ASUS M2N32-SLI Deluxe WiFi Edition

[PAGETITLE=Introduction] Though the AM2 platform was not released that long ago, there are an innumerable amount of motherboards to choose from. Choice is a good thing though, especially when you may or may not be on a budget. The board we are looking at today comes from ASUS and is one of their top models. It has all the goods, including the nForce 590 chipset. Beyond that though, there are features found here that only ASUS provides. The M2N32 is an AI Lifestyle board, meaning it's feature complete for your lifestyle and performance needs. As we will see later in the review, this is clearly the case. M2N32-SLI Deluxe Wireless Edition Features Support AMD Socket AM2. NVIDIA nForce 590 SLI MCP. NVIDIA LinkBoost Technology. 2 x PCI Express x16 slot with NVIDIA SLI support, at full x16, x16 speed. Dual-channel DDR2 800/667/533. ASUS 8-Phase Power Design. WiFi-AP Solo supports IEEE802.11b/g. AMD Live! Ready. Bundled ASUS Array Mic. The addition of WiFi and AMD Live! support may make the board out to seem like it's for an HTPC or the like. Make no mistake, this is a board also caters well to enthusiasts and overclockers. Overall Features I won't be getting into every minor thing this board offers, but if you are interested in the overall look you can take a look at the official specs page. The M2N32-SLI Deluxe is designed for anyone, whether you be building an HTPC or a sweet gaming rig. This board has it all. This is not ASUS saying this, this is -me- saying this. I've been using the motherboard for near a month, and I am left quite impressed with all it offers. The board packs the nForce 590 SLI MCP chipset meaning you can hook up SLI right away. This chipset in itself introduces a lot of features to the user: nForce 590 MCP Benefits Designed to offer a lot of overclocking headroom. Linkboost - Increases the bus speed of PCI-E slots when equipped with supported GPUs. FirstPacket - Optimized network technology that helps put priority to network gaming traffic. SLI-Ready Memory - Uses EPP enhanced modules if you require them. DualNet - Increased performance with the dual-gigabit ethernet ports that features TCP/IP offloading. Support for S-ATA RAID configurations, including RAID5. A feature complete motherboard would not be as such without proper cooling considerations. The M2N32-SLI uses a special heatsink that covers the Southbridge, Northbridge and PWM all in one fell swoop. This sink uses copper heatpipe technology to dissipate heat quickly, but fins are only found on the PWM. The SB and NB are merely covered with a heatpipe enhanced heatsink. It does the job though while taking away the need for a chipset fan. This should result in less power consumption (albeit low) and less noise. Since this board also caters to overclockers, it's no surprise the wealth of tools that are included. I will give a brief overview: ASUS Specific Overclocking Features AI Clock Skew - Automatically or manually adjusts the memory clock signal timing for improved memory overclocks. OC Profile - Ability to save and load BIOS profiles from within the BIOS and even off a CD-Rom or thumb drive. Precision Tweaker - Complete control over Vdimm, Vcore and other overclocking specific features. AI NOS - Safe overclocking for those who don't want to delve into manual tweaking. PEG Link - Allows to increase PCI-E buswidth and memory throughput. So, I think it's obvious that this is indeed a packed board. Time to take a look at the packaging and the board overview! [PAGEBREAK] [PAGETITLE=Packaging & Contents] The boards packaging is nothing out of the ordinary, but it is heavier than others I have seen due to all of the extras. The box you see below is the outer casing, which has a flap in the front which can be lifted up to view more info. Removing this casing you will have the actual box. From the small stickers, we can see the board is compatible with all AM2 CPU's, supports SLI and Corsair memory. Of course it supports other memory, but Corsair is a leading partner. I apologize in advance for these horrible pictures... Upon opening the box, there's quick proof that this is one stuffed package. First, I took out the motherboard plate for the back of your PC, cables for extra firewire/USB functionality and a Q-Connector. This is quite a useful little device, although I have not used it because I don't feel I need it. In gist, you insert your HDD LED/Power LED/Power Switch/etc wires into this, which will essentially make it one cable instead of four or more. This is great if you are swapping motherboards often. When I first pulled the next piece of equipment out, I had no sweet clue what it was. Until I saw the pink connector... which obviously is used for mics. Yes. this is a strange looking microphone, but a cool looking one. It doesn't have any clips or sticky surface so no matter where you put it, it will move around if a desk/monitor is nudged. Cool addition, however. Next we have the S-ATA and IDE connectors, in