First Look: Intel P35 chipset

Rear I/O

To describe Asus as reinventing the rear I/O would be an overstatement, but it is certainly not afraid of updating it to support new things. Back when we reviewed the company's first Republic of Gamers motherboard (Crosshair) last year we reported on the inclusion of its LCD screen.

Now Asus has updated the PS2 ports for the first time, dropping the green mouse socket and instead including two USB sockets.

This boosts the rear I/O to six USB 2.0 ports instead of the usual four without having to extend it or drop other, equally useful sockets. Because the chipset now supports 12 USB 2.0 sockets in all, you can still have four to the front of the case for easy access, at the same time as having a very expansive six on the rear for all your permanent USB peripherals.

The PS2 keyboard socket is still needed because not every USB keyboard can be seen by a BIOS, so allowing that amount of backward compatibility is always good.


The other four USB 2.0 ports are topped with two RJ45 sockets providing both Gigabit Ethernets (is that like Internets? -- Ed.), and between them are the two eSATA ports and six-pin Firewire sockets in red. You can get sound out from the motherboard from digital coaxial or optical, with additional motherboard S/PDIF pin-outs as well, or from the six 3.5mm audio jacks.

Finally, at the end is the wireless connector just above the top PCI-Express x1 slot.

BIOS

Given Asus' previous reputation it's very complete as you'd expect and not unlike the P5B Deluxe and Commando BIOSes previous to it. The advanced features are comprehensive and the BIOS allows the chipset to support additional straps now up to DDR2-1333MHz. Asus gives plenty of play in the voltages, with a relatively liberal 2.55V on the memory and 1.7V on the CPU. There is also control for PLL voltage and reference voltage, as well as "clock overcharging".

Asus includes the previously discussed custom Q-fan control, Asus EZ Flash 2, Asus OC Profile, Ai Net 2, AI NOS, AI overclocking and CGI Function. This is an early 0201 BIOS, so things might change in the future.