FOXCONN Launches BLACKOPS Intel X48 Enthusiast Motherboard

[Donnie27]

It comes with lots of stuff in the box thats for sure o.O!!!

Actually $400 = £200, thats still cheaper then the Asus Asus P5E3 Premium WiFi :

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Produ...oductID=729912

But the only thing I want right now in the motherboard department is a cheap alternative to the P35 that has 2x 16x PCI-E lanes for crossfire. Nvidia has the 650i and 750i for cheap SLI, but still nothing decent for ATI unless you want to cripple your second card on a 4x slot.

A 1x 16x or 2x 8x solution like when SLI was first released would even be better then a 16x and a 4x IMO. But theres no reason why they cant offer two full 16x lanes on budget boards if Nvidia are able to do so.

Both the X38 and X48 are far too expensive for a budget buyer wanting to use crossfire.

8 X 8 PCI-E scored better than 16 X 16 and 16 X 4. But the overall result showed much to do about nothing. Or little or no difference. I'm not running CF yet, but if I did, 16 X 4 is the least of my worries. I wish some one would post that review again

[Mungri]

8 X 8 PCI-E scored better than 16 X 16 and 16 X 4. But the overall result showed much to do about nothing. Or little or no difference. I'm not running CF yet, but if I did, 16 X 4 is the least of my worries. I wish some one would post that review again

Well, I used my 3870 in both my 16x and 4x slot and I got this:

http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o...vv/16xvs4x.jpg

So in a crossfire setup, wouldnt the second card also be crippled like this?

Death to 4x PCI-E slots please

There are a few X48's with two slots for around £150, but that is still a bit too much, and the X38's are terrible overclockers.

If I had the cash I would go ahead and buy an X48, but I am still hoping we can get a sub £100 budget version like the 650i / 750i but for crossfire.

[Donnie27]

Well, I used my 3870 in both my 16x and 4x slot and I got this:

http://i118.photobucket.com/albums/o...vv/16xvs4x.jpg

So in a crossfire setup, wouldnt the second card also be crippled like this?

Death to 4x PCI-E slots please

There are a few X48's with two slots for around £150, but that is still a bit too much, and the X38's are terrible overclockers.

If I had the cash I would go ahead and buy an X48, but I am still hoping we can get a sub £100 budget version like the 650i / 750i but for crossfire.

No. Even if the number 2 card is crippled, you still get a nice Boost. Like some AMD Fanboy who says he doesn't like Intel's Business Practices, I don't like nVidia's. I don't like their chipsets either. Games are a sideline issue for me and I prefer Intel Chips over nVidia. I'll put up with Slower CF and AMD's open-ness about CrossFire over nVidia's BS any day. I don't really game enough to justify Intel or nVidia expensive boards or high-end Video Card/s.

Unless we're talking Xtreme Overclocking, then most (X38's) are not terrible overclockers. Many of us have 24/7 Air overclocks and never need higher FSB that Extreme Air, LN or chilled water needs I like other people racing the Cars and Computers while I drive both of mine safely.

My Cheap Gigabyte Boards is wayyyyyy better than the Foxconn P35A.

Last but not least, any 3DMarks is useless since it doesn't correspond to any real world Game.

[Mungri]

Last but not least, any 3DMarks is useless since it doesn't correspond to any real world Game.

Oh but I believe it does. A lower score in 3D mark does indeed mean slower performance all round in your games (likewise higher score = better performance).

4x PCI-E lanes are a bottleneck for current graphics cards. While a crossfire setup on a P35 will give you a nice performance boost, it still wont be as good as an X48 and two full 16x lanes. But just buying an X48 for two full 16x lanes isnt worth the cost if that is the only extra feature I am wanting to upgrade to.

Regardless of Nvidias recent practice which I am also not a fan off, they can at least offer boards in the budget range with two 16x slots, I dont see why Intel / AMD cant do this.

Right now with Crossfire, you have to spend £150-£200 if you want full speed crossfire and a decent overclocking board, something that Nvidia can at least do with SLI for £50-60.

[RPGWiZaRD]

I really like the new Foxconn which started evolving into enthusiast market SERIOUSLY since Shamino joined and have had some innovative ideas as far as motherboard market goes. These boards are way out of my budget but at least it's free to admire them.

For around $400 that's a pretty good deal (just look at ASUS...) concidering you get a Sonar sound card and other nifty features. Plus Blackops isn't that bad name either.

[Donnie27]

Oh but I believe it does. A lower score in 3D mark does indeed mean slower performance all round in your games (likewise higher score = better performance).

4x PCI-E lanes are a bottleneck for current graphics cards. While a crossfire setup on a P35 will give you a nice performance boost, it still wont be as good as an X48 and two full 16x lanes. But just buying an X48 for two full 16x lanes isnt worth the cost if that is the only extra feature I am wanting to upgrade to.

Regardless of Nvidias recent practice which I am also not a fan off, they can at least offer boards in the budget range with two 16x slots, I dont see why Intel / AMD cant do this.

Right now with Crossfire, you have to spend £150-£200 if you want full speed crossfire and a decent overclocking board, something that Nvidia can at least do with SLI for £50-60.

