![[H]ardOCP](/images/blank.gif){kind=small}
- Date:
- Thursday , December 21, 2006
- Author:
- Daniel Dobrowolski
- Editor:
- Kyle Bennett
- Google +1
MSI P965 Platinum
MSI is no stranger to creating enthusiast motherboards, geared toward PC enthusiasts of all types. Today we look at MSI’s latest offering, the P965 Platinum based on Intel’s popular P965 Express chipset.
MSI Utilities
The P965 Platinum comes with several utilities with varying functions. They are Digicell, Dual Core Center, MSI Live Update 3, Password Keeper and Lockbox. The Digicell application is very simple. It serves a very basic purpose. That purpose is to serve as a launcher for the other applications listed above. It does have one purpose of its own, and that is hardware diagnostics. It really only diagnoses onboard LAN functions, and displays some system information as shown in one of the screenshots below.
The MSI Dual Core Center displays information on the CPU temperature, FSB and clock speeds. Also, MSI’s Dynamic Overclocking Technology functionality can be toggled on and off from this utility as well. This utility is nice because it is simple, and allows you to overclock dynamically within Windows. This allows you to adjust your overclock on the fly without having to go through a series of reboots. To use the Dynamic overclocking utility, you need to click the D.O.T. button. Once clicked the fan in the corner will begin to spin. The arrows next to the D.O.T. button sets the pre-defined overclocks by percentage for the utility. The range is from 3% to 25%. FSB is adjustable from the default FSB speed of 266 to 371MHz.
The advanced menu is accessed from the arrow at the bottom left of the utility main screen. To create a custom profile you only need to click on the User Profile button, and then click on advanced, and then the Clock icon. From there, the profile can be adjusted to the users liking. The nice thing about this utility is the fact that you can adjust the fan speed and thermal thresholds for each profile individually. Each of the four icons at the top of the utility corresponds to Motherboard Temperature, Motherboard Voltage, Motherboard Fan Speed and Motherboard Clock. Also at the left hand side of the main screen are your preset settings. They are AV, Game, Office, Silence, and Cool. There is also a Sharp Mode and Smooth Mode button near the bottom of the utility.
The MSI Live Update 3 application is a web based utility offering live update features for motherboard drivers, utilities and even the installed video card. The application can detect your installed video adapter brand, and perform live updates on the drivers for that installed card. The interface is very simple and easy to use. On the left hand pane of the application are the various options for Live update configuration. Live BIOS, Live Driver, Live VGA Driver, Live Utility. Simply highlight the option for what you want to update and then click on connect to MSI Live Update Server.
MSI's Password Keeper utility and Lockbox are also simple tools for password storage and encryption. Create your password, and then log in to begin creating passwords and filling in information you'd like to secure. Create a title for the password file you wish to create and then fill in the appropriate fields.