ASRock P45R2000-WiFi Motherboard Review

[Eldonko]

ASRock P45R2000-WiFi DDR2 / DDR3 Motherboard Review

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Manufacturer Product Page: ASRock P45R2000-WiFi Overview
Product Number: P45R2000-WiFi
Availability: TBD
Price: TBD
Warranty Length: 3 years



Following up the X48TurboTwins-WiFi, ASRock continues with the philosophy of catering to the mid-range and high-end (enthusiast) markets with a board utilizing another new Intel chipset, the P45R2000-WiFi. The latest from ASRock is based off the popular Intel P45 chipset, a follow up of the P35 chipset, and allows for high speed DDR3 memory support along with two PCIE2.0 slots for your CrossFire needs. Along with the latest and greatest chipset, the board hosts a number of innovative features such as support for 1600 and 1333 FSB processors out of the box as well as hybrid DDR2 and DDR2 memory compatibility. With this board ASRock sticks with their roots of providing a safe upgrade path for consumers looking to keep some of their old hardware and adds the latest technology to the mix. The superior FSB clocking power of the P45 chipset could be just what ASRock needs to get their name on the enthusiast map.

Once again, ASRock takes the latest chipset, adds a ton of features, and sells it at a fraction of the price of competitor P45 chipset boards on the market. The board features quad core Yorkfield and dual core Wolfdale processor support out of the box without a BIOS upgrade and PCIE2.0 CrossFire support. In addition to CrossFire support, the P45R2000-WiFi allows for either DDR2 or DDR3 memory to be used. Now that DDR2 memory is dirt cheap, many users want the opportunity to use DDR2 but be able to upgrade to DDR3 in the future when the memory becomes mature and prices come down. ASRock found a niche here as with the P45R2000-WiFi, as there are very few DDR2/DDR3 P45 hybrid boards on the market.

In addition to CrossFire and hybrid memory support, the P45R2000-WiFi includes a WiFi module and software for those into LAN parties or that want their PC in a location without a LAN cable accessible. For audio enthusiasts, the board supports 7.1 channel HD Audio with Content Protection, as well as DAC with 110dB dynamic range support (ALC890B Audio Codec). The benefit to this is gaming and 2 channel sound can be run through a 7.1 channel sound system. Overall, it looks like ASRock continues to appeal to everyone with their latest board in terms of features.

ASRock provides a 3 year warranty for motherboards through Authorized Distributors which means you won't be RMAing your motherboard to a factory in Taiwan. This will save the user a lot of money in shipping, however, this also promotes "passing the buck" policies that some retailers love to promote. To put users at ease, ASRock states if you are having issues with your point of purchase, they will honor your warranty nonetheless.

This is the third ASRock review at Hardware Canucks in just a few months, and the boards are looking better and better for the enthusiast. ASRock is really trying to shed the reputation of “cheap boards for a cheap price” and move more to “feature packed boards for a cheap price”. That said, these boards are crucial for ASRock to turn the corner in terms of quality.

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[Eldonko]

Specifications

Specifications

CPU
- LGA 775 for Intel® Core™ 2 Extreme / Core™ 2 Quad / Core™ 2 Duo / Pentium® Dual Core / Celeron®, supporting Penryn Quad Core Yorkfield and Dual Core Wolfdale processors
- Compatible with FSB2000/1600/1333/1066/800 MHz
- Supports Hyper-Threading Technology
- Supports Untied Overclocking Technology
- Supports EM64T CPU

Chipset
- Northbridge: Intel® P45
- Southbridge: Intel® ICH10R

Memory
- Dual Channel DDR3/DDR2 memory technology
- 4 x DDR3 DIMM slots
- Supports DDR3 1333/1066 non-ECC, un-buffered memory
- Max. DDR3 capacity: 8GB, max DDR2 capacity: 4GB
- 2 x DDR2 DIMM slots
- Supports DDR2 1066/800/667 non-ECC, un-buffered memory

Expansion Slot
- Supports ATI™ CrossFire™
- 2 x PCI Express 2.0 x16 slots (green @ x16 mode, blue @ x8 mode)
- 2 x PCI Express x1 slots
- 3 x PCI slots

Audio
- 7.1 CH Windows® Vista™ Premium Level HD Audio with Content Protection
- DAC with 110dB dynamic range (ALC890B Audio Codec)

