Thoughts
EPoX, with its EP-5LWA+ i925XE motherboard, has done things a little differently that most other tier-1 manufacturers. Whereas they're happy to load on every conceivable feature known to man and bundle in everything but the kitchen sink, EPoX has been more conservative. The end result is a motherboard that's comparatively light on features, but, crucially, comes in at £30 or so cheaper than the competition. £120 or so buys you a capable Alderwood board that's laid out well, has decent overclocking options and utter stability.The most important decision a potential i925XE purchaser needs to make is whether they really need third-party SATA/PATA RAID and wireless networking integrated into a motherboard. If you do, look elsewhere, as there are a number of current examples that fulfill that criteria. If, on the other hand, you're happy with a decent feature set that includes dual PCI-Express GbE LAN, good sound, and decent tweaking options, you could and should save yourself £30 and consider EPoX's implementation.
The EP-5LWA+ continues EPoX's theme of producing solid, enthusiast-friendly motherboards that offer excellent layout and which strike a decent balance between cost and features.
HEXUS Right2Reply
Andrew Cotterill. UK Territory Business Manager, for EPoX, had this to say about the review:
Dear Tarinder & David,
Thankyou very much for a great review of what we see as a great board here at EPoX in terms of Design, Stability, Performance and of course as is indicated by the review – Value!
When I sold the first batch of this product to one of my UK customers he was truly and I would state duly amazed at the low cost point considering the target audience. We have noted for due consideration the comments with regard to SATA cables, BIOS setting profile saves and O/S based overclocking utilities and would state that with the latter of those it is really a case of watch this space!
I think that you and your readers will agree that the mainboard exudes quality in terms of build and BIOS implementation which is an area that other tier 2 manufacturers do lack in quite heavily, and hence being able to buy such a product at c. £120 including VAT in the UK really does begin to show that we are hopefully getting it just right for the customer.
Your points in relation to voltages are noted but we would add that DDR2 isn’t generally over-receptive to voltage augmentation like the Winbond TSOP’s on PC3200 for which we have a range of NVidia chipset A64 mainboards that will go upwards of 3 volts and do memory clocks in excess of 300Mhz. DDR2 does fast if it can at stock volts, and tends to just crash when you raise volts too much due to the difference in strobe signaling to that of conventional DDR. It also has less ability for other tweaks in terms of slew manipulation of the crossed sine frequencies – perhaps a mouthful, but a limitation of a complex technology.
