We issued the same warning to all the motherboard vendors for our P35-DDR2 compatible motherboard shootout. Compare Prices on P35-DDR2 Motherboards As we stipulated for our earlier DDR3 motherboard comparison, we said every board would be treated as a retail sample, and no excuses would be made for products still in development that performed badly. Yet two boards arrived that simply weren't ready for prime time, and this is our second update in which another vendor, in this case MSI, gets another chance.
As with the Biostar TP35D3-A7 Deluxe, the only way MSI qualified for any compassionate relief was by completely failing in the overclocking portion of its original review. We received a replacement board of revision 1.1 a few weeks later following its dismal bus speed results, but gave MSI more time to mull over its failure before working the newly-revised board into our busy test schedule.

Unlike the previously updated Biostar board, the MSI has a few visible circuitry changes that require a little more consideration before we move on to test it.
The smallest of changes can make all the difference in overclocking, such as the repositioning of a capacitor (including the addition of a place to solder it) between two PCI-Express x1 slots hints, indicating that the circuit layout has been altered.

Also notice that there are now jumpers located next to one of the x1 slots, which can be used to force CPU FSB detection from 200 to 266 MHz (FSB800 to FSB1066) or from 266 to 333 MHz (FSB1066 to FSB1333). This could aid in setting the board to the correct boot strap when overclocking, but a BIOS-FSB adjustment should make those changes just as effectively.
Notice that the header marked JSL1C1 no longer has pins; this is the connection for MSI's VoIP-to-telephone card, which is included in the upscale P35 Diamond package that was to be an optional component for the P35 Platinum.
Filling those empty solder spots with pins would not restore this option, as MSI also changed the audio codec from the 8+2 channel multi-streaming plus VoIP Realtek ALC888T to the smaller and less-elaborate eight-channel ALC888. The loss of two separate channels for unfettered headset use while other audio files play through the speakers downgrades this board firmly into the mid-priced market. MSI now offers a $15 mail-in-rebate through qualified vendors, which could compensate would-be buyers, at least until its retail price comes down by a similar amount.
Once again we'll retest the performance to make sure nothing gained in overclocking capability has been lost here. This is especially important considering that the board has received updates in both hardware and BIOS. All benchmarks from the P35 Platinum's previous review were retested under an identical software configuration, but the BIOS was updated to version VP.0B4 (6/12/2007).

Benchmark tests actually improved by 0.02% for the P35 Platinum Revision 1.1. That difference is small enough to be coincidental, but it's nice to see that none of the former revision's impressive performance was lost.
We continue to use our early-stepping Intel Core 2 Duo E6700 for overclocking stress tests Compare Prices on Core 2 Duo E6700, which is a part that constantly challenges motherboard stability by not having much FSB tolerance. Top boards typically push it to 3460 MHz at a 10x multiplier and 1.50V core, and the highest FSB we've reached in recent months was 459 MHz at a lowered 6x multiplier.

A maximum stable FSB clock of 463 MHz (FSB1852) is a new record for our stubborn processor and a tribute to MSI's engineering efforts.
Conclusion
The former MSI P35 Platinum Revision 1.0 won the performance portion of our earlier P35 DDR2 shootout, but by too small an amount to offset its staggering defeat in overclocking. Today's P35 Platinum Revision 1.1 maintains all of the original board's performance but with huge gains in overclocking stability that beat every board covered in our previous review. MSI could have easily won an Editor's Choice award had the firm presented such a beast for the original competition, but because all of its competitors have also continued their development work, it's unfortunately too late for such accolades.
The loss of 8+2 channel audio capability with the substitution of a standard eight-channel codec comes at the same time as a rebate in lieu of reduced retail prices. Buyers who would rather save money than pay for those extra audio capabilities will be pleased to see that the MSI P35 Platinum Revision 1.1 is now a stellar overclocker.