Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe Motherboard Review – SLI Part 1

With the recent launch of the nForce4 chipset, motherboard manufacturers have been scrambling to take the newest AMD powerhouse chipset from paper to production and get products on store shelves. The nForce4 brings many new features, such as onboard hardware firewall, a new SATA controller and the much anticipated ability to use two graphics cards through a Scaleable Link Interface (from now on referred to as “SLI”). Asustek is one of the first motherboard manufacturers to get a product to market that takes advantage of all of the nForce4’s features.

Asus was kind enough to send us their brand new AMD flagship, the nForce4 A8N-SLI Deluxe motherboard and two EN6600GT’s so we could review a full-blown Asus SLI setup. We are going to take a look at this hardware in a three part article suite. With this article, Part 1, we will be looking at the motherboard. Then in Part 2 we will look at the the SLI compatible EN6600GT’s, and finally in Part 3 take a closer look at the performance and issues of a current SLI hardware setup, and maybe give some insight to those looking at 6600GT SLI hardware.

• SLI Part 2 – Asus Extreme N6600GT
• SLI Part 3 – The Current state of nVidia SLI

Part1 – Motherboard – Asus A8N SLI Deluxe
The A8N SLI Deluxe is Asus’ latest and greatest offering for the AMD64 socket-939 platform, utilizing the nForce4 chipset. The nForce4 is the most recent chipset from nVidia for the AMD64 and it will be available in three flavors: nForce4 SLI, nForce4 Ultra and the nForce4. The nForce4 Ultra is the performance model, touting some extra features from the base nForce4. The A8N SLI Deluxe motherboard utilizes the nForce4 SLI chipset, and as the name implies it enables the use of SLI graphics hardware.

The motherboard feature list is packed full of the usual and some brand new features such as the new SATA 3Gb/s standard, PCI-Express and even an onboard hardware firewall. Here is the full list of specifications pulled from the Asus website:

The motherboard comes in a very clean looking and eye catching box with a glossy and satin finish. The front sports the Asus AI logo, for their proprietary motherboard overclocking. On the back there are descriptions of the boards feature set and a section for Asus’ AI suites “proactive features”. There is also a flip up portion which contains more and more descriptions of the board’s components, layout and bundled AI software. I can attest, if you picked this box up off the shelf, you’d have every question answered about this board short of, “Hw many FPS in my favorite game am I going to get?” Nice job Asus.

Inside of the box I was surprised as to the sheer amount of accessories included. Being a minimalist, I really didn’t know what to do with them all, but I’m sure many of you think the more the better. Here is the complete list of accessories: SLI connector, 1 x 1-port IEEE1394 module, 1 x SLI retention bracket, 8 x Serial ATA cables, 1 x SATA Extension module for external devices, 4 x 2-port SATA power cable, 1 x 2-port USB2.0 / Game module, 1 x 2-port USB2.0 module, 1 x COM Port, module, 1 x UltraDMA 133/100/66 cable, 1 x IDE cable, 1 x FDD cable, 1 x I/O Shield, User’s manual, Instant Music, Setting Sticker, and WinDVD Suite

Some key accessories of note are the Serial ATA extension module and the SLI accessories. The Serial ATA extension module lets you access two of your SATA connectors through a PCI slot. That way you can connect two SATA externally if you need a quick file swap, or need to test a HD and don’t want to mount it permanently in your case. The SLI accessories include the SLI bridge connector which links two identical graphics cards for SLI operation, and Asus even included a hold down to make sure the connector doesn’t fly off during transport.

Board Layout
The board layout overall is pretty good, Asus used a sleek black PCB and the followed a more traditional AMD layout. The CPU socket is centered on the right with the power MOSFET’s behind the I/O connectors and the ram slots are parallel to the bottom edge of the board (unlike parallel to the right side like some nForce3 boards). You can see that this board is a Revision 1.02, so there were very minimal hardware changes done before the board hit store shelves. Capacitors on the board are from several manufacturers: Rubycon, Taiwan Ostor and KMG.

