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The A7N8X offers bus frequencies up to 211 MHz. Keep in mind that the MCP-T is linked to the SPP via HyperTransport and runs at a fixed frequency. Therefore, unlike in conventional designs, there are no worries to run the PCI bus out of spec. We were able to clock the XP2800+ to the same 2404 MHz that we reached with the same CPU on other boards and which corresponds to a 178 MHz bus frequency. Unfortunately, the "unlocking" trick does not work with the A7N8X, meaning that one is stuck either with the multiplier of the CPU or has to manually unlock it.

Update (since some of you guys didn't leave me alone ... ) If the latter is done, there is no more holding back and the A7N8X can be pushed all the way up to the highest levels supported by the BIOS.

211 MHz External CPU bus and working ...

Conclusion

When we are talking about conclusions here, it is necessary to differentiate between the conclusions with respect to the nForce2 chipset on the one side and the ASUS A7N8X Deluxe on the other side. Definitely, the chipset is a giant leap up from its predecessor and in the new version featuring the real MCP-T instead of the preproduction version all bugs we encountered with the first board have been weeded out. For example, there was an issue with the IDE drivers and enabling APIC in the BIOS, likewise, there was a shutdown problem. We looked at the new version and found no issues, Two Thumbs Up.

211 MHz External CPU bus and ... Sandra ... Note that the memory voltage was left at the default 2.6V (single 512 MB Mushkin PC3200 DDR)

What is particularly impressive about the nForce2 and, by extension, the A7N8X Deluxe are the general performance and the fact how the memory is handled. Single DIMMs, dual or triple configurations, nothing really threw the board off except for running the 1GB DIMMs. Also as we showed in the earlier review, the nForce2 has almost no competition when it comes to performance meaning that the signs are set for a giant leap also in market share.

One of the aspects we have not covered yet is the quality of the integrated Soundstorm. It is hard to describe it in a few sentences, so let's just say that it is pretty overwhelming.

What about the A7N8X? There is a lot of things we can say, most of all, the A7N8X Deluxe is probably the best Socket A board we have reviewed so far, despite the non-working multiplier adjustments. But maybe that can still be fixed.

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