ASUS P5W DH Deluxe vs ASUS P5W DH Deluxe

[Axle209]

I'm in the market for new system, I cant decide which MOBO to get. I was leaning toward Asus P5B Deluxe. Can someone tell me which would be better?

 

[Eurasianman]

Depends on what you want. Both are exceptionally great. However, you might want to reword your topic. The only difference between the two motherboards is one uses Intel 965 chipset and the other 975X chipset. Both are supposedly ready for Quad Core with a simple BIOS update. With the P5W, you get Crossfire. The P5B does not. Regardless that the P5B has two PCI Express x16 slots "supposedly", the second one only operates at 4x.

If I am mistaken, feel free to make note of it.

 

[kcrush]

I'm in the market for new system, I cant decide which MOBO to get. I was leaning toward Asus P5B Deluxe. Can someone tell me which would be better?

Wow by some strange coincidence I am building two machines for people and after a quick trip to the computer show I bought the Asus P5B for the lower end machine and the P5W DH Deluxe for the higher end machine.

I'm still waiting for a few parts to ship from an online retailer to complete both machines but from inspecting the MB, the DH Deluxe is more suited for the gaming machine since it does come crossfire-ready and the version I bought seems to be engineered to handle 65nm quad core processors but will almost certainly require a bios update (so have a duo core processor in thier first) to handle it. But that leaves a nice upgrade path for a least the next year or two.

Plus it comes with a wireless card already added in so you only need to connect the included wireless antenna up to get wireless network access which saves you from having to buy a card if you want to go that route.

If you're going the multi-video card route I'd defintely go with the DH, as I can't find anything that definitely says the P5B supports nvidia or crossfire despite having the two card slots.

If you're going single video card route with no ideas for going multi-video and want to save a few bucks so you can spend elsewhere in your system (like upgraded CPU) I'd say go with the P5B. Can't say for sure if its going to be Quad core compatable but its Duo core compatable and the non-deluxe version.

Both boards (non-deluxe version of th p5b) are certified as Vista ready as well.

As Eurasianman noted it all depends on how you plan on using the machine.

Gaming machine I'd go for the DH deluxe for upgradability. Otherwise I'd stick with the P5B as it should serve nicely.

Of course I'll know more once I have all the parts and can torture both machines.

 

[Eurasianman]

Well put. I was going to go for the P5B Deluxe, but seeing as I'm a gamer, like you said, I chose the P5W DH Deluxe and couldn't be happier!

My only gripe is the slow POST. Hey, kcrush, when you get the computers up and running, if you figure out how to get the P5W to POST quicker, let me know. I've already tried what others said, which was to disable the Q-Fan.

Good luck on your build Axle209. Also, be sure to note, that today, nVidia is releasing the nForce 6xx series. There's a thread about it on General - Motherboards section. nForce 680, where are them? or something like that is the topic. (yes, I know it's "them" and not "they", don't ask as I have no idea)

 

[papi4baby]

Have you had any problems with that board?

 

[Eurasianman]

Depends on your definition of the word "problem"

The only problems I've had are drivers for Vista and not being able to get the hard drive to spin when @ 400 * 9 = 3.6GHz overclock. Other than that, none really.

Oh yes, when installing Windows, it was a pain to figure out how to get the audio to work. But I finally got it to work. Also, make sure to set the hard drives for ACHI or whatever instead of IDE. This will impact performance of read/write to the hard drive. After Vista is released, I'll get a new soundcard and possibly a TV Tuner.

Also, it sucks that ATI/AMD merged because now Intel is being ridiculous and not allowing ATI on their motherboards anymore. IMO, I like ATI when it comes to dual display. Reason, if I go to a webpage that has a embedded video and it's on display 1, with Nvidia, display 2 will go into full screen video while display 1 is still at Desktop. With ATI, this doesn't happen. Minor gripe.

Lastly, a minor issue is that the board requires some heavy cooling. At least in my setup. Easy to fix though with a P180B case

Good side: I'm running at 333 * 9 for a 3.0GHz (25% overclock) @ 1333 FSB which is what C2Q will require. In other words, this motherboard should theoretically run Core 2 Quads with a simple BIOS update. Looking forward to it.

I just wish Intel would quit changing die size. Once they move to 45nm, I'll need a new motherboard again

 

[Axle209]

Thanks for the comments.

 

[306maxi]

I just wish Intel would quit changing die size. Once they move to 45nm, I'll need a new motherboard again

You mean you wish Intel would stop making progress? :roll:

 

[dlmac]

I am also struggling to decide which MB to get. It will not be until February so perhaps a better MB will be out. I am a gamer, I want to overclock and have dual graphics (DX10!!). Not one board seems to be the best for all of that, am I wrong? the P5B uses Intel P965 which is better for overclocking. But the P5W, P975, is better for gaming? Is that because it allows for crossfire and the P4B does not? What overclocking limitation are there with the P975 compared to the P965 MB?

 

[306maxi]

I am also struggling to decide which MB to get. It will not be until February so perhaps a better MB will be out. I am a gamer, I want to overclock and have dual graphics (DX10!!). Not one board seems to be the best for all of that, am I wrong? the P5B uses Intel P965 which is better for overclocking. But the P5W, P975, is better for gaming? Is that because it allows for crossfire and the P4B does not? What overclocking limitation are there with the P975 compared to the P965 MB?

You should also consider getting a board based on the RD600 or 680i SLI chipset.

 

[dlmac]

Any specific recommendations? I have a feeling that i will be getting a different board all together by February. I may go with nvidia but I have always been an ATI fan (boo AMD, why did you have to buy them?) oh well. Anyway, Ill go for the best performer at the time.

 

[Eurasianman]

Haha, I agree

 

[kcrush]

*sigh* its taken a bit but I can finally report of the P5B deluxe...if you are on the fence, avoid this board.

