Asus P5E3 Deluxe WiFi

Review Pages

1. Introduction, features
2. A closer look
3. BIOS settings
4. Test configuration
5. Everest Ultimate Edition 2007
6. SiSoftware Sandra
7. PCMark05, 3DMark06
8. Science Mark 2.0, Pov-Ray, x264 Benchmark
9. Maxon CineBench
10. SuperPI
11. SYSmark 2007, WorldBench 6
12. Lost Planet: Extreme Condition
13. Overclocking
14. Asus ExpressGate 1
15. Asus ExpressGate 2
16. Final words

Asus has been introducing very interesting models with several unique features for enthusiast and experienced users. The Intel X38 Express chipset offers a better memory performance as this was confirmed in all our tests. So if you are looking for a passage to a DDR3 memory configuration with a very fast motherboard, then the Asus P5E3 Deluxe WiFi Edition is a perfect choice.

So that's about it? No really, there are more features to mention before concluding this review. The X38 Express chipset offers two PCI-e v2.0 with official ATI Crossfire configuration. Too bad that Nvidia's SLI isn't supported as things would be much less complicated for most users. So what else is there to mention? Almost to forget, the Express Gate. A rather interesting approach from Asus that uses an embedded live Linux distribution (SplashTop) installed in an onboard memory that allows you to access the Internet in less than 10 secs without the need of a hard disk drive and of course without even an operating system installed. From our short experience, we liked Express Gate, even though it's very limited. This means that you can't add more applications or tweak it, at least for now :-)

Concluding this review, we feel that this motherboard aims to the people who want a top rated motherboard with many features and of course at a corresponding price. At this moment, users will find the Asus P5E3 Deluxe WiFi edition at the retail price of 295-310 Euro! That's probably one of the most expensive motherboards ever sold in the market. Now for the good news, if you don't want the Express Gate feature and the WiFi 802.11n module, Asus offers the P5E3 Deluxe for 260-280 Euro, so in the best case you can save up to 40 euro. That sounds as a better bargain.

If you can afford such an expensive motherboard, then the Asus P5E3 Deluxe WiFi Edition won't disappoint you. It's loaded with many features and its memory/cpu performance is very good. There are no serious problems with overclocking and overall the Intel's X38 chipset is future proof, until the next generation of motherboards is released (Q2 2008).