LAN
- PCIE x1 Gigabit LAN 10/100/1000 Mb/s
- Realtek RTL8111B/RTL8111C
- Supports Wake-On-LAN
- Supports Dual LAN feature

Wireless LAN
- ASRock WiFi-802.11g module
- 54Mbps IEEE 802.11g / 11Mbps IEEE 802.11b
- Supports Software Access Point mode (AP mode) and Station mode (Infrastructure mode and Ad-hoc mode)

Rear Panel I/O
- 1 x PS/2 Mouse Port
- 1 x PS/2 Keyboard Port
- 1 x Coaxial SPDIF Out Port
- 1 x Optical SPDIF Out Port
- 6 x Ready-to-Use USB 2.0 Ports
- 2 x eSATAII Ports
- 2 x RJ-45 LAN Ports with LED (ACT/LINK LED and SPEED LED)
- 1 x IEEE 1394 Port
- HD Audio Jack: Side Speaker / Rear Speaker / Central / Bass / Line in / Front Speaker / Microphone

Connectors
- 6 x SATAII 3.0 Gb/s connectors, support RAID (RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 10, RAID 5 and Intel® Matrix Storage), NCQ, AHCI and Hot Plug functions
- 2 x eSATAII 3.0 Gb/s connectors (shared with 2 SATAII ports)
- 1 x ATA133 IDE connector (supports 2 x IDE devices)
- 1 x Floppy connector
- 1 x DeskExpress Hot Plug Detection header
- 1 x COM port header
- 1 x HDMI_SPDIF header
- 1 x IEEE 1394 header
- CPU/Chassis FAN connector
- 24 pin ATX power connector
- 8 pin 12V power connector
- CD in header
- Front panel audio connector
- 2 x USB 2.0 headers (support 4 USB 2.0 ports)
- 1 x WiFi/E header

BIOS Features
- 8Mb AMI BIOS
- AMI Legal BIOS
- Supports "Plug and Play"
- ACPI 1.1 Compliance Wake Up Events
- Supports jumperfree
- SMBIOS 2.3.1 Support
- CPU, DRAM, NB, SB, VTT Voltage Multi-adjustment
- Supports I. O. T. (Intelligent Overclocking Technology)

Support CD
- Drivers, Utilities, AntiVirus Software (Trial Version)

Unique Features
- ASRock OC Tuner
- Hybrid Booster: CPU Frequency Stepless Control, ASRock U-COP, Boot Failure Guard (B.F.G.)

Hardware Monitor
- CPU Temperature Sensing
- Chassis Temperature Sensing
- CPU Fan Tachometer
- Chassis Fan Tachometer
- CPU Quiet Fan
- Voltage Monitoring: +12V, +5V, +3.3V, CPU Vcore

Operating System Support
- Microsoft® Windows® 2000 / XP / XP 64-bit / Vista /Vista 64-bit compliant

Certifications
- FCC, CE, WHQL

 

[Eldonko]

Intel P45 Chipset & ASRock P45R2000-WiFi Features

Intel P45 Chipset

The new P45 chipset by Intel supports a variety of features including new Intel 1600 MHz Front Side Bus processors, dual-channel 1600 MHz DDR3, Extreme Memory Profiles (Intel XMP), next-generation dual PCI Express 2.0 lanes, and Intel Extreme Tuning, allowing for maximum platform performance.

The Intel P45 Express Chipset is driving PCIE 2.0 to mainstream users, delivering up to 16 GB/s bandwidth, twice the bandwidth of PCI Express 1.0. The Intel P45 Express
Chipset supports either a 1 x 16 or 2 x 8 PCIE2.0 configuration for expandable discrete graphics capability. PCIE2.0 also provides greater flexibility and reliability in design because it is backward compatible with PCIE1.0 and can dynamically manage power and performance through software controls. The greatly improved 16 GB/s of graphics bandwidth capability enables much higher levels of performance on graphics-intensive applications such as high-end gaming and video rendering.


ASRock P45R2000-WiFi Features

A few notable features on the ASRock P45R2000-WiFi include the ASRock OC Tuner, 7.1 Channel HD Audio, All Solid Capacitors, Yorkfield and Wolfdale CPU support, DDR2/DDR3 hybrid memory, CrossFire support, and WiFI capabilities. A brief summary of each of these features is as follows:

 

[Eldonko]

Packaging and Accessories

Packaging and Accessories

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Keeping with the ASRock standard colourful, eye-catching box, the P45R2000-WiFi is based on the same design as the previously two ASRock releases (Penryn1600SLIX3-Wifi & X48TurboTwins-WiFi). The boxes of the three boards are virtually identical, with a contemporary black design, bold yellow text, and many feature description images - a nice contrast.

