Features and Layout
Biostar has made lots of noise in recent months about the overclocking capabilities of its motherboards, but before we put any claims to superiority to the test in a fair comparison we’ll first consider its more obvious characteristics.
The TPower X58 (also labeled T-Power X58) has three x16-length slots, but unlike many of its “mid-range” competition, this motherboard doesn’t come with 3-way SLI pretensions. Because the third PCIe 2.0 slots has only four PCIe lanes, placing it at the bottom isn’t a major concern even though it would require a special case to mount a double-thick graphics solution there. More practical uses would be a single-slot card for additional displays or a x8 RAID card, and performance fanatics might find it the perfect place for their Fusion-io ioDrive.
Moving its third x16-length slot to the bottom position allowed Biostar to spread its two full-bandwidth x16 slots apart by one additional space, allowing for improved ventilation around the top card’s fan intake when multiple cards are installed, such as 2-way SLI or Crossfire configurations.
Most of the layout is perfect for cable management, with highlights including traditional power and ultra ATA connector placement and improved FP-Audio header positioning. Previously seen on several generations of Gigabyte motherboards, Biostar has moved the front-panel connector significantly northward, putting it immediately forward of the rear-panel jacks for easier cabling to top-mounted and upper-bay front-panel connectors.
Our only major layout complaint is that the floppy connector, located under the bottom expansion slot, will be extremely hard to get to. The best solution for Windows XP users who want a floppy for loading AHCI or RAID drivers would be to use an extra-long flat cable and wrap it under the board, so that it can exit at the “proper” location in front of the TPower X58’s main power connector. That is, after all, where most cases have a 3.5” external bay.
One small caveat concerns the forward-facing SATA connectors, which point the cables towards the hard drive cage of most cases. This design is common enough now that most cases are designed with the needed space to plug cables here, but buyers will still need to pay close attention during case selection.
A Port 80 display is found just above the internal reset and power buttons, the combination of these making bench testing easier. Unfortunately, the display will be difficult to see when long graphics cards are installed in the second x16 slot.
Biostar TPower X58 (Revision 5.1) | |
|---|---|
Northbridge | Intel X58 Express |
Southbridge | Intel ICH10R |
Voltage Regulator | Twelve Phases |
BIOS | 080015 (01/15/2009) |
133.3 MHz Base Clock | 133.3 (+0.0%) |
Clock Generator | Realtek RTM885N-914 |
Connectors and Interfaces | |
Onboard | 3 x PCIe 2.0 x16 (Modes: x16, x16, x4) |
| 1 x PCIe x1 |
| 2 x PCI |
| 2 x USB 2.0 (2 ports per connector) |
| 1 x IEEE-1394 FireWire |
| 1 x Ultra ATA (2 drives) |
| 6 x Serial ATA 3.0Gb/s |
| 1 x Fan 4-pin (CPU) |
| 2 x Fan 3-pins (Chassis, Power) |
| 1 x Front Panel Audio connector |
| 1 x CD-Audio In |
| 1 x S/P-DIF Out |
| 1 x Power Button |
| 1 x Reset Button |
| 1 x Port-80 Diagnostics Display |
IO panel | 1 x PS2 (keyboard) |
| 8 x USB 2.0 |
| 1 x IEEE-1394 FireWire |
| 2 x External SATA (eSATA) 3.0Gb/s |
| 2 x Digital Audio Out (Coaxial + Optical) |
| 2 x RJ45 Ethernet |
| 6 x Analog Audio Jacks (8-ch. out, 4-ch. in) |
Mass Storage Controllers | |
Intel ICH10R | 6 x SATA 3.0Gb/s (RAID 0, 1, 5, 10) |
JMicron JMB363 PCIe | 1 x Ultra ATA-133 (2-drives) |
| 2 x SATA 3.0 Gb/s |
Network | |
2x Realtek RTL8111C PCIe | Dual Gigabit LAN |
Audio | |
Realtek ALC888S HD Audio Codec | Eight-Channel (7.1 Surround) Output |
IEEE-1394 FireWire | |
Texas Instruments TSB43AB22A | 2 x FireWire 400 (1x Internal, 1x I/O Panel) |
Biostar’s unusual placement of a JMB363 Ultra ATA/SATA controller allowed the company to more easily put its Ultra ATA header at the top of the TPower X58’s front edge, for easier cabling to upper-bay devices such as legacy optical drives. The controller's SATA ports are both wired to rear-panel eSATA connectors. Combined bandwidth is limited to 2.5 Gb/s by the controller’s PCIe x1 connection
Unlike the added drive controller, both RTL8111C Gigabit network controllers get more than enough bandwidth from independent PCIe x1 lanes.