The back I/O panel contains the following ports, from left to right: PS/2 Keyboard and Mouse, RCA and SPDIF Digital audio, Parallel port, IEEE1394 Firewire, Marvell PCI Gigabit LAN, nVidia Gigabit LAN, 4xUSB 2.0 and 6 analog audio mini-jacks. Behind the I/O ports you can see that Asus chose to place an aluminum heatsink on the MOSFET’s that feed the various power hungry components on this board. The heatsink is roughly 5/8”x3/4”x4” and is mounted using spring push pins. Underneath there is a hefty amount of white heatsink compound and each MOSFET makes good contact with the heatsink.

Asus engineers did a good job of keeping the CPU socket area rather clutter free. The only issues you may run into is if you have a cooler mounting that extends beyond the stock LOTES bracket; it could come into contact with the components on the upper edge of the stock bracket. Another is if you have a large heatsink that require tipping to mount, such as the Thermalright XP90 and XP120. A Thermalright XP90 was used in this review, and there is a possibility of hitting the MOSFET heatsink depending on how you orient the heatsink. To the right of the CPU socket is the Auxiliary 4-pin 12v connector, in a location I feel is more preferred. Up and out of the way. To the left of the CPU socket you can see the accessory Marvel Gigabit LAN controller and the Asus EZ Plug Molex connector. This plug supplies auxiliary power to the PCI-Express x16 slots for use during SLI mode. PCI-Express requires 75watts of power for the graphics subsystem, so with two graphics cards this can put heavy stress on the board’s power lines. The plug also has an indicator light to remind you to plug a connector in when in SLI mode. This assures there is no lack of power when both cards are fully utilized. The only issue I see here is that Asus placed this connector in a very tight spot once you have cards, chip and heatsink mounted.

In the lower right of the board are the ram slots, IDE connectors, Floppy connector and the 24-pin ATX. This board can accept both the 24-pin ATX and 20-pin ATX power supplies. So if you find yourself with a good or brand new 20-pin ATX power supply, there’s no need to rush out and buy a 24-pin. Great feature. The ram slots on this board are color coded to designate which slots to use for dual channel operation. In this case use both blue slots to run two memory modules in dual channel. One major layout snag you can see here however is the fact that those with longer cards may run into the all to common problem of the clips hitting the graphics card PCB. This can make removing ram a pain with a graphics card installed.

To the left of the memory slots in the lower left, you can see the nForce4-SLI chipset, the SATA connectors, Silicon Image 3114R SATA-RAID controller, CMOS battery and reset jumper, BIOS chip, I/O and game port headers, and 3x USB2.0 connectors. The nForce4-SLI chipset has been covered with a small, chrome, actively cooled heatsink mounted with push-pins that puts out mildly noticeable noise. Underneath you can see the bare nForce4-SLI chipset. Asus used a thin plastic spacer to cover the capacitors around the chipset and a dark gray, putty like thermal interface material along with a small amount of white thermal grease. This board offers a grand total of 8 SATA connectors across two RAID controllers. The black connectors are associated to the chipset based NVRAID, the red connectors are associated to the accessory Silicon Image RAID controller.

In the upper left of the board you will find a blue and a black PCI-Express x16 slots, 2x PCI-Express x1 slots, the ASUS SLI EZ-Selector slot, the ALC850 audio codec chip (just above the rightmost PCI-Express x1 slot), 3x PCI slots, an IEEE-1394 Firewire connector and the motherboard power status LED. The x16 PCI-Express slots are used for graphics cards and are color coded for primary card (blue) and secondary (black). All video output is utilized through the primary x16 slot regardless of whether you are using SLI or not. Currently to utilize SLI, motherboards have to have a physical switch to split the PCI-Express x16 graphics channel across two x16 slots, thereby splitting one x16 into two x8 channels, one for each card. Asus uses a special bridge they call the SLI EZ-Selector. They use a unique design that takes advantage of a SODIMM slot common to most laptop memory. Just release the clips and the EZ-Selector pops up at a 45 degree angle. Remove the selector PCB and re-insert it in its respective orientation to select either single or dual video card operation. Asus has a patent pending for this design using existing technology for a unique use. This method is very easy to use and should definitely cut down on the number of RMA’s for broken SLI selector cards.