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The marketing aspect is focused mainly on the WiFi capabilities with the WiFi module as the main point of focus on the front. The rear side of the box has a similar focus and explains the uses and advantages of the WiFi capabilities and highlights the performance advantages of PCIE 2.0.

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Looking inside, the accessories are packed similar to most motherboards, all individually packaged in plastic, resting on a cardboard divider on top on the board. The motherboard is wrapped in the standard anti-static bag to avoid damage to components from static charges. Beneath the board there is a thick foam sheet to prevent shipping damage.

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Here we have all the accessories which come with this board and it seems that ASRock hasn't left much out at all. The colors of the cables run quite nicely with the general color scheme of the board itself while the inclusion of four SATA cables is great even though one will have to be used to run to the SATA connector at the back-end of the board if you want to use the eSATA I/O port.

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As the P45R2000-WiFi is a Wifi board, a wireless LAN module is also included with the accessories. This 802.11g WiFi module is a reasonable size, about 9 centimeters in height, and the cord is about 1 meter long which allows the user to position the module in a convenient location. Double-sided tape (included) can be used to secure the module in place. Accompanying the LAN module is a Wifi bracket, used to provide an output to run the LAN module through. The bracket includes a smaller hole so the user can see the LAN activity light if needed.

Specific package contents and motherboard accessories include:

Package Contents
- ASRock P45R2000-WiFi Motherboard (ATX Form Factor: 12.0-in x 9.6-in, 30.5 cm x 24.4 cm)
- ASRock P45R2000-WiFi Quick Installation Guide
- ASRock P45R2000-WiFi Support CD
- ASRock WiFi-802.11g Module Operation Guide

Motherboard Accessories
- 1 x ASRock WiFi-802.11g Module
- 1 x Antenna
- 1 x WiFi Bracket
- 1 x ASRock SLI/XFire Switch Card
- Quick Installation Guide, Support CD, I/O Shield
- Floppy/ATA 133 Cables
- 4 x SATA Data Cables (Optional)
- 1 x SATA 1 to 1 Power Cable (Optional)
- 1 x HDMI_SPDIF Cable (Optional)

 

[Eldonko]

Included Software

Included Software

The ASRock P45R2000-WiFi comes with two notable pieces of software: ASRock OC Tuner and Wifi-802.11g software.

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Similar to the previous two ASRock boards we tested, the Wifi-802.11g software turned out to be very user-friendly and intuitive. The included Wifi module supports two kinds of wireless network modes: Access Point Mode and Station Mode. Access Point Mode is used if the user wants to share Internet access with wireless stations in the local environment and in this mode the module becomes the wireless access point that provides LAN access to other wireless stations. Station Mode is used to connect directly to an access point or with other stations in wireless range.

Both modes worked well and wireless networks were found almost immediately. One point to note however, is Wifi must be enabled in the BIOS for the Wifi software to load in Windows.

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The ASRock OC Tuner comes with four main screens, two containing monitoring features and two for real-time tweaking of voltages and frequencies. The system health screen includes CPU and motherboard temperatures as well as fan speeds. The hardware monitor is more detailed and includes all temperatures and voltages monitored on the board as well as FSB, CPU, and memory frequencies.

The key benefit for using ASRock OC Tuner is the ability to tweak many different overclocking settings in a Windows environment. CPU, RAM, VTT, NB, GTL Ref, and PLL voltages are all adjustable as well as the CPU ratio (multiplier), FSB frequency and PCIE frequency.

All features of the OC Tuner worked flawlessly and it really saves a lot of time when overclocking since the user does not have to reboot constantly like when tweaking from the BIOS. We found OCTuner to be an excellent software feature of ASRock boards and really was a pleasure to work with. Use extreme caution when playing with these settings as hardware damage and operating system corruption is possible if the user goes too far with an instable overclock.

 

[Eldonko]

A Closer Look at the P45R2000-WiFi

A Closer Look at the P45R2000-WiFi

The board layout, color scheme, and design of the P45R2000-WiFi are almost an exact replica of the ASRock X48 board. The PCB is the trademark blue with yellow RAM slots for DDR2 memory and green and pink RAM slots for DDR3 memory. The main SATAII connectors are red and the eSATAII ports are orange for a noticeable difference for the user.