Supporting two 400 Mb FireWire ports, the TSB43AB22A controller needs nothing more than a legacy PCI connection.
An ALC888S codec interfaces Intel’s ICH10R HD Audio capabilities to provide up to 7.1-channel surround and independent front-panel stereo output simultaneously via multi-streaming technology.
Check prices for Biostar's TPower X58
- Two Steps Forward, Three Steps Back
- ASRock X58 SuperComputer
- X58 SuperComputer BIOS, Software And Accessories
- Asus P6T
- P6T BIOS, Software And Accessories
- Biostar TPower X58
- TPower X58 BIOS, Software And Accessories
- DFI LANParty DK X58-T3eH6
- X58-T3eH6 BIOS, Software And Accessories
- EVGA X58 3X SLI
- Foxconn Renaissance
- Renaissance BIOS, Software, And Accessories
- MSI X58 Platinum SLI
- X58 Platinum SLI BIOS, Software, And Accessories
- Test Settings
- Benchmark Results: 3D Games
- Benchmark Results: Audio And Video Encoding
- Benchmark Results: Productivity
- Benchmark Results: Synthetic
- Power, Heat, And Overclocking
- Conclusion







Warpedsystems has tested a least half of these, my Evga failed out of the box, i would normally let that slide but with all the 680i and 780i issues and failures over the years - beware. So i can not speak of the evga - i will say the 780i FTW is kick butt mobo!
Asus is asus and 90% or so of my stuff i ship, i switched to the new P6t from the deluxe and have had some issues - i am sitll working on the P6T tonight as i type. Opps- my jr tech set the blk to 180 and over clocked the QPI to max - i think he smoked the mobo ran amd cpu = its first in 5 years if so?
Some did not make it? no gigabyte? gigabyte is really pushing on asus for number one - really! Ya, all the evga fans are what? I can say how many evga mobos break and fail: pci-e slot fail, pressure around the cpu mounting failure, lock ups - evga lock ups are just accepted as part of life! We all know that evga error code!
I have to say the gigabyte and the higher end asus deluxe version sure seem a lot more reliable for 4ghz systems - again - we only took 1 evga and it locked up and i said "that is it the last time" - the FTW 780i gives me faith evga will come around on x58.
what ever you do - do not oc the blk and QPI - poof!
nice stuff THG!
One of the companies forgot to send a board and didn't respond in time to the reminder...see the introduction of the article. What makes you think that company wasn't Gigabyte?
Judging from the feature list, the board was plain P6T, but all pictures seem to be of P6T SE.
http://media.bestofmicro.com/7/3/192063/original/asus_p6t_kit.jpg
Sorry, but you can't make a good review without including one of the top manufacturers of X58 motherboards.
Sorry, but you can't make a good review without including one of the top manufacturers of X58 motherboards.
I am not the extreme overclocking kinda guy. In fact, I still am running on default settings on my Core 2 Duo E6750. I don't plan to overclock over 3,2Ghz on my new 920, if I ever do overclock.
Neither boards support SLI, but I'd be interrested in a dual Radeon 4870 1GB Crossfire config.
Thanks in advance
Tell that to Gigabyte.
No salavat23. Sorry but you can't make a good reader without reading the introduction.
I have the P6T and love it. 3.8 GHz using DDR3 1333 RAM. All I need to do is change these settings:
Ai Overclock Tuner: Manual
CPU Ratio: Auto
Intel Speed Step: Disable
Bclk: 190
DRAM: DDR3- 1523
DRAM: Bus 1.66
That's all that you need to do to get 3.8 GHz out of it. Works like a charm.
Agreed. While manufacturers not meeting the deadline is somewhat annoying, I'd really like to know which brand, and especially which motherboard model had the spectacular failure. I'm about to buy components for a Core i7 build, and knowing which one had issues would add some piece of mind to the decision.
Tom's guys, can you help us readers out on on this?
I'm curious what's the difference between their reviews and the ones here?
As for the reviews here you go..
http://www.motherboards.org/reviews/motherboards/1861_16.html
http://www.thinkcomputers.org/index.php?x=reviews&id=943&page=11
http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/1761/13/asrock_x58_supercomputer_motherboard/index.html
I guess my concern is who is right??
From my discussions with Thomas, it seemed that this board was solid until you started overclocking it, after which we had two different boards burn up. Thomas can clarify, though.
I would really love to know where the Intel board stacks up in this.