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Summary

This is a quick, summary review.  If you want more information and a more detailed review of this product, check our full review of the Asus P5GD2 Premium.

Up until now at PC Perspective, we have only looked at Intel 925X/XE chipsets. While those chipsets offered some great results for the enthusiast, not everyone was going to buy one mainly because of the price. Today we are looking at an Intel 915P motherboard by Asus. The Intel 915P offers essentially the same features as the 925X but priced lower and supports DDR1 in addition to DDR2.

The Asus P5GD2 Premium is a DDR2-only board and has very large list of features - one that is most impressive for any motherboard I have reviewed. As the "Premium" moniker would imply, this motherboard package spared no expense.

Asus P5GD2 Premium RAID Options
ITE 8212F (IDE)	RAID 0, 1, 0+1
SiL3114C (SATA)	RAID 0, 1, 10, 5
Intel Matrix RAID / ICH6R (SATA)	RAID 0, 1, matrixed

There are two Marvell Gigabit LAN controllers and Asus wireless 802.11g all built onto the motherboard. There are a total of 8 Serial ATA connections on this motherboard, and 3 IDE connections allowing for a total of 14 drives! Not only has Asus ensured you can support a large number of newer SATA and older IDE drives, they also gave independent RAID functionality to it all - three RAID controllers total!

The SATA Extender for easy hot-swapping.

There is support for Intel's High Definition Audio specification which is a great step up from the old AC'97 codec, 8 USB devices, and 3 Firewire ports (one IEEE1394a, and two IEEE1394b) . As if this isn't enough, Asus also has a SATA port extension that you can mount onto the rear of your chassis. This allows you to hot-swap one or two SATA drives, without having to open up the case. 

Performance

Final Words

The Asus P5GD2 Premium is masterful product - it has everything you'd want and expect when upgrading to new technology standards like PCI Express and DDR2. The huge amounts of features is what will attract people to the Asus P5GD2 Premium compared to the competition - huge drive support, 3 different network connections, great audio, and more!

With performance, the Asus P5GD2 Premium is typically the top of the bunch thanks to DDR2 memory bandwidth and a fast CPU. However the performance was not drastic or dramatic compared to the DDR version of the 915P which came very close in majority of non-gaming benchmarks.

In terms of enthusiast support, the Asus P5GD2 has all the essentials you need from voltages to frequency adjustments. A testament to the company's ability, the P5GD2 sports a copper MOSFET cooler, a heat-spreading PCB, and was able to overclock to 250MHz with surprising ease on stock air cooling.

I did experience some problems with the Intel SATA controller failing to boot the computer at times. Increasing the chipset voltage to 1.6V seemed to improve stability during boot, but I'm not sure if this is a good long-term solution.

All in all, the Asus P5GD2 Premium is a product to be reckoned with - "Premium" isn't even a word I would use to describe it! It has everything anyone would ever want and more. It's clear that Asus intends this board for those who want it all with the latest technology. It overclocks easily and comes backed with an industry leading 3-year warranty!

For a more detailed examination of this motherboard, please read the detailed review!

Strong points:	Other Considerations:
Massive drive support (14 in total) Three RAID controllers 2x Gigabit LAN (PCIe and PCI bus) 802.11g wireless IEEE1394b support Intel HD Audio support Overclocks very well (250MHz on stock) Cooling additions - Mosfet and coolstack Software fan control, LAN cable tester, and dynamic overclocking (Ai NOS) Huge amounts of accessories 3 year warranty	SATA gave us problems at times. Expensive package if you aren't going to use all the features. Asus' BIOS overclocks 2MHz automatically.

Feel free to use our PriceGrabber service to find great deals on this motherboard!

 

Click here for the Detailed Review