In what games? None the game engine demos correspond to any game on the market. Each Game engine favors different GPU's, Different AI favors different processors, some like IMC, some like large Cache, some combination of the above and finally some like all of this. I've rigs win 3DMarks on to be trashed in real world games. It's only Value is in testing like systems to see if they're set up correctly and torture testing for stability. Anything beyond that is a waste=P

nVidia wants to sell a chip to enable SLI and blocks it as best they for everyone else, including ATI boards, not just Intel. This is anti-competition that makes even Creative Labs look like Open Source Linux guys. I refuse to support them and the rest of THIS MARKET should Demand better from them.

It is not a question of slots, two X16 slots are barely faster than two X8 slots. There is a bottleneck for most games running 16X and 4X and I wish I can remember the site that ran two cards and not BS of running one like Toms did.

[Donnie27]

4x PCI-E lanes are a bottleneck for current graphics cards. While a crossfire setup on a P35 will give you a nice performance boost, it still wont be as good as an X48 and two full 16x lanes. But just buying an X48 for two full 16x lanes isnt worth the cost if that is the only extra feature I am wanting to upgrade to.

BTW, where are you getting the X38 info?

http://www.overclockersclub.com/revi..._x38_dq6/3.htm

A closer look at the PCI area shows that the two PCI-Express 16x slots are far enough apart to put two high end cards with coolers into your computer, which is important if you plan on using Crossfire or SLI. You also should have access to at least one PCI-Express 1x and one PCI slot even if you have two huge video cards.

(Go to GIGABYTE's website for the latest CPU support list.) L2 cache varies with CPU 1600/1333/1066/800 MHz FSB

That long maximus thread is hoot as well LOL!

[THRASHER2]

DROOOOOOOOOOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Great job on the MotherBoard

[dread77]

OK, Hipro already taught us a couple of things regarding this board. Though, does anyone know WHEN and from WHERE we can get one or two of these sweeties????

[Mungri]

BTW, where are you getting the X38 info?

I'm getting the X38 info based on the fact that X48's are nothing other then hand picked X38's which overclock better. If there was nothing wrong with the X38's in the first place, then why do we need X48's?

P35's were great from the start. They havnt required replacing in such a short time frame as the X38 did. There were a lot of problems on most X38's and they could barely overclock anywhere above an FSB of 400 Mhz.

I think that the chances of getting a decent clocking X38 were exceptionally slim. Some overclocked yes, but the majority couldnt get anywhere close to what P35's were capable of.

The X48's now are basically the hand picked X38's that were capable of great overclocks. The remaining X38's are just atrocious.

In that review on the gigabyte you posted, I only see them overclocking it to an FSB of 350 mhz lol???? Am I missing something here?

I am talking about 500+ FSB overclocks, not a measly 350 Mhz. My MSI P35 can do up to 530 Mhz on air, find me an X38 that can do that

The X48 is supposedly able to be overclocked to this kind of a level, but I havnt actually seen any results yet to confirm this either, but I am believing that it does, particularly this foxconn board. If it doesnt then ........ wait, let me see results first please!!!

[ZillaPct]

this is the best mainboard on x48

the final version is very good, peter nice work

[Donnie27]

I'm getting the X38 info based on the fact that X48's are nothing other then hand picked X38's which overclock better. If there was nothing wrong with the X38's in the first place, then why do we need X48's?

P35's were great from the start. They havnt required replacing in such a short time frame as the X38 did. There were a lot of problems on most X38's and they could barely overclock anywhere above an FSB of 400 Mhz.

I think that the chances of getting a decent clocking X38 were exceptionally slim. Some overclocked yes, but the majority couldnt get anywhere close to what P35's were capable of.

The X48's now are basically the hand picked X38's that were capable of great overclocks. The remaining X38's are just atrocious.

In that review on the gigabyte you posted, I only see them overclocking it to an FSB of 350 mhz lol???? Am I missing something here?

I am talking about 500+ FSB overclocks, not a measly 350 Mhz. My MSI P35 can do up to 530 Mhz on air, find me an X38 that can do that

The X48 is supposedly able to be overclocked to this kind of a level, but I havnt actually seen any results yet to confirm this either, but I am believing that it does, particularly this foxconn board. If it doesnt then ........ wait, let me see results first please!!!

OK, thanks for the reply. That review wasn't meant for overclocking but for Two Video card info. 400MHz is 1600MHz effective about 3.6GHz some folks are about 450MHz FSB and not the lowly 350 they talked about.

All P38's aren't the same. Some are heavy duty and some are barebones or budget models. Example;

http://www.custompc.co.uk/reviews/15...38-quadgt.html
Core 2 Duo E6750, rather than a 2.66GHz CPU.
Abit IX38 QuadGT

Overclocking was a much more rewarding experience. Slightly increasing the FSB voltage, and increasing the CPU voltage to 1.525V allowed us to push our CPU to its limit of 3.66GHz, with an FSB of 458MHz (1,832 effective). This boosted the GIMP and video encoding scores to a very respectable 1,306 and 1,325 respectively, which is almost equal to the scores of the Asus. However, the multitasking test was again slow, dragging the overall score down to 1,164. The Asus P5K Premium WiFi-AP scores 1,307 overall, as it doesn't make a meal of the multitasking test.

Just like processors, all chipsets are not created Equal and some boards will out do the exact same model. 500MHz FSB? Sure if I drop the multiplier LOL!