Layout and Features
ASUS' layout is pretty good considering the number of features onboard. The CPU is rotated differently from the Canterwood version, not that it makes any discernable difference. ASUS have gone back to using plastic pushpins to secure the retention bracket to the PCB. It seems a little strange to have a totally redesigned layout for the CPU, capacitors and MOSFETs. Not only that, the 4-pin 12v connector has been moved down to centre of the board. That's not a position we favour.
ASUS retain the same massive heatsink on the i865PE. If you thought the P4C800's MCH heatsink was a close fit, the P4P800's is that much closer to the 8x AGP slot The slot now features a lockable insert. The heatsink almost gets in the way of a number of graphics cards. Cooler mounting, too, is a little restricted. There was absolutely no need to foul the AGP and CPU sockets in this manner. The 4 colour-coded DIMM slots also sit a little closer to the AGP slot. A capacitor gets close to fouling an oversized AGP card. There's a rather large gap between the AGP port and first PCI slot. That's good news if your video card's cooler is a little larger than normal. ASUS make it easy to run in dual channel mode; just choose the same colour for both DIMMs.
You'd think the Canterwood would have all the cutting-edge features, wouldn't you ?. It's the Springdale version features the ICH5/R Southbridge. The 'R' supports native Serial ATA, both in independent and RAID0 mode. The two ports on the right hold one drive each. You can also see two USB2.0 headers, sadly no extra brackets are provided to maximise their usage.
VIA have branched out into producing RAID controllers for both S-ATA and P-ATA. The VT6410, shown above, services the two P-ATA ports (one is rotated). Capable of running 4 drives with ATA133 speeds, it supports the usual functions of RAID0, RAID1, RAID0+1. It can also run them in a JBOD (Just a Bunch if Disks) manner.
The configuration screen is reminiscent of Highpoint's. It's all intuitive enough.
The top-left of the board houses another VIA PHY and controller. The VT6307 is a 2-port controller with a single port housed on the backplane. Again, another header is provided on the PCB but no FireWire bracket is provided to take use of it. Perhaps two ports should have been integrated on the backplane ?. The AD1985 CODEC (right) is one of a new auto jack-sensing breed. Fed from the AC'97 off the ICH5/R, the AD1985 supports S/PDIF (middle-top). 6-channel support, excellent resolution and decent sound quality make it a premium on-board software-based solution. Thankfully, ASUS integrate a S/PDIF RCA-out on the backplane.
The 3COM 940 LOM surfaces again on the P4P800D. The i865PE chipset also supports a dedicated link from a Gigabit controller to the MCH. That CSA (Communication Streaming Architecture) hasn't been taken up here. Rather, the Gigabit link is still PCI based. That's not really that problematic in a home PC environment because most users don't have the necessary peripherals to saturate the Gigabit speed.
A single RCA S/PDIF-out takes the place of the usual second serial port. Optical-out would have been an extra bonus. 4 USB2.0 ports, the Gigabit jack and a FireWire port give the user some degree of high-speed flexibility. The audio jacks double up in 6-channel mode and provide the aforementioned auto-sensing capability.
