Make no mistake about it, Intel’s Core 2 CPU is a strong performer regardless of the platform it’s running on. If you were hesitant of running Core 2 on an older platform like NVIDIA’s nForce4 SLI X16 Intel Edition, don’t be, clearly our testing with the ASUS P5N32-SLI SE shows that the platform is still an excellent choice for Core 2. In fact, Core 2 actually posted a wider margin of victory in Quake 4, and F.E.A.R. at 800x600 when compared to our tests with the Radeon X1900 XTX/975X combination from a month ago.
With that being said, it certainly wouldn’t be a bad idea to wait and see how upcoming chipsets for Core 2 pan out. Right now street prices on ASUS’ P5N32-SLI SE motherboard are quite high, with the board selling for over $250 at the moment. 975X motherboards can be found for a little less than that, and if you really want to save some money, P965 motherboards are currently selling for under $200 at most retailers (keep in mind that P965 doesn’t support multi-GPU setups). In all honesty, until more motherboards are available on the market from a wider variety of manufacturers and retailers, prices on Core 2-ready motherboards will remain artificially high in large part due to the extraordinary demand right now for anything that’s compliant with Core 2. The debut of Intel’s latest CPU seems to have set off a surge in hardware sales as end users are eager to take advantage of the latest AMD and Intel price cuts. Even VGA prices are spiraling downwards in anticipation of new GPU releases.
With demand surging and supply of Core 2-ready products low, retailers seem to be taking a little advantage of the situation and artificially raising prices.
For instance, prior to Core 2’s launch we were told by NVIDIA to expect ECS’ nForce 570 SLI motherboard to sell for around $90, while the ASUS nForce 570 SLI board should sell for about $110. Based on today’s retail prices, we wouldn’t be surprised if both motherboards carried street prices at least twice that if they were available at retail today.
If you don’t have the luxury of waiting though, and must buy a Core 2 SLI-ready setup today, the choice is clear: ASUS’ P5N32-SLI SE motherboard. The P5N32-SLI SE has all the hardware features you’d want in an enthusiast-class motherboard, as well as a plethora of BIOS settings for tweaking FSB and DDR2 memory speeds. By updating their original P5N32-SLI motherboard with official support for Core 2, ASUS has an in demand product that’s hitting the market at just the right time. As we said earlier, until the nForce 570/590 motherboards ship (or until other manufacturers update their own nForce4 SLI offerings), ASUS is the only ticket in town right now if you want SLI support and Core 2 all in one package. We now look forward to seeing what they have in store for nForce 570 and nForce 590 SLI. Hopefully we’ll find out in a few weeks…
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