Review:Foxconn Inferno Katana GTI Motherboard

[crio]

Recently a massive amount of motherboards based on P55 chipset found their way to stores shelves.There are many models by many companies so that everyone can choose whatever covers their needs.I had the luck to have one of them for testing and i present it to you.It is the Foxconn Inferno Katana GTI made by the famous Quantum Force Dept.The full review was done for HWBOX.gr and can be read here with many more images and falsh charts.

Specs & Test system










Motherboard Pics




Banchmarks + Tests





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Lets start with what we liked in Katana.First to all her price,150 (~220$) is a pretty fair price and if you add the really good bundle then you see a really good combo.The temps are very low ,that's because there is no Northbirdge, so the main source of heat from a mobo is out.The design is amazing and makes it a great choice for modders who want the best looking thing for their case.Furthermore ,the reset/cmos/power buttons that tend to become a standard in many mobos are also present but what really took as by surprise was the voltage measuring points.We usually don't see that stuff in a mid-end mobo...Hmmm,not bad at all


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Unfortunately none is perfect.We all saw the great Bclk numbers with many P55,well you don't see them here.The max bclk was 220.I wanted and expected more..Just like bloodrage there are issues with the cores voltages.Katana sometimes read 1.05V as default voltage and other times 1.25V so when i gave +250mv i expected 1.5V but saw 1.3V from bios.I then entered +450mv which would be 1.5V but saw from the bios and measuring points a 1.7V which i quite insane for air overclocking...They have got to fix this...Also when running on default clocks the only Ram frequency the mobo was giving was 1333 ,even if i entered everything manually it still did so.I hope those issues will be fixed with a good BIOS..


As we come close to the finish i have to say i was impressed by Katana and add that this mobo is worthy of a title.So at hwbox we gave her the title of


HWBOX

Value For Money Award

[George_o/c]

Solid effort Chris !
That's a wonderful little beast ! I just hope that the Vcore problems you guys came across will be solved in the near future.

[hiwa]

very nice review thanks for posting

[Mescalamba]

I´m impressed, that theres even some review.. I almost tought, that except some samples that are probably owned by Foxconn emploies exists.

[overclocking101]

WOW this board looks nuts!!!! what do the pci-e slots run at?? X8 x X8 or X16 x X8 what??? thats what i really wanna know. this board looks imense.

[George_o/c]

I´m impressed, that theres even some review.. I almost tought, that except some samples that are probably owned by Foxconn emploies exists.

Of course it exists. Already listed at www.plaisio.gr, for 149€.

[kiwik]

Will keep my eyes on this board, I hope they release a good BIOS, otherwise I'll go with DFI.

[dread77]

Amazing job bro!!!!!!!! Well done.

[Solid Snake]

Very nice bro.

I like the colors on the MB

[mak1skav]

Of course it exists. Already listed at www.plaisio.gr, for 149€.

It is listed as coming soon item in this shop.

[sofos1990]

Well done Chris

[zfactor]

newegg has them i believe

[WaterFlex]

Nice review, mate. Good mobo indeed.

[George_o/c]

It is listed as coming soon item in this shop.

I only said it's listed, not in stock. Nevermind, they 'll be here pretty soon I guess

[Mescalamba]

Will keep my eyes on this board, I hope they release a good BIOS, otherwise I'll go with DFI.

Go with DFi, save you nerves and money.. Or EVGA..

[George_o/c]

DFi saves your nerve and money ? They are quite difficult motherboards, especially for mainstream users / overclockers who don't want to spend infinite hours on overclocking and bios tweaking. From my personal experience they will eventually pay you off big time, but 'till then, they will be a pain in the ass.

[kiwik]

I have looked at the EVGA boards and they look a bit more expensive for the same kind of feature set.

[zfactor]

hopefully these will end up better than the last fox stuff. my bloodrage had just to many issues and i put the dfi back in when i was running the e8600's... did they ever get a bios that worked 100%?? i stopped playing with it after many tries

[hiwa]

here is our review

http://www.nexthardware.com/recensio...katana-gti.htm

http://translate.google.com/translat...katana-gti.htm

[FU1G0R]

DFi saves your nerve and money ? They are quite difficult motherboards, especially for mainstream users / overclockers who don't want to spend infinite hours on overclocking and bios tweaking. From my personal experience they will eventually pay you off big time, but 'till then, they will be a pain in the ass.

if you are a mainstream user only avoid the f9 for the genie bios and use the normal bios for noobs, there are 2 bios modes, for noobs, then press f9 genie bios .... as simple as that, dont know why people say DFI is only for the hardcore, theyre easy boards to work with if you want to use them in the "non expert mode"

Nice review by the way, the Gti is the low end model, the katana (without the gti) is higher end, nice work Crio, love to see gaming benches at diffrent clock speeds, very accurate

[kiwik]

DFI boards aren't hard to work with.

I had more problem with ASUS and MSIs than with my recent DFIs.

[FU1G0R]

dont you think its kinda weird we havent seen any dfi p55 t3eh9 reviews online? if someone has please send me a link , im really curious about that one (dfi addicted :P )

[kiwik]

The board (p55-t3eh9)was supposedly launched last week in Europe, they had the socket burning problem hit them in the testing labs, so they postponed the launch and check with other socket makers.

[SubZero.it]

Mmm...I really like this board,but what about foxconn's socket problems?And what about a new bios?

[exacratie]

Nice test...did you check if you have any problem with contacts on the socket??