One good thing I notice right off the bat is the fact that Asus allowed for two x1 PCI-Express between the SLI video card slots. This gives those using 2-slot video cards or wanting to fit a water block and tubing between the cards plenty of wiggle room. It also allows for a better thermal design as the primary card won’t be hindered by the secondary card being right up against it.

The BIOS on this board was updated to the latest AMI – Phoenix AWARD BIOS version 1003.06 Beta. The Bios has been split into several major tabs, the first of which is the Main tab which contains basic Time/Date information and disk information. Any line in the BIOS that has a triangle bullet to the left of it can be opened into a submenu. The next tab is the Advanced tab which contains many submenus. This is where you will find all the major settings for things like clock speeds and memory settings. There are also tabs for extra features like the Asus audio POST reporter, and the Instant Music feature.

In the CPU Configuration submenu you will find basic CPU information, settings for the HTT multiplier (1-5x CPU Frequency in JumperFree Submenu), turning Cool and Quiet technology on/off, and a submenu for memory settings. In the DRAM Configuration submenu are the memory timings and latency settings. All the timings in are similar to any other enthusiast motherboard so you should have no problem tweaking memory to your hearts content. In addition there are memory/CPU FSB ratios indicated by DDRXXX ratings. The actual ratios can be determined by using a stock CPU FSB of 200MHz in relation to the rated memory speed (DDR:CPU): DDR200 (1:2), DDR266 (2:3), DDR333 (5:6), DDR400 (1:1), DDR466 (7:6), DDR500 (5:4), DDR533 (4:3), DDR550 (11:8), DDR600 (3:2).

The PCIPnP submenu allows you to select a plug and play OS, set video card priority between PCI and PCI-X, set IRQ resources and perform PCI/VGA palette snoop for ISA graphics cards. In the Onboard Device submenu you will find settings to turn selective onboard hardware on/off and submenus for the onboard IDE, NVRAID, and USB controllers.

In the NVRAID submenu you can select specific drives connected to either PATA or SATA ports dedicated to the NVRAID controller. Here drives can be individually selected for the controller to oversee. Back to the advanced tab and the JumperFree Configuration submenu you will find the majority of tweaking and overclocking settings.

Under Overclock Profiles you will find several predetermined overclocking profiles which open up their settings below to allow the board to overclock by 3, 5, 8, and 10% of the stock CPU speed or leave the settings off. With the profile set to Manual you have access to CPU voltage (max of 1.65v) memory voltages (max of 3.00v), PCI-X frequencies (max of 145MHz), CPU multiplier, PCI lock, and the CPU speed. CPU speed is the CPU FSB and will determine you HTT, CPU and memory clocks based off their respective multiplier or ratio (Note: HTT multiplier and memory ratio is in CPU Configuration submenu. I would have liked to see them all in one place, makes overclocking much easier). The CPU FSB can be scaled to a maximum of 400MHz FSB.

Under the Power main tab and its submenus you will find all of the power-on wakeup events and power switch modes. In the Hardware Monitor Submenu are real time temperatures and voltages so you can monitor the system before boot-up. You can also turn on the Q-Fan controller and set the threshold temperature for the controller to target. If the temperature breaks that threshold the fan is run at full speed.

Under the Boot main tab you can set the major boot priorities for each device. To change all of the boot settings like num-lock, quick boot and change the halt-on errors you can go to the Boot Settings Configuration submenu.

You can set the overall device boot priority in the Boot Device Priority submenu. This will set the device order in which the system will search for bootable OS’ or applications. Lastly there is the Exit main tab which allows you to save changes, reload defaults and exit the BIOS.

Asus included quite a few programs with this board to allow interaction with hardware and tools for updates and various customizations. Here are some previews of the included software.