addition to the SLI bridge. The WiFi connector! The manual and support CD-Rom. Optional chipset fan, if you prefer to have one. Onto take a hard look at the board and layout. [PAGEBREAK] [PAGETITLE=Board Layout] Time to take a look at the board itself and examine the layout. When it comes to motherboard layout, there never seems to be a "perfect" solution. There always seems to be a few minor things that keep it from being the perfect board. Let's see if that's the case here. Some aspects of the board prove to be a tight squeeze. Take the top PCI-E slot, which is directly next to the large heatsink. Removing a GPU will be a fun experience with such a tight space. Pushing up on the tab will hit the heatsink. Nothing major, but a slight bit of extra space would have been welcomed. Here is a close-up of the copper heatsink unit. Quite an interesting design. You can see the single heatpipe running through the entire unit. Along the way, each 'checkpoint' is secured with screws and plastic tabs. As you can see here, the heatsink is covering the entire PWM to dissipate heat quickly. The caps in between are not touching this sink, but leave 2mm~ in between. The socket in it's 940-Pin glory: As mentioned earlier, the board includes six S-ATA ports, all located nearer the bottom of the board, just underneath the BIOS battery. Also seen here are four 3-Pin fan connectors. No doubt that should prove more than enough for anyone. The IDE/Floppy and motherboard connectors are all incredibly close to one another. This will not prove to be a problem in the least if you don't use any IDE devices, but plugging in an IDE CD-Rom proves a tight squeeze. At the top left corner of the board we can see another S-ATA connector and 4-Pin CPU fan connector. There's also a tilted cap. Strange. The non-removable WiFi card is located directly below the rest of the connectors. There is no antenna pre-connected, which is great for those who don't intend to ever use it. Now here's an odd place for the 4-Pin motherboard connector. Honestly, I have no idea why it belongs here, because the power cable will just be resting atop your video card. Strange place indeed. Not to mention a tight squeeze. During installation, I didn't notice this connector until after I had the GPU installed. The spot was so tight, that I could not plug the cable in without having to cut myself to pieces. So I was forced to remove the video card and plug it in first. In a good spin though, here are even more fan connectors. Here is a glamour shot of the available slots. Two PCI-E 16x, One PCI-E 4x, One PCI-E 4x and two PCI slots. The blue and pink ports are for hooking up external Firewire or USB ports. The BIOS chip and voltage regulator. Also the BIOS battery and reset switch. There are a slew of ports available here, including a PS/2 keyboard/mouse, S/PDIF, firewire, S-ATA, USB ports, Ethernet and of course the audio. This board takes advantage of SoundMAX digital HD audio. Lastly, here is the back of the board. Since the board is black on the front, it was a surprise to see it completely blue on the back. Whew, that was a lot of ground covered. Let's dedicate some time now to taking a hard look everything the BIOS has to offer. [PAGEBREAK] [PAGETITLE=Look at the BIOS] The BIOS in the M2N32 comes straight from Phoenix and is one of the best I've ever used. Before I jump into the screens though, I will explain a minor problem, that almost cannot even be called a problem. This motherboard POSTs incredibly fast. Yes of course this is a good thing for the most part... shorter boot time is hard to complain about. However, I have found myself having to rapid-tap the DEL button after turning the PC on, in order to assure I will get into the BIOS. Even then, I've had to reboot the PC a few times before getting in there. So, it is a problem and it isn't, just depends on how much overclocking or BIOS customizing you plan on doing :-) If you've ever been in a Pheonix BIOS you are well aware of what you will see first. Setting the time and date is rather mundane, but must be done. One thing I find somewhat odd here is the fact that by default, HDD SMART is disabled while Diskette A: is enabled. I'm willing to bet the majority of people with this board will not even use a Diskette drive, but most everyone would want SMART. Could be just me, who knows! Advanced This is where all of the fun stuff takes place. Anything overclocking or tweaking related is in here. The first option is for Jumperfree Configuration and here is where you can overclock your CPU and set voltages. Since ASUS includes a feature called "AI Overclock", you could use that if you want a modest overclock but want to remain in safe boundaries. Of course the real fun takes place when you set the option to manual, which allows you full control over everything. The max VDIMM on this board is 2.500v while the max...

ASUS M2N32-SLI Deluxe WiFi Edition

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Rob Williams