Performance Results; Overclocking
Here comes possibly the biggest review cop-out of all time, but we benchmarked the P5W64 WS Pro against the Intel D975XBX Bad Axe at stock clocks -- with identical CPU, graphics, memory and software builds -- and found, hilariously, no real-world difference. Actually, we lie. Cinebench 2003 reported just over 2.5% higher for the P5W64 WS Pro, but that was because we had EIST off on the ASUS, whereas it's always on on the Bad Axe. Turn EIST on on the WS Pro and things fall back in line. Woo.So if you want to see how a modern i975X-based board does with a single fast graphics card, the best CPU and some of the best DDR2 memory ever created, check out Tarinder's look at the Core 2 Duo X6800 and friends. Find the X6800 points on the graph, imagine pretty much zero difference and et voila, that's the performance of a stock clocked P5W64 WS Pro at the same settings. Such is benchmarking life.
Overclocking
Stock performance aside, let's look at overclocking. Hints abound from around the web that pre-release ASUS P5W64 WS Professional boards were nothing short of spectacular in terms of CPU bus overclocking held out in our evaluation of the sent review sample.Check this out.
The CPU voltage was raised for other overclock attempts and left there for the bus clock runs. MCH voltage was 1.70V, memory was run at 1:1, 2.30V, 5-5-5-18 timings (Corsair XMS2-8500 modules). 500MHz out of the box, unmodified, is pretty spectacular for a production Core 2 Duo mainboard and first-run BIOS, we reckon. Closer to 510MHz was experimented with but proved too unstable.
We managed just over 3.3GHz stable (looped Pifast) on serious air (Zalman 9500), at 1.44V, easily (and quickly, given the time we had for overclock testing) enough. Maximum memory overclock was just over 1150MHz, using modules rated for 1066MHz, although we didn't have time to find the absolute limits so take those results as they come.
We get the impression that this is a board for the seasoned and serious overclocker using Core 2 Duo. Unable to strap exotic cooling to CPU or otherwise, we can rarely push the absolute outer limits of boards here at HEXUS, but our testing with the P5W64 WS Pro (review sample at least!) shows that it's got the hardware and BIOS to hit mad CPU bus clocks with relative ease.
Before we conclude, a look at the main reason the board exists.