AI-Booster – The AI-Booster is an Asus developed program that allows control over various clock frequency and voltage settings from Windows. You can monitor in real time basic temperatures, voltages, fan speeds, clock frequencies as well as change the settings for the AI-NOS features. AI-NOS allow dynamic overclocking settings using various profiles. The profiles are based off modest percentage increases over the stock processors settings. The tuning menu gives control over CPU multiplier and FSB, memory and CPU voltage, and also threshold temperature for the Q-Fan control. Once everything is set you can also save your own settings profile and apply it whenever you want.

nVidia Firewall – This program you can install along with the chipset drivers. One of the key features of the nForce4-SLI chipset is the onboard firewall. Similar to 3rd party programs like ZoneAlarm, the nVidia Firewall adds an extra level of protection for your PC. Allowing you to block ports and limit access to your computer over all the incoming connections as well as monitor and block any outgoing connections from Spyware or Viruses. The great thing about the nVidia Firewall however is that it does the majority of this in hardware, similar to a hardware router with a firewall built in. This relieves the stress on your precious CPU cycles so protecting your system doesn’t become a hated resource hog. The nVidia Firewall runs a small application in your system tray that lets you select from basic profiles on the fly. When you open up the nVidia Firewall Summary it uses a small Apache service to load up in your web browser with a basic visual showing the blocked and allowed connections, incoming and outgoing. There are configuration settings for all your applications so you can customize the firewall any number of ways.

There are also basic configuration wizards if you find yourself getting blocked from your own windows shares, or need to release specific ports. There are an incredible amount of settings and you can save them all into your own specific custom profiles which can be loaded on the fly later via the system tray icon.

PC-Probe – Asus also included their PC-Probe which allows users to monitor all the temperatures, fan speeds and voltages of the system from windows. You can keep data logs and set alarms for if voltages drop, fans stop spinning or temperatures spike. PC-Probe can also display quite a bit of system information such as BIOS and board revisions, memory usage and processor information.

Asus Update – The Asus Update utility is used to check for new BIOS revisions and safely re-flash the onboard motherboard BIOS chip from windows. The program connects over the internet to an Asus hosted FTP server and allows you to select from whatever new or even beta revisions are available. I used this program to successfully flash the motherboard to the BIOS used in this review.

MyLogo2 and Winbond Voice Editor – MyLogo is a program that can edit the full screen boot logo’s contained in the BIOS files for this motherboard. This allows you a bit of extra customization. This board also features a vocal POST dialogue that while the computer boots will output to the speakers and audibly mark each step of the POST procedure and any boot errors. The Winbond Voice Editor allows you to import your own recorded sounds to replace the stock voice. Again, allowing for some more customization.

Test Setup
To help run the Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe through its paces, we will be comparing it against a similar setup using what some may tout as the nForce3 GB “King of the Hill”, the MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum. Both setups will use the same components, but vary the motherboard and video card due to the Asus board using PCI-Express and the MSI using AGP 8x. The system specs are as follows:

Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe (nForce4-SLI, BIOS 1003.06 Beta), AMD64 3200+ Winchester, Crucial Ballistix Tracer PC4000 2x512mb (DDR400 @ 2.0-2-2-5), Asus EN6600GT (Forceware 66.93), WD Raptor 360DG 36GB, WD 1600BB 160GB, Lite-On DVD-RW SHOW-1213S, Windows XP Pro (SP1 and DX9C)

MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum (nForce3 GB, BIOS 7025v1.41 Beta), AMD64 3200+ Winchester, Crucial Ballistix Tracer PC4000 2x512mb (DDR400 @ 2.0-2-2-5), Asus EN6600GT (Catalyst 4.12), WD Raptor 360DG 36GB, WD 1600BB 160GB, Lite-On DVD-RW SHOW-1213S, Windows XP Pro (SP1 and DX9C)

Audio
Overall it seems the ALC850 AC’97 codec was implemented well on this board. It provides a full 8.1 channels with SPIDF or coaxial digital outputs. While playing the CD Fast by Custom using Sony MDR-V600 headphones or using the provided SPIDF output through a Harman Kardon AVR130, audio reproduction was crisp with no noticeable distortion.

SATA Drives
Onboard there are two SATA controllers. One being the NVRAID controller on the nForce4 chipset supporting RAID0, RAID1, RAID 0+1 and JBOD spans across the SATA and PATA-IDE connectors. The other controller being the accessory Silicon Image controller and support RAID0, 1, 0+1, and RAID5. The single NVRAID controller generally would be more than enough capability for the average user, but Asus’ choice to add the Silicon Image controller with RAID5 capability is a great addition for those wanting to use this board in conjunction with a large hard drive array for file storage.

