Asus P5Q Deluxe: Intel P45 has arrived

Stability

We reset the BIOS to its default values and then turned on Asus's EPU to automatically control the phase use and clocks of everything except the graphics card. We started off by loading the quad-core processor with a Prime95 torture test instance on all cores, then when that had warmed the system up we threw on 3DMark06 looping over the top.

A day later we came back to find everything running as expected and the system was completely responsive and stable. There were no additional cooling fans to aid the heatpipes apart from the CPU fan from the OCZ Vendetta, and we found the heatpipes and fins still only just warm to touch.

We have to certainly agree with Asus that 16 phases does keep things cooler by spreading the stress to the components over more MOSFETs, and combined with the cooler P45 chipset this means the board should be able to withstand a higher ambient temperature without adding to it.

Overclocking

Going on the suggestions from Asus with regards to GTLs and voltage settings for Yorkfield processors. With a 1.3V and 0.655x GTL for the north bridge, 1.3V VTT, 1.66V CPU PLL and 0.675x CPU GTL we easily achieved 485MHz FSB with a 6x multiplier into Windows. It wasn't quite so stable under load, but given more time tweaking the AI clock skews and GTLs we're sure that it would be stable.

We actually found that with an E8500 Wolfdale that leaving the GTLs set to Auto was more fruitful than actually trying to play with them. We managed to push 500MHz FSB into Windows with pseudo-stability. Given the vastness of options we expect there to be some good results in time as we realise that the 0302 BIOS is still young and we know every company is working its tail off trying to improve BIOSes all round at the moment.

One thing we did miss is a clear CMOS button. We've been spoiled by Asus’s lovely backlit power and reset switches and our inherent laziness doesn't extend to switching a CMOS jumper back and forth – we’d love to see a button for CMOS reset too and, what’s more, it doesn't even have to look good.

Conclusions

One major thing to notice is that now mainstream CrossFire on an Intel platform has a new foothold in the P45 chipset, it's dual PCI-Express 2.0 x8 lanes (effectively equalling dual PCI-Express 1.1 x16 bandwidth) offers a much more balanced solution that's light years ahead in performance compared to the x16/x4 combinations we frequently saw from all but one (Asus Blitz) P35 board. The P35 boards were great for being inexpensive, yet fantastic performers, and the P45 chipset should just sweeten the deal at this price point. Although we're still missing the ever more popular Nvidia SLI (thanks to Nvidia) this might sway a few to jump ship to AMD, but a large part of this anticipation depends on how well AMD's next generation graphics product performs next month.

This board is difficult to quantify – on one hand Asus has brought what was premium features that would cost you easily in excess of £150 down to the mainstream level, after all, you can get ExpressGate on even the most basic P5Q-E now. On the surface, for £120 this has a fantastic set of features, some of which you can't find elsewhere, yet we don't feel satisfied – it's a large evolutionary jump, not revolutionary.

We still want far more out of the ExpressGate feature and we'd prefer to have WiFi over a second Gigabit Ethernet – that's a worthwhile pairing because it adds diversity rather than mirroring the plenty of boards that already feature two GigE sockets, and we'd put a heavy bet on the fact more people will find having WiFi without losing a rear I/O USB port or PCI expansion slot more useful than a second Ethernet connection. Also, you can't use the two DriveXpert sockets as normal SATA ports, so basically you end up with only five out of eight that are usable due to the layout.

The EPU is an evolution for the better – despite the odd bug, the software side is excellent; it’s well laid out and easy to use. However you can't use it if you're overclocking or even just tweaking the BIOS because it overclocks and underclocks the system so needs complete control, and yet, it's not diverse enough to allow detailed custom user settings for all four performance states. We don't deny what we're asking for will take a lot of work, and for now this would certainly satisfy a need and potentially an upgrade, but not if you already own an "energy saving" motherboard.

One thing that Asus has going for it here is its core performance and BIOS – while we've been waiting weeks for solid BIOS revisions from the competition (we're currently testing Asus, Gigabyte and MSI in house), Asus has provided a BIOS that mirrors its Republic of Gamer boards in tweaking options. If you learn how to use them, you can really set it off to do some great things and while each performance gain is a small percentage, coupled together they nudge it ahead of the competition on many accounts like we've seen in our performance numbers.

We can't yet draw value conclusions because we've yet to see the final prices of other P45 boards. However considering £120 is quite a sum over current P35 prices yet it still remains under X38 and X48 board prices, but this Asus P5Q Deluxe is generally more fully featured than any of them, we'd certainly equate this to a high value indeed. However, whether you'd be tempted for the P5Q Deluxe over the P5Q-E or P5Q-Pro which feature a still very capable eight phase EPU and virtually everything else the Deluxe does – certainly everything a mainstream user would really need: do you need that x4 slot? Then we'd save £10 to £25 and put it to better use elsewhere.

In the tit-for-tat battle between A and G part of us questions that all we're heading into is a lot of "16 is better than 12", "our Fujitsu capacitors are better than your Fujitsu capacitors" and "our P5Q Premium can also have four Gigabit Ethernet connections like your P45-DQ6". Why not build boards with features and (low) prices that customers want, not just to have engineering e-peen swinging contests across Taipei? With the inevitable rise in component prices because copper and oil (for example) are getting ever more expensive, we could see prices rise anyway, so we're worrying about where the business efforts are really focused – will the consumer lose out?

Final Thoughts

Asus has appealed to the budget conscious, feature loving, overclocking enthusiast very well indeed even though some of these features are mutually exclusive in use. It's not perfect but it's evidently a clear that this is a thorough evolution over previous Asus products, even previous P35 boards as a whole. It's raised the bar massively for what mainstream should be compared to the previous generation, yet in almost every area it's still left us wanting more. Its hardware features are innovative and daring, but we find ourselves rhetorically questioning "would I actually use it though?" If yes, then jump on it like it was made of gold. Asus has proved that its P45 P5Q Deluxe is a step up from P35, and almost emulates X48 but for far less money: it has our vote for this reason alone.

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• Performance
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• Value
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What do these scores mean?