Not surprisingly, ASRock stuck with an oddly placed 20/24 pin ATX connector situated up near the I/O panel instead of typical location of the bottom of the board near the RAM slots. This strange placement is found in other ASRock boards and remains on the P45R2000-WiFi likely because it would be quite expensive to move from a manufacturing standpoint. The issue one may face is with a bottom mounted power supply where the ATX power cable would have to stretch past and above the GPU, making hiding wires very difficult. It could also interfere with larger aftermarket CPU coolers.

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A key feature on the P45R2000-WiFi is the addition of hybrid DDR2/DDR3 memory. This means the user can use either two sticks of DDR2 memory or up to four sticks of DDR3 memory (max 4GB and 8GB respectively). The memory slots are color coded and clearly labelled so adding memory to the correct slots is simple, pink and green for DDR3 and yellow for DDR2. For dual channel, use the two slots of the same color. The two types of memory also only fit into the appropriate slots to prevent mistakes during installation.

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Due to the nature of the P45 chipset and strap changes, ASRock included a group of jumpers that must be altered to change the Northbridge strap. These four configurations are useful if users want to use different RDAM frequencies and for overclocking. Jumper configurations for default, FSB1066, FSB1333, and FSB1600 are illustrated above.

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To switch between CrossFire and single video card modes, users are required to switch around a Switch Card. The card is simply turned around if 8x/8x mode is desired instead on 16x mode for a single card. In terms of spacing, the PCIE2.0 slots are quite close together, leaving users a touch over four centimetres between two video cards. Some other boards we have tested put a PCI slot between the PCIE slots to provide clearance for water blocks or after market air cooling; however, all of the PCI slots are located below the PCIE slots in this case. In the testing for this review, two water blocks were used for cooling and they did fit, but the cards were very close together.

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For Northbridge and Southbridge cooling, ASRock uses aluminum heatsinks on this board. The heatsinks are painted a goldish color and are reasonably nice looking. The northbridge and southbridge heatsinks may not look as aesthetically pleasing as some more expensive heatpipe designs, but the P45 chipset runs so cool that the NB temperature never exceeded 36C even at the highest available NB voltages and full CPU load.

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The VIA Fire IIM VT6308S 1394 Host Controller is a IEEE 1394 high-speed serial bus used for PCI peer-to-peer interconnections. More popularly known as "Firewire", it is commonly used for transferring large audio and video files from various devices. For onboard sound, the board uses uses the Realtek ALC890B codec chip, with eight audio channels (7.1 surround) and 110db rated signal-to-noise ratio. This is a DTS (Digital Theater Systems) supported codec and is a great onboard audio solution.

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Meanwhile, the BIOS chip is removable on this board which makes it nice if the BIOS becomes corrupted during a flash. If this happens, the BIOS chip can be easily removed and a new one put in without having to RMA the entire board. To avoid this issue it is a good idea to always flash from a floppy or a USB drive and not in Windows.

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Similar to the previous two ASRock releases, the P45R2000 uses all solid capacitors. Solid caps seem to be becoming the standard on motherboards these days even if this does represent a somewhat groundbreaking change away from ASRock's past boards. These caps are said to be of higher quality and more durable than the older electrolytic style capacitors which have often been a source if trouble on older electronics.

The 12V connector is in a typical spot, next to the CPU socket. There is enough distance between this connector and the CPU socket there were no clearance issues even with a large aftermarket heatsink.

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The Wifi card on the P45R2000-WiFi is located near the bottom of the board and is the Realtek RTL8187L. According to Realtek, this is a budget IEEE 802.11a/b/g Wireless LAN Network Interface Controller with USB 2.0 Interface. Also included with the Wifi card is the wireless LAN module. ASRock provides an 802.11g Wifi module supporting 54Mbps IEEE 802.11g / 11Mbps IEEE 802.11b. This module also supports Software Access Point mode (AP mode) and Station mode (Infrastructure mode and Ad-hoc mode). The benefit users will find with this feature is avoiding stringing LAN cables if the PC is in an area with no accessible connections.

Two RJ-45 LAN Ports are a first for recent ASRock boards and provides users with two LAN options. The LAN ports are ran by Realtek RTL8111C Ethernet controllers. The RTL8111C controller combines a triple-speed IEEE 802.3 compliant Media Access Controller (MAC) with a triple-speed Ethernet transceiver, PCI Express bus controller, and embedded memory.