Sisoft Sandra Professional 2005 1.10.37 – File System Benchmark – A synthetic benchmark that yields a MB/s transfer speed of a Hard Disk. This test is useful for comparing the relative efficiencies of Hard Disk performance of two systems using the same Hard Disk type. Higher transfer rates are better.

SATA performance using the newer nForce4 NVRAID controller was a little disappointing. Transfer rates for the Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe are roughly 12% lower than that of the MSI Neo2 Platinum. This board is in definite need of a chipset driver update, and/or BIOS tweak. This is a clear sign of their infancy.

PATA Drives
There are two Parallel-ATA channels onboard that are color coded, blue for primary and black for secondary. The parallel channels can be striped in conjunction with the Silicon image SATA RAID controller.

Sisoft Sandra Professional 2005 1.10.37 – File System Benchmark

PATA performance with hard drives proved roughly 7% better on the Asus board than with the MSI and its nForce3 GB chipset. Good for those still using PATA drives.

Sisoft Sandra Professional 2005 1.10.37 – CD/DVD-Rom Benchmark – A synthetic benchmark that yields a kB/s transfer speed of a CD/DVD-Rom. This test is useful for comparing the relative efficiencies of Hard Disk performance of two systems using the same CD/DVD-Rom type. Tests were conducted with Ubisoft’s Far Cry DVD in the drive. Higher transfer rates are better.

Transfer rates were identical between both setups. So you shouldn’t have a problem in this area.

Memory
Using dimm’s A1 and B1 as labeled in the motherboard manual the Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe ran in dual channel mode without a hitch.

Sisoft Sandra Professional 2005 1.10.37 – Memory Bandwidth Benchmark – A synthetic benchmark that yields a MB/s bandwidth of a memory subsystem. This test is useful for comparing the relative efficiencies of memory performance of two systems using the same memory type. Or it can be used to compare performance differences of two different types of memory on the same system. Higher bandwidths are better.

You can see the Asus board has a very slight edge over the MSI in memory bandwidth. Nothing to write home about but it is good to see improvements over the nForce3 GB chipset with its more developed drivers and BIOS.

Everest Home Edition 1.10.106 – Memory Benchmark – A synthetic benchmark that yields a MB/s bandwidth of a memory subsystem for both reading and writing. This test is useful for comparing the relative efficiencies of memory performance of two systems using the same memory type. Or it can be used to compare performance differences of two different types of memory on the same system. Higher bandwidths are better.

Again, we see the Asus board with slightly better memory performance, and incrementally better during writing operations.

Futuremark PCMark2004 – All tests (excluding graphics) – From Futuremark, the makers of the popular 3DMark graphical benchmarking series, PCMark focuses on the application side of benchmarking. It is a synthetic benchmark that tests an overall systems performance in operations such as file conversions, scientific calculations, web page rendering, memory read/write and file transfers. This program outputs a raw number score which can be used to compare different systems overall performance in applications (graphics tests disabled). Higher scores are better.

The Asus nForce4 board took quite a hit versus the MSI nForce3 GB board. Lets see the score breakdown between components and see where PCMark04 find the Asus board to be lacking.

We can see here that CPU scores very slightly lower with the Asus board. Memory as expected came out marginally better as previous tests would hint. Though the drop in SATA hard drive transfer speed we saw earlier made a significant 8% drop in hard drive performance from the MSI Neo2 Platinum. What this means is you may see a similar hit if you use a SATA drive as your system drive like in our test setup. Hopefully Asus can apply some tweaks to the BIOS and nVidia can help with a new chipset driver release.

dBPowerAmp – WAV to MP3 Lame Conversion – A real world test to compare a systems ability to perform file conversions to any other system. In our tests a 50MB WAV file is used and converted to 128kbps MP3 with very high quality setting. Lower times are better.

Both systems performed on par. Neither showed a weakness in this test against the other.

3D System Tests
These tests are completed using low resolutions, sound disabled, no V-Sync, no Anti-Aliasing, and no Anisotropic Filtering. This is done to try and isolate total system performance without much influence from the graphics card. Tests are run twice and the average frames per second determined from the second test.

