I will never buy a Gigabyte untill they put on a Clear CMOS button, even just an internal one is fine, and I wont ever buy a board where I wouldnt have any PCI slots available after installing two GFX cards.

I have used Asus for years, Ive had a Socket A asus mobo (cant remember which), two S939 Asus mobos - A8N-SLI which fried from too much overclocking, then an A8R-MVP deluxe which was a LOT more overclock friendly . They served me fine, except for the one that died ofc, but that was from a time when manufacturers still didnt make boards that could withstand much overclocking.

Then when I upgraded to S775, I found the MSI P35 Neo2 to be unbeatable value. Nothing else came close to matching it for the price, asus and Abit boards with the same features cost more then £30 more. And, it is rock solid stable with an FSB of 475 on a £66 board!

Brilliant, no actuall need to spend almost 4x as much on an X48, although I would still like one for the extra bling bling.