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- Date:
- Thursday , December 04, 2008
- Author:
- Morry Teitelman
- Editor:
- Kyle Bennett
- Google +1
ASUS M3A78-T Mobo - 790GX Chipset
The ASUS M3A78-T is one of the newest boards touting support for the AMD AM2 and AM2+ processors. The 790GX chipset seems to perform as well as its 790FX counterpart, but is it enough to hold off the Intel onslaught?
AiSuite
ASUS chose to include their AiSuite Windows based monitoring utility in with the board drivers. The version of AiSuite shown is 1.04.10. The AiSuite utility supports a variety of monitoring and configuration settings including real time display of system voltages, fan speeds, temperatures, CPU FSB and speed, as well as several supported overclocking methods.
The AiBooster button gives access to the AiBooster interface, allowing for automated or full manual control of CPU FSB and multiplier, and system voltages.
The Performance screen allows for selection of a preconfigured overclocking level, where the system controls the voltages and various FSB settings, while the Advanced screen allows for full manual control. Note that for all voltage, CPU FSB and multiplier manipulation, supported options can be selected from a pull down master list.
Note that the AiBooster interface allows for selection and saving of pre-configured user profiles as well.
The Q-Fan button within the main AiSuite window allows for operational configuration of all fan headers through preset options.
AMD OverDrive
ASUS also includes the AMD OverDrive utility, designed specifically for use with the AMD 790 chipset. Note that the app version show is 2.1.4. The application itself is split in to 4 specific areas – System Information, Status Monitor, Performance Control, and Preference. The System Information tab shows detailed information concerning speeds and settings of all onboard components, including memory and CPU settings.
The Status Monitor tab is broken in to several screens displaying CPU related temperatures, voltages and bus speeds both numerically and graphically, as well board bus speeds.
The Preference tab contains application related settings, including a control for enabling Basic or Advanced mode within the Performance Control tab. There are capabilities for loading and saving customized profiles as well.
With the Performance Control mode set to Novice from within the Preference tab, the Novice Mode screen shows. Novice Mode allows for selection of pre-configured overclocking levels, with the maximum overclock achieved with the slider moved to the High Performance setting. Note that in this mode, the system sets all voltages and bus speeds for you.
When the Performance Control mode option within the Preference tab set to Advanced, the Clock/Voltage and Memory screens become user accessible. All system bus speeds, voltages, and multipliers (including the CPU and HyperTransport ratios) can be set via the Clock/Voltage screen. The Memory screen allows for direct user configuration of all memory related timing and speed settings.
The Benchmark screen contains controls for an AMD provided benchmarking utility, useful in gauging system performance. The Stability Test screen contains a set of tests for gauging system stability, with the ability to select individual tests as well as the overall test duration. The Auto Clock screen contains a system speed optimization tool, which will automatically set optimal overclocking parameters for your system.