ASUS P4S800D-E Deluxe
First, as always, the feature table.| ASUS P4S800D-E Deluxe | |
| CPU Support | All Socket 478 processors including Prescott P4, Northwood P4 and all Celeron variants |
| Northbridge |  SiS655TX |
| Memory Support | 4 slots, DDR400, 4GB max, dual-channel |
| AGP | 8X |
| Southbridge | SiS964 |
| Audio | Analog Devices SoundMax AD1988 from SiS964 feed |
| Audio Connectivity | 3 port backplane speaker, S/PDIF coax I/O on backplane |
| PCI | 5 x 32-bit 33MHz PCI 2.1 slots |
| IDE | 2 ATA133 compliant ports from SiS964, 1 port from SiS180 |
| IDE RAID | RAID 0, RAID 1, DAID 0+1, JBOD from SiS180 |
| SATA | 2 ports from SiS964, 2 ports from SiS180 |
| SATA RAID | 2 drive, RAID 0, RAID 1, DAID 0+1, JBOD from SiS980 |
| Networking | Marvell Yukon™ 88E8001 32-Bit Gigabit Ethernet Controller, ASUS WiFi 802.11b slot |
| USB | SiS964, 4 x backplane USB2.0, 2 x I/O USB2.0 |
| FireWire | 1 x backplane port, 1 x I/O port (both 6-pin powered) from VIA VT6307 |
| Other I/O | PS/2, Parallel, 1 x Serial |
ASUS have done the sensible thing and augmented SiS's own SiS180 SATA and PATA controller, featuring RAID functions, onto the P4S800D-E Deluxe, giving the board what it's missing versus an ICH5/R equipped Canterwood or Springdale. It brings the board in line with ASUS's own Canterwood and Springdale products, especially with the inclusion of the Yukon Gigabit networking ASIC from Marvell.
Audio functionality gets exposed via Analog Devices' brand new (launched in December 2003) AD1988 SoundMAX AC'97 2.3 CODEC part, fed by the SiS964. It's a six-channel CODEC with 96kHz sample rate and 20-bit resolution when converting from digital to analogue (only 16-bit in the other direction, sample resolution on the line and mic inputs are limited in that regard), a competent on-board solution in this day and age. It's no eight-channel 192kHz, 24-bit Envy24, but it's no poor part either. Sound quality was subjectively good, on a par with the AD1980 I favour on my current ASUS K8V board, over a few basic listening tests.
With 5 PCI slots, 6 USB 2.0 and 2 powered FireWire400 ports, added to the 4 SATA ports and support for up to 6 PATA disk or optical devices, your peripheral, disk and onboard PCI expansion options are all numerous. The P4S800D-E seems to be about flexibility. The SiS180, flexible memory controller on the 655TX bridge and FireWire400 ports see to that.
So despite possible budget intimations with the choice of chipset, ASUS have seen to it that the P4S800D-E Deluxe doesn't feel like anything budget at all. The WiFi slot, present on all recent ASUS motherboards, gives you WiFi capabilities too, despite the actual card and aerial being missing from the bundle package. It's a purchase option, should you wish to dip your toes in that particular water.
There's not much I'd add to the P4S800D-E, should I be the one responsible for its design or feature set. I'd possibly be looking to use AD1980 and add optical S/PDIF output but the basic feature set is very solid.
So a nice base and good extra features. Here's a shot of the backplane port cluster before a look at the bundle, presentation and manual.