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The rear panel inputs and outputs are quite complete on this board and include two interesting additions: a dual eSATA port and High Definition audio outputs (Coaxial S/PDIF Out Port, Optical S/PDIF Out Port) for your Home Theatre needs. Other I/O ports include: one PS/2 Mouse Port, one PS/2 Keyboard Port, six Ready-to-Use USB 2.0 Ports, two RJ-45 LAN Ports with LED (ACT/LINK LED and SPEED LED), and one IEEE 1394 Port.

 

[Eldonko]

BIOS Rundown

BIOS Rundown

An enthusiast knows that the components, accessories, and features of a motherboard are only part of the puzzle. The BIOS is what can make or break a board’s performance for both stability and overclocking. We will take a closer look at the overclockability of the board in the overclocking section.

The ASRock P45R2000-WiFi features an AMI 8mb BIOS and supports ACPI 1.1 Compliance Wake-up Events. Like many other ASRock boards, you must press F2 instead of the typical delete key to enter the BIOS upon booting. Seems strange to move from the standard delete key, but it is not an issue if users are aware of it.

Click on image to englarge​

First off, ASRock offers three splash screen options as well as an option to disable all splash screens to allow viewing of POST messages. Disabling of splash screens is recommended when overclocking in order to see what speed the system is booting at from the POST screen.

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The BIOS info page is typical of many other boards on the market. This page shows which CPU and memory is installed and a few specifications such as cache and speed. This is also where you can check which BIOS version is installed, which is displayed at the top at the page.

The PC Health page is also standard, showing CPU and motherboard temperatures, fan speeds for the two fan headers, and voltages (vcore, 3.3v, 5.0v, and 12.0v). It would have been nice to see Vdimm and a chipset monitoring setting but this of course could mean a more expensive monitoring chip.

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The CPU Configuration page includes CPU Thermal Throttling and Intel Speedstep Technology, both of which are recommended to disable if you want the multi to remain static. This is also the screen where you will find adjustable frequencies for CPU / PCIE and the CPU multiplier. Users must set Overclock Mode to Manual to adjust these settings.

The Chipset Setting page is where you find all of the overclocking settings you will need to push your system to the limits. Settings on this page range from memory dividers, memory timings, to many voltages and other useful settings. Let’s take a closer look at the overclocking options at our disposal.

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First you have the memory remap feature. This is to be enabled if you are utilizing 4GB or more of memory so it will all be recognized in Windows. Another feature on the Chipset Settings screen that you will see in Intel chipset boards is XMP Technology. XMP (extreme memory profile) is Intel compatible and provides the next level of JEDEC standard. Briefly, XMP is an extra speed bin to JEDEC’s standard DDR3’s definitions, allowing for higher speeds and tighter timings than JEDEC, simply by enabling the XMP Profile.

One thing we have not saw much of from ASRock is secondary memory settings in the BIOS. The X48 board BIOS has only the basic four: tCL, tRCD, tRP, tRAS plus DRAM Command Rate (1N vs. 2N). However, the P45R2000-WiFi hosts a variety of memory timings, from the four basics, to tRFC, right down to tRD; basically everything a user would need. For memory dividers there are three available: 400Mhz (DDR3 800), 533Mhz (DDR3 1066), and 667Mhz (DDR3 1333). We will go over how the dividers work in detail in the overclocking section.

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Two other pages linked to Chipset Settings page are DRAM RCOMP Strength Settings and DRAM DLL Skew Settings. These settings have to do with the memory registers but after several hours of tweaking, these pages didn’t seem to help FSB or stability at all.

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Continuing down the Chipset Settings screen, we see all of the voltages needed for overclocking. At default all of the settings are set to auto, which provides stock voltages for each component. Memory voltage maxes out at 2.34v for DDR3 and the maximum vcore is 1.60v. It is important to note that unlike most other settings that have a drop-down menu and allow easy voltage selections, the only way to adjust CPU voltage is by pressing + and – on the keyboard. This method is not as convenient and it takes extra time to adjust CPU voltage.

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Northbridge, Southbridge, Southbridge1.1v, VTT and PLL voltages are not numeric selectable voltages but rather settings of low, medium, high, and very high. It is a little concerning to not be aware of how much voltage is actually being used in each of the settings and it is recommended to avoid the highest setting altogether to be safe and not risk damaging an expensive CPU. This is especially important for VTT voltages as several users have reported dead 45nm CPUs at only 1.5v VTT. ASRock support unable to provide any actual voltages for these settings nor measure points for a digital multimeter; however, we heard from a reliable source that very high for VTT = about 1.42v.

