Thoughts
ASUS has waved its deluxe wand over a socket-939 motherboard with encouraging results. Deluxe means a horde of useful goodies. ASUS obliges with Gigabit Ethernet, 54g Wireless, FireWire400, on-chip and discrete SATA and decent sound. Packaging and presentation is usual ASUS, that is, first class. We were also pleased to report that the board ran flawlessly with the strictest memory timings. Performance, as our graphs have shown, was excellent, so much so that S940 is firmly relegated into third place, behind our test Model 3800+ and the S939 FX-53.The contentious issue of S939 motherboard overclocking reared its head here. We found it difficult to run past 220MHz, suggesting that VIA's proclaimed AGP/PCI lock isn't quite as secure as NVIDIA's nForce3 250. We'd also like a touch more voltage for system RAM.
Paired with low-latency memory and a high-end graphics card, ASUS' A8V Deluxe provides excellent performance right across the board. If you've set your heart on a power system and want the absolute best, ASUS' £90 A8V Deluxe Wireless Edition is a good a starting point as any. Recommended if S939 is right for you.
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