X38's available early next month!

tehlexinator

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Yep, there coming and coming sooner then you though.
Check it out. Good read:
http://www.dailytech.com/Intel+Prepares+X38+Express+Launch/article8467c.htm


This is what we know: (Some of this may be me confusing features with another board... Its late and I haven't slept yet. If you find errors, tell me. Also ignore my spelling. Its like 3 A.M..)

- No SLI (BOOOO!)
- PCIe 2.0 (Also TWO full-speed PCIe x16 bus's. Don't get excitged. Xfire only. Come on hacked SLI drivers *fingers crossed*.)
- Improved cooling (But how much better?)
- Improved 45 NM CPU support (P35 has this... but ok, I'll bite and say thats "new".)
- Higher "official" USB speed. (I like the word "official". That is all. Does anyone actually follow the "official" speed?)
- DDR2 and 3 (Good. DDR3 will also have an "Extreme Memory" feature but unless it makes it less expensive and makes it suck less, DDR3 is still not worth it. Small latency hacks really won't help DDR3.)
- You can edit your BIOS from your OS (Yes please!)
- The good stuff should not cost over $320 (unless you buy from newegg and they price gouge again). Low end X38's (still better then anything in the P35 family) should run at about the price of current high end P35 chipsets, and P35 chipsets are getting cut in price. (So if you want a P35, wait a bit.)
- No need to "pencil mod" like with the P35. (Yaaay 3 seconds time saved!...?)


Looks like the marketing people at Gigabyte were on the money with this info and an "early september" street date.
I also managed to get some Asus folks to say "sometime in september". They left out the early part and all further attemtps resulted in stalemates; even me saying "Now if its early September wink once" didn't really do anything over the phone... But hey who knows, maybe the guy was winking?

There you have it. Hopefully these live up to the hype. I know I am getting one as soon as I see it.

When the forum posts the link it may separate c.htm into c.h tm. So change it to match.
http://www.dailytech.com/Intel+Prepares+X38+Express+Launch/article8467c. htm should be c.htm.


Lol wow they took down the link! Umm hopefully it comes back up...
 

echelon_101

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I suppose Intel want to start to shy away from "historical tech", most functions that were contained on PCI cards have been shipped onto the motherboards themselves these days, you only really need a PCI slot for an old X-fi or Soundblaster card.

I am also slightly relieved that I have moved my build to the end of September rather than build it now.

Also this board looks really juicy http://www.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=9017
 

rammedstein

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That is actually up to manufacturers discretion, it hasn't been certified by nvidia, but a number of manufacturers i have contacted say that they will support 3rd party sli...
 

tehlexinator

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Really? I had both the Asus and the Giga people tell me they will have SLI and now that I contacted them again more recently they said that they will not have it. Of course I am dealing with marketing chaps so no idea how accurate the info is, but they have been close to the money many times before.

Just thinking of 2 SLI’d G92’s… Hot…


But the reason on so few PCI slots is… Why have more then one or two? Do you still use ISA slots? Most mobos already have a built in nic, sound, etc, etc.

 

tehlexinator

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Update:

MSI is also saying they will be available in September... But they are saying around mid September.
Of course it could be because there MSI and are always late out the door, but I thought I should update you guys.
And once again, they said no on SLI.
Booo.
Ram I'm really hoping you're right though.
 

gwolfman

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Sweet! xFire and SLI, nice! I'd probably still stick with nVidia since the only ATi card I bought sucked, but it's nice to have the option and see that manufacturers will support both and start that trend! I hope Asus joins that group too, I love their motherboards.
 

systemlord

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Know where does it say on the retail box for P35 that PCI-E 2.0 is supported. If it did they would have advertised so.
 

rockyjohn

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Lets see soundcard, tv tuner card or 2, modem - that's 3 or 4. I am not sure how fast some of these are going to be migratged to PCIe but I can see it being a major inconvenience for some, and even if new PCIe cards are available if prevents reusing old components. I hope the network connecition on the MB does not go bad - since one can't then slip in a PCI card to take care of it. Further I have not checked recently but lets hope that there are good PCIe cards for controllers and any other communications ports one might want (USB, eSata, and parrallel port or other legacy ports some individuals might want). Ya one is all anyone needs. Right.
 

cb62fcni

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Hahahaha, yea, cuz everyone is really big on truth-in-advertising right? Actually, P35 can support PCI-E 2.0 as far as the NB is concerned, but no one has yet implemented it on the board. You can't just flash your bios and magically have your PCI-E 16x slot become a PCI-E 2 slot unfortunately, there's electrical differences in the socket. So technically, you're both right. Kinda.
 

tehlexinator

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Read me:

http://download.intel.com/products/chipsets/P35/317304.pdf

(Does not support PCIe 2.0).

Read me 2:
[url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCI_Express]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PCI_Express [/url]

If you don't want to read then here is the highlight.

" In June 2007 Intel released the specification of the P35 chipset which does NOT support PCIe 2.0 only PCIe 1.1 [4]. Some people may be confused by the P35 block diagram [5] which states the Intel P35 has a PCIe x16 graphics link (8 GB/s) and 6 PCIe x1 links (500 MB/s each), for simple verification one can view the P965 block diagram which shows the same number of lanes and bandwidth but was released before PCIe 2.0 was finalised. Intel's first PCIe 2.0 capable chipset will be the X38 and will be released in Q3 2007[6]. AMD starts supporting PCIe 2.0 from its RD700 chipset series. NVIDIA has revealed that the MCP72 will be their first PCIe 2.0 equipped chipset.[7] "

Don't argue what you can't prove people...


As for needing PCI slots...
Sound cards are already PCIe. So are TV tuners. Modem? Got me there. I didn't know anyone still used those actually...
 

jwlangs

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Dailytech says Sept 23rd NDA lift date for reviews and performance numbers, but the boards come out weeks before? Okay, so tech websites (and whoever else signs an NDA agreement) can't post anything, but the whole rest of the world can? Somebody please explain this to me.
 

nicolasb

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So far there is no full-blown PCIe X-Fi card, AFAIK. There is a PCIe XFi card of sorts, but it's OEM-only and functionally equivalent to an "XFi Xtreme Audio" - the cut-down, less functional version. There's also no PCIe equivalent of an Auzentech Prelude for high-end buyers.

And there's no PCIe version of a Sweetspot video-capture card either.
 

warezme

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Old X-fi???, uh so which new sound card are you referring to?? the crappy CPU hogging built in ones???

If you want high quality, high performance audio thats not dragging your CPU down with extra junk, X-fi or similar IS your only choice, so PCI slots are required, at least two I would think.
 

royalcrown

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Don't those need actual good drivers though, I bet vista will never see them because you'll need the "Soundblaster Y-FI Super Xtreme Fatal1ty Gold wallet sucker edition." I'll stay with onboard sound till they get off their *** and make drivers. ADI is not that bad.

 

systemlord

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I thought 32 bit OS'es could only support 3 GB of ram, but not 4 GB.
 

BUFF

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except that you can get PCI-E format X-Fis & Asus' new Xonar ...