One bright point in the voltage section is instead of using non-numerical settings for GTLREF Voltage, ASRock added options ranging from 0.67 x VTT to 0.615 x VTT, which is quite handy for FSB overclocking. Generally 0.615xVTT is best for 45nm CPUs and 0.67xVTT for 65nm, but this is dependant on other voltages and requires some tweaking to find optimal combinations.

All in all, the enthusiast user should be quite pleased with the availability of additional BIOS options such as secondary memory timings, Skew settings, and voltages such as VTT and PLL. It looks like ASRock continues to adapt the BIOS to appeal to a wider market; as more boards come out the BIOS seems to be becoming more and more overclocker friendly. Hopefully with the next board ASRock will include actual voltages for NB, SB, PLL, and VTT and add additional voltage availability for vcore.

 

[Eldonko]

Test Setup & Methodologies

Test Setup & Methodologies

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Test Setup

Processor: Intel C2D Xeon E3110 (45nm dual core)
Video Card(s): MSI RX3870 512MB / HIS IceQ HD3870 512MB
Memory: Patriot Extreme Performance 2GB 2X1GB PC3-10666 DDR3-1333 CL7-7-7-20
Motherboard: ASRock P45R2000-WiFi
Hard Drive: Seagate Barracuda 80GB SATA
Power Supply: Tagan BZ 900W
Case: None
Cooling: Swifttech Apogee (CPU), DangerDen Brass Maze 4 (GPU), D-Tek Fuzion (GPU), 2 x dual heatercore w/ 4 x 120mm fans
Fans: 2 x 120mm, 1 x 80mm
Operating System: Windows Vista Basic 64 bit

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Overclocking Methodology

The following section shows the maximum overclock achieved on a dual core Xeon E3110 45nm 1333FSB CPU. For testing methodology two main tests will be used and several benchmarks will be run at the overclocked speeds. The first of the two main stability tests will be a 5 hour custom test of OCCT which tests CPU, memory, and FSB stability. OCCT is a great test for reviews because it tests multiple core CPUs, creates user friendly graphs of temperatures and voltages, and is very efficient at picking up errors.

The second stability test will be 3 runs of 3DMark Vantage. This tests the 3D stability of the overclock as well as CPU, FSB and memory. Once an overclock passes these tests but fails anything further, this is the point deemed as “stable” for the purposes of this review.

Upon commencement of testing, BIOS 1.20 dated 06/27/2008 was flashed as it is the most recent release by ASRock. The BIOS was only semi-stable and the 1600FSB jumper had to be enabled to allow for overclocking. The ASRock BIOS is said to support 45nm CPUs and 1600 FSB CPUs right out of the box. Well, the 45nm claim is true since Xeon E3110 booted up first try.

General Benchmark Methodology

All benchmarks will be a comparison of the Xeon E3110 at stock speed and at maximum overclock to give an idea of how much performance a user can gain when overclocking the P45R2000-WiFi. For CrossFire tests, the overclocked speed will be used to test performance between one and two HD3870 video cards in 3D benchmarks and games.

The overclocked speed on the Xeon E3110 will be 4005Mhz on the overclocked tests and RAM speed will be set to 593Mhz (DDR1186) and 7-6-6-20. CrossFire will be enabled, ATI Catalyst 8.6 drivers will be used for 3D along with Windows Vista Home Basic 64 bit.

 

[Eldonko]

Overclocking Results

Overclocking Results

Let’s see how the P45R2000-WiFi lives up to the true test of a board, overclocking! The board is packed with features, uses the latest and greatest chipset, but all that means nothing for an enthusiast if the board does not overclock well. Well we had a lot of trouble trying to overclock this board and we can say it certainly is not user friendly overclocking for a novice user.

First off, using any FSB jumper configuration other than FSB1600 would allow hardly any overclocking at all, maybe 200Mhz at the most if memory was underclocked. Also, with the FSB1333 configuration (which is recommended with a 1333FSB CPU), the board was not even stable at stock with Optimized Defaults and XMP selected. We had to loosen Performance Level to 10 in Windows to have stability at stock. Overclocking FSB by 1 led to insta crash (likely because of strap change and MCH issue common of P45 boards). After several days of tweaking, it was determined that an overclock was possible in FSB1600 mode and we were able to achieve an overclock of 4005Mhz. Benchmarks were possible at 4100Mhz, but for the five hour OCCT test to finish we had to reduce to 4005Mhz.

