Asus, a manufacturer of reliable and high quality products, has one of the largest range motherboards. In 2003, Asus sold 5,000,000 motherboards which means one out of every 5 desktop computers was built using an Asus motherboard. Asus motherboards are known for their high performance and for being feature packed.

In our previous review of the P5ND2-SLI Deluxe Asus motherboard, we saw how dual VGA cards, in SLI mode, can be combined with the NForce4 Northbridge chipset and the Intel 775 CPU. This time, Asus has adopted the same technology, without the SLI certification, using the new Intel chipset, the 955X. The new Asus motherboard is the P5WD2 Premium.

- Features

AI Life Series AI Life Series motherboards bring lifestyle and personal computing together. They entertain you with TV, radio and Dolby support, and link you to the rest of the world via wireless connection(WiFi-TV bundle edition only). To create a peaceful environment, several new and improved innovations are also included to reduce noise and temperature. Don't change your way of life for a computer. Instead let the ASUS Life Series improve the quality of your life.
Stack Cool 2 Stack Cool 2 is a fan-less and zero-noise cooling solution. It effectively transfers heat generated by the critical components to the other side of the specially designed PCB (printed circuit board) for effective heat dissipation.
AI Quiet With PCs serving as the entertainment centerpiece and playing a bigger role in our lives, quiet operation is in high demand. No one wants to hear the cooling fan spinning when watching a movie or listening to music. The ASUS AI Quiet function dynamically controls CPU speed and reduces temperature and fan speeds when peace and quiet are what you desire.
Wifi-TV PCI Card Connectivity and entertainment are the key words of personal computing in the 21st Century, and the AI Life Series delivers both. (Note: Optional, the WiFi-TV card has to be purchased separately)
Total Wireless Solution Offering IEEE 802.11a/b/g standards all in one add-on card, the WiFi-TV PCI card allows convenient wireless connection to the Internet and other digital devices. Share photos, videos and MP3 music files between the wireless devices at home without the tangling wires. Moreover, the unique setup wizard makes establishing a wireless environment a piece of cake. - Easily sync up with Centrino notebooks and other wireless devices - 802.11a standard offers less signal interference and better performance - Setup wizard simplifies wireless network establishment
The Next TV Standard Get ready for the Digital TV revolution! ASUS WiFi-TV PCI card offers not only analog TV input, but also the much talked-about Digital TV connection, which presents higher resolution and more functions than the traditional analog standard. FM radio is also supported on this multi-functional card to provide a flexible solution to enjoy your favorite television and radio shows. - Analog TV, Digital TV (DVB-T) and FM radio - Edit video recorded on your camcorder with bundled authoring software - Enjoy great multimedia experience with the bundled Cyberlink PowerCinema
SATA on the Go The motherboard supports the next-generation hard drives based on the Serial ATA (SATA) 3Gb/s storage specification, delivering enhanced scalability and doubling the bus bandwidth for high-speed data retrieval and saves. The external SATA ports located at the back I/O provide smart setup and hot-plug functions. Easily backup photos, videos and other entertainment contents on external devices.

	Intel LGA775 Pentium 4 CPU This motherboard supports the latest Pentium 4 CPU from Intel in LGA775 package. With 1066/ 800/ 533MHz FSB, 1MB L2 cache, Hyper-Threading Technology and core-speeds up to 3.6GHz and beyond, Intel's LGA775 Pentium 4 is one of the fastest desktop processors to date.
	Dual-Core CPU Enjoy the extraordinary CPU power from the latest dual-core CPU. The advanced processing technology contains two physical CPU cores with individually dedicated L2 Caches to satisfy the rising demand for more powerful processing capability.
	Intel 955X chipset The Intel 955X is the latest chipset designed to support maximum 8GB dual-channel DDR2 667/533 architecture, 1066/800 FSB (front-side-bus), PCI Express x16 graphics and dual-core CPU. Easily build an entertainment PC or create a multimedia environment with its exceptionally high bandwidth. Together with the 4 Serial ATA ports enabled through the SATA 3Gb/s RAID controller integrated in the ICH7R Southbridge, the Intel 955X satisfies multi-task processing and data security.
	Intel® MPT (Intel® Memory Pipeline Technology) The Intel® Memory Pipeline Technology (Intel MPT) delivers additional system-level performance by optimizing memory access between CPU and system memory, and allows increased performance at standard operating specifications.
	Native DDR2 800 Support To attain top performance, ASUS engineers successfully unleashed the true potential of DDR2 memory. Native DDR2 800 maximizes system performance by eliminating the bottleneck when overclocking both the CPU and memory, providing great performance for 3D graphics and other memory demanding applications.
	Universal PCI-E Slot The Universal PCI Express technology offers utilization flexibility of the Southbridge PCI Express interface. It enables users to plug in an additional PCI Express graphics card to set up a dual graphics card platform on a single motherboard. ASUS’ own smart quick switch further detects how users installed their PCI Express devices, and intelligently reroutes the PCI Express lanes for optimized bandwidth allocation.
	AI NOS™ Applications such as 3D games and video editing demand a huge chunk of system resource. Inject ""nitrous oxide"" into your CPU! The patented AI NOS™(Non-delay Overclocking System) technology intelligently detects system load and automatically boosts performance for the most demanding tasks. Unlike other dynamic overclocking techniques, AI NOS™ reacts much faster to satisfy your unending need for speeds .
	PEG Link This latest technology, PEG (PCI Express Graphics) Link Mode, is a unique feature that enables users to boost graphics card performance for superior video quality. PEG Link allows users to raise GPU and VGA memory throughput via the motherboard BIOS the same way system bus and memory bus are tweaked. PEG Link Mode enables powerful video performance on DX8 and DX9 applications. ASUS engineers carefully fine-tuned the parameters for every single PCI-Express card to provide system stability during high-speed graphics operation.
	Precision Tweaker Precision Tweaker is designed for serious overclockers. It offers ways to raise system performance inch-by-inch and step-by-step to achieve maximum performance! This is about getting the most out of your machine, and taking pride in your customized computer. Precision Tweaker provides overclocking options for all major parts of the system: CPU, Memory, PCI-Express, and Front Side Bus. - vDIMM Take control of how much power is going into the memory modules. ASUS gives you 8-step voltage control to the DIMM - vCore Find out ""exactly"" how much power your CPU needs. Fine-tune it with 0.0125 volts at a time - PCI-Express x16 Frequency Explore the frequency options of your PCI-Express x16 graphics card - SFS SFS (Stepless Frequency Selection) allow FSB tuning from 100MHz up to 450MHz at 1MHz increments.
	ASUS CPU Lock Free The P5WD2 Premium now offer the CPU Lock Free feature, which allows you to adjust CPU multiplier to 14x. The reduction of multiplier value provides more flexibility for increasing external FSB frequency to raise memory bus bandwidth. CPU Lock Free boosts overall system performance by making synchronous modification possible. Enjoy better performance at the same CPU operation speed and improve your system without pushing the CPU to the limit.

You can see the full, detailed specification table below: