Gaming and overclocking
The Sapphire AM2RD580's gaming performance can be directly compared to the Intel-powered ASUS COMMANDO's; both use the same graphics subsystem. The Foxconn NVIDIA board is equipped with GeForce 7900 GTX.
Once we dial up the resolution and add in a second, multi-GPU-forming graphics card, be it NVIDIA or ATI, the Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory performance is more than acceptable at 1920x1200 4xAA 8xAF. Indeed, looking at the ATI-based results, platform differences cease to make a meaningful performance contribution: the test becomes limited by the GPUs.
Overclocking
We feel it prudent to publish figures that most users will be able to achieve with elementary overclocking, rather than some sky-high, stable-for-a-second FSB that puts the board in a good light but is not achievable unless heavy-duty cooling is involved. Further, we deliberately apportion 30 minutes to the overclocking testing and report our final, stable figure. This, we, feel, is indicative of what an enthusiast might spend before frustration sets in.We managed to raise the Foxconn N570SM2AA's Front-Side Bus to 310MHz by using our conservative overclocking methodology. That represents an overclock that's dual Prime95 stable, albeit run for only 5 minutes at the maximum speed.
We encountered far greater problems in pushing the Sapphire AM2RD580 board to its limits. It would consistently fail to POST at above 235MHz FSB. We tried changing a number of performance-related parameters but to no avail. The sample board was disappointing in a number of respects, including overclocking potential.