Testing memory independently, the board was sub par for both DDR2 and DDR3. We were able to run stock on the DDR3 kit (666Mhz 7-7-7-20) but not a Mhz more without memory errors. DDR2 would not even run at stock speeds on any divider and corrupted Windows at only 450Mhz.

We suspect the issues with overclocking on this board are BIOS related. It seems the memory and MCH tables are not set up properly or there is an issue with memory registers as the board showed many symptoms of memory incompatibility. FSB maxed out around 465-470 even using very high for NB and VTT voltages and for 24/7 stability it had to be run closer to 450. One point to mention is GTLREF was best run at the 0.615xVTT setting, this added quite a bit of stability at high FSB.

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Even with issues with FSB and memory clocking, a reasonable overclock of 4005Mhz was achieved, a gain of 33%. To accomplish this, the FSB1600 configuration and 3:4 memory divider were used; giving RAM speed of 593Mhz (DDR1186) and 7-6-6-20. It is important to note however that a lot of work went into achieving stability. These settings will be used throughout the benchmarking sections.

 

[Eldonko]

System Benchmarks

System Benchmarks

SuperPI Benchmark

SuperPi calculates the number of digits of PI in a pure 2D benchmark. For the purposes of this review, calculation to 32 million places will be used. RAM speed, RAM timings, CPU speed, L2 cache, and Operating System tweaks all effect the speed of the calculation, and this has been one of the most popular benchmarks among enthusiasts for several years.

Results: A 23% increase in SuperPI 32M is noted going from 3000Mhz to 4005Mhz on the E3110 and ASRock P45R2000-WiFi. This is not quite as high a gain as the overclock percentage (33%), which shows us SuperPI is quite dependant on memory speed and latency.


CINEBENCH R10

CINEBENCH R10 is a testing suite that assesses your computer's performance capabilities, both 2D and 3D. CINEBENCH runs several tests on your computer to measure the performance of the main processor and the graphics card under real world circumstances.

The test procedure consists of two main components: The first test sequence is dedicated to the computer's main processor. Next, a 3D scene file is used to render an image file. The scene makes use of various CPU-intensive features such as reflection, ambient occlusion, area lights and procedural shaders. In the first run, the benchmark only uses one CPU (or CPU core), to ascertain a reference value. On computers that have multiple CPUs or CPU cores, CINEBENCH will run a second test using all available CPU power.

In this review, single-CPU and multi-CPU rendering speeds will be measured for both stock speed and an overclocked system.

Results: The CINEBENCH R10 results show an impressive increase in performance in rendering moving from a stock system to an overclocked system. Improvements in rendering time of 25% and 26% are noted for single-CPU and multi-CPU rendering benchmarks respectively. Not bad at all.


Sandra Memory Bandwidth, Processor Multi-Media, and Processor Arithmetic

SiSoftware Sandra (the System ANalyser, Diagnostic and Reporting Assistant) is an information & diagnostic utility. The software suite provides most of the information (including undocumented) users like to know about hardware, software, and other devices whether hardware or software. The name “Sandra” is a (girl) name of Greek origin that means "defender", "helper of mankind".

The software version used for these tests is SiSoftware Sandra Professional Home XII.SP2c and the three benchmarks used are the Memory Bandwidth, Processor Multi-Media, and Processor Arithmetic benchmarks. These three benchmarks were chosen as they provide a good indication of three varying types of system performance. The bandwidth test shows performance of memory sub-systems, the multi-media test shows how the processor handles multi-media instructions and data, and the arithmetic test shows how the processor handles arithmetic and floating point instructions. These three tests illustrate three important areas of a computer’s speed and provide a wide scope of results.

Results: Sandra processor multi-media and arithmetic show impressive improvements on an overclocked system, with 34-36% gains in performance. Memory bandwidth shows a more modest gain at 17-18%, however the overclocked memory tests were only running the RAM at 593Mhz @ 7-6-6-20 and the stock tests were using XMP at 666Mhz @ 7-7-7-20. If we didn’t experience memory incompatibility issues, we may have seen a larger gain in bandwidth. Still, an 18% improvement is still well worth the time to overclock the system.