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P4S800D-E Deluxe

ASUS keeps the market motivated by developing the P4S800D-E Deluxe based on the SiS655TX chipset. Will that and a ton of features allow this "Deluxe" board to compete with the Intel chipset boards?

ASUS remains one of the top manufacturer choices when enthusiasts start looking to replace the motherboard in their own machines. For those looking for outstanding quality and solid stability, ASUS rarely disappoints. The newest P4S800D-E Deluxe combines these sought after ASUS traits with an alternative chipset in the form of the SiS655TX.

The SiS655TX chipset is a direct competitor to the very strong Intel i875P chipset and ASUS joins this SiS chipset with a solid package touting plenty of flagship options.

The P4S800D-E Deluxe offers support for Dual Channel DDR400; Marvell Gigabit Ethernet Controller; 1 Serial ATA RAID 0 and 1 controller; 1 mixed-mode RAID 0,1,0+1, and JBOD controller; AGP 8X; and 6-channel SoundMAX audio.

Main Specifications Overview:

Detailed Mainboard Specification List:

Board Layout

In a Geiger-esque fashion, the box design offers a view of a machine-like portal leading to what is contained inside. The intricate design hides the subtle use of pink and sparks an interest to the board within.

The accessories ASUS included in the package are the normal fare, but of top-shelf quality. The IDE and SATA cables are very well constructed and the IDE cables include an ASUS logo emblazoned pull tab. The inventory is as follows: 2 80-wire ATA 133 cables; 1 40-wire IDE cable (for use with CD-ROM or older HD technology); 1 standard floppy cable; 2 SATA cables; 1 dual drive SATA power adapter; 1 Back Panel I/O Shield; 1 IEEE 1394 (1 port) bracket; 1 USB/Game Port bracket; User Guide; and CD. ASUS also provided a case sticker. The manual is adequate, but is completely missing any BIOS information (if that is needed).

The design and layout of the P4S800D-E Deluxe is practically flawless and component placement is not an issue. At this point, I do not have any problems with this board. We’ll see if that remains the case. This board carries a revision number of 1.02.

Capacitor manufacturers on this board are United Chemi-Con (marked KZE, USA and Japan), Taiwon Ostor Corporation (marked RLG, Taiwan), and others marked RLZ from unknown manufacturers.

The area directly around the CPU socket is clutter free. The row of capacitors just above the HSF cage is short enough to stay out of the way.

The SiS655TX North Bridge is cooled by a passive aluminum heat sink held in place by two cross-corner, spring loaded pins. Unfortunately, the motherboard must not be mounted in a case to remove this HS and I suggest any HS replacement be completed prior to installation to mitigate this headache. The SiS655TX seems to be a hot chipset (at least on this board) and the passive HS is not up to the job of dissipating that heat, but more on that later.

Two of the three system monitored fan connectors (labeled PWR_FAN and CPU_FAN) are placed out of the way at the lower-right corner of the CPU cage. Above the North Bridge is the ATX 12V power connector whose placement, which proper cable routing, will pose no issue. Just above the larger, green capacitor at the top of this picture are the two of the four jumpers (these two are USBPW12 and USBPW34) that control USB device wake-up.

As expected, the four DIMM slots are directly below the CPU socket area and are color-coded for easy Dual Channel implementation. ASUS recommends that the blue slots are used first for Dual Channel configurations (by installing identical DIMMS) and the black slots second. Be sure to review the Qualified Vendor List (QVL) for tested and supported memory modules as we saw some instability with certain RAM. We could not get a clean XP install with Kingston PC3500 sticks. Just be aware of this issue and plan accordingly to side-step these issues. Here is a link to the QVL for the P4S800D (the P4S800D-E Deluxe is not released yet): QVL

The P4S800D-E Deluxe supports up to a total of 4GB of RAM ranging in technology from PC1600 to PC3200.

The ATX power connector and the two IDE connectors are at the bottom edge of the board just below the DIMM slots. These IDE connectors are the primary and secondary controllers.

The South Bridge is powered by the SiS964 MuTIOL 1G Media I/O chipset. The P4S800D-E Deluxe offers 1GB/s bandwidth between the SiS655TX and SiS964. Below this workhorse is the Clear RTC jumper (CLRTC1) to clear the CMOS. Next to this jumper are the SiS964-powered Serial ATA connectors (SATA1 and 2) offering RAID 0 and 1 support. The other two Serial ATA connectors (SATA3 and 4) are to the left flanking the SiS180 RAID chip. At the bottom edge of the board is the floppy connector and the IDE RAID connector (also controlled by the SiS180 chip). This IDE connector and SATA3/4 all play very well together in any of the supported configurations (RAID 0, 1, 0+1, and JBOD).

Framing out the left side of the board is the front panel connector block (color coded) followed by the chassis intrusion connector and the third system-monitored 3-pin fan connector (CHA_FAN1). Just above this fan connector is the GAME/MIDI connector (orange). The blue connector block at the top is for COM2 (the back panel only offers a single serial port), but this package does not come with an additional serial bracket.

The additional USB connectors (USB56 andUSB78) for the USB bracket are above the SiS964 chip. The other two jumpers (USBPW56 and USBPW78) controlling device wake-up are sandwiched between the USB connectors.

The IEEE 1394 connector (red) for the included bracket is just above COM2. Further up the left side is the power LED followed by the WiFi slot. The P4S800D-E Deluxe includes 5 PCI and 1 AGP slots in addition to the WiFi slot. This slot supports the ASUS WiFi card for wireless (802.11b at last report), but this model does not include the WiFi card itself.

The top of the board is home to the front panel audio connectors and the CD and AUX audio connectors.

The P4S800D-E Deluxe includes the following components on the Back Panel I/O: 1 each PS/2 keyboard and mouse ports; 1 parallel and 1 serial port; 1 S/PDIF out (RCA); 1 IEEE 1394 port; 4 USB ports; 1 LAN port; and 1 audio tower (line-in, line-out, and mic-in).