In the last 10 years I have only had 1 other motherboard that has given me this much trouble and that was because it died and took random components with it.

I bought the board and some memory that another person on recommended and said ran with the board. It hated it ( PQI pc 5400 DDR2 667).

I did however manage to get some OCZ Platinum PC DDR 800 PC 6400 ram to run with it. BTW that ram was *supposed* to go on the gaming machine I mentioned before.

I did like the fact that I could do a bios update with a thumb drive before installing an OS, unfortunately the latest BIOS vers 806 didn't really help.

If there is a problem with a component, the board will not make a sound it just won't post. You troubleshoot it by removing components one by one and if it makes any noise then the problem was the last component you removed.

When it wasn't making any sounds I was blaming everything from the CPU to the case.

I'm used to the MB telling me wtf is going on, so this was quite frustrating.

Then there was bios problems, everytime I made a change in BIOs a reset wouldn't do it. I had to power down fully before it would reboot.

Then I made the mistake of using the Asus disk and installing the Intel ICH USB update that was included on the disk, which promptly disabled every USB port (don't install pls, it works just fine without). I stupidly thought it actually was an update to impove the USB 2.0 performance..it wasn't.

BTW one of the things slowing down the POST is the IDE. I'm at work at the moment so I can't see the screen, but there is an option in there to switch the IDE from RAID, to IDE to ACHI (sp?). If you can disable it, if you can't, it just going to post slow since it displays that stupid thing for a good 3-5 seconds and I can't find an option to turn the stupid wait screen off.

I don't think its the Q-Fan since I didn't bother with that until I had the system fully up and stable. Though I've noticed that this board really doesn't manipulate the fan speed very well as some fans it will run 100% and others it will run at min, even just after startup when temps are cool.

I put a Vanessa -L on the CPU and its running the fan at 100% even though CPU temps are in the upper 30's celcius.

However once I got the system up and stable, it was rock solid, laughing at Prime 95 and 3d Mark 6 (ran Primte 95 18 hours and 5 minutes before I finally stopped it). I had no trouble installing any software and it got win xp on fairly fast (little more than an hour start to stop, including drive format)

Even though it works fine on anything I throw at it now, my biggest fear is I'll get it to my friend and thier family will plug something in and it will die.

The P5B pretty much destroyed my enthusiam for this dual build as I stare at the P5W DH Deluxe with trepidation. Even though I hear good things about it...well, that's for next weekend. I'm going to spend the rest of the week trying to stress test this first machine to make absoutley sure it doesn't drop as soon as I hand it off, because its a 1.5 hour one way trip to fix something.

If yer in the market for a new board consider the new Nvidia chipset for the gaming machine. This merger between AMD/ATI has knocked both companies for a loop and it may be a while before they catch up.

 

[Eurasianman]

Sorry to hear that. I also have the "wait" when I boot the computer up. I also noticed, that changing the drive to from IDE to AHCI requires the ICH** drivers. But I think the point of that is that your SATA drives will actually run at it's specified speed (let me know if I'm wrong).

Other than that, I've had a quite few issues with my P5W DH Deluxe motherboard as well. At first, I got everything installed and everything worked. But as soon as I started playing around with drivers and have them all up to date, I started to run into some problems. But luckily, everything is stable now, even with the new BIOS 1506. The only thing I don't like is the CPU temps. But that's a CPU issue, not the motherboard.

Like you were saying, perhaps I should have waited for the nForce 6 series motherboards.

I had an nForce 3 250GB socket 754. Man, that board is still kicking hard! I guess the lesson to be learned is is that Intel has sucky chipsets!

That or we just got the "bad batch"

 

[kcrush]

Actually I have had almost no trouble with the P5W Deluxe board. I did notice after I installed the OS that I had the bios setting to IDE instead of AHCI and that of course changed the way the hardware reads the drive so I'd need to reinstall windows. For now I have left it as IDE.

THe board even used the slower DDR2 RAM I had setup for the p5b machine that didn't like it.

The reboot cyle on this board however is stupid, taking up to almost a minute at times and that's because it sits there checking to see if any drives have been added. This shouldn't take more than a second or two but I've seen it hang for nearly 15-20 seconds on the Asus splash screen.

Once up the board has show much love as compared to the P5B which showed much hate.

Everything works as advertised and its fast but not quite as fast as I was expecting. I may just bite the bullet and reinstall the WinXP with the drive setting to AHCI to see if i get some speed improvement.

For the record the systems were:

Intel Core 2 Duo 6400
Asus P5B
2 GB DDR2 800
WD Raptor 74GB
Nvidia 7600GT

System #2
Intel Core 2 Duo 6600
Asus P5W DH Dexluxe
2 GB DDR 667
WD Raptor 150GB
ATI X1950XTX
Creative Sound Blaster X-FI Fatality

 

[Eurasianman]

Yea, when I first built my computer and started it up, I left the SATA as IDE. And then changed it to ACHI (sp) and then my computer wouldn't boot up. So I bit the bullet and reinstalled and can now tell a difference.

I'm glad to hear that you're happy with the motherboard.

 

[kcrush]

heh I made the same mistake and tried reinstalling but even setting the dvd-rom drive as the boot drive and telling it that there is no hdd doens't help as it completely ingores the dvd rom and tries to boot the hdd every time.


I finally gave up and just left it as SATA as IDE.

 

[Eurasianman]

Woo!!! I figured it out!

When installing Windows, leave the hard drive setting as IDE in the bios. Install Windows XP and then make sure to install the latest Intel chipset update from Intel's website. Then reboot your computer and go into bios and change back to ACHI (sp) and theoretically, this should work. Just found that out this weekend.

The drivers that come with the CD, IMO, are crap!