Novalogic Commanche4 Demo Demo Benchmark – 640×480

Commanche4 is a CPU limited game. Both boards perform on par with each other in this test. Note however that because we are using different generations of graphics cards, there should be some room for error in a direct 1 on 1 motherboard comparison in these tests.

Epic Games Unreal Tournament 2004 – Benchemall Recorded Demo – 640×480

UT2004 is a CPU limited game. Here we see roughly a 10 FPS performance dip by the Asus nForce4 board.

iD Software Doom 3 – OCmodshop Guardian Demo – 640×480

Doom3 is a GPU limited game. Again we see both boards perform on par with each other. A very slight edge goes to the Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe.

Valve Half-Life 2 – OCmodshop Coastal Firefight Demo – 640×480

Half Life 2 is a CPU limited game. We see a similar drop in FPS as we did earlier in the UT2004 tests. About 6 FPS dip by the Asus nForce4 board.

Overall I would have to choose the MSI Neo2 platinum as the overall winner in the 3D System Tests, but again note the difference in graphics cards even if they are not a major contributing factor to these tests. The results in the GPU limited Doom 3 test would hint at an even playing field between both setups, and the significant drop in performance in two Direct-X CPU limited games would hint at the MSI board being the overall better performer in these tests.

Testing the board’s maximum HTT clock at a 1:1 memory to CPU ratio, I found the board to max out at 271MHz. This was attained while dropping the CPU multiplier to x5, the HTT multiplier to x3, and relaxing the timings on the Crucial Ballistix Tracer PC4000 to 3.0-5-5-10. Above this speed the system refused to post correctly. The speed attained by the Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe is nothing to scoff about, however with the MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum a maximum speed of 294MHz was attained using the same hardware and settings.

Over the course of several weeks of testing and tweaking a final overclock was attained with the following settings and using a Thermalright XP-90 heatsink: 258MHz x 10 (2.5-3-3-9), 1:1 memory to CPU ratio, x4 HTT. At these settings the system has run rock solid stable through hours of gamming, CAD work, and audio/video encoding.

Issues
During testing several issues or minor annoyances were encountered. For one after about a week the active heatsink on the nForce4 chipset began to make an irritating grinding noise. Most likely due to the fact that the fan is close to failing and the fan blades are hitting the interior of the heatsink. DC fans are not always the most reliable and long life product on the market, but I have an issue with anything starting to fail within the first week of use. Second, the memory ratios indicated in the BIOS are either implemented incorrectly or just don’t work. Several attempts to make the board run at a ratio other than 1:1 memory to CPU ended up with the board automatically turning the dynamic overclocking settings on and running the memory well below the 200MHz mark. Thirdly, it is hard not to re-examine the issue of poor SATA performance and hope that the issue is related to software and that the chipset drivers and motherboard BIOS are still in their infancy.

Note: Asus just recently released a new BIOS version 1003.010 with some fixes. Unfortunately full testing couldn’t be completed before this article was posted. However, keep an eye on our forums for any updates. The Major changes listed are: Voltage support for 90nm chips, CPU fan control fix and added 64bit Microsoft OS support. Minor changes were not listed, but as many enthusiasts know, there can be quite a difference from one BIOS version to another.

Conclusion
Coupled with some newer chipset drivers and some BIOS updates, this board should definitely be a winner and have some great performance to boot. Looking at it overall I feel the Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe is a great product.

Asus worked hard to make this board one of the first to market sporting the newest nVidia nForce4-SLI chipset. They also added a huge list of features and accessories that would make anyone in the market for a new system drool. Although at the extreme end of overclocking, the Asus A8N-SLI was not the top dog, it still did allow for a great stable overclock.

For those not looking to overclock to the brink, I can see this board being the center of a really great AMD64 system. I am giving the Asus A8N-SLI Deluxe motherboard 8.5 out of 10. I would like to thank Asustek for sending us this new motherboard for review.

Pros

• Great features
• Additional RAID5 controller
• Onboard hardware firewall
• Good board layout
• Lots of accessories
• Stable

Cons

• NVRAID SATA performance
• BIOS seems to need revision
• Chipset fan quality control