Latest Board Products (Asus - M3N-HT Deluxe Mempipe review)

One of the latest boards form Asus is the M3N-HT Deluxe, based around Nvidia's new nForce 780a SLI chipset which offers 3-Way SLI support for AMD processors, as well as bringing Nvidia's new HybridSLI technology to the table.

Nvidia's HybridSLI consists of two technologies - HybridPower and GeForce Boost - both of which are only available under Windows Vista. The power-saving HybridPower works by turning off the dedicated graphics card when you're not playing games and dynamically switching in the onboard GeForce 8 series graphics. GeForce Boost, meanwhile, allows the graphics core of a dedicated card and the core of the integrated graphics to be used in SLI mode.

So far, so good, but at present both technologies are limited to a couple of cards each. GeForce boost only works with GeForce 8400GS and 8500GT entry-level cards, while HybridPower is restricted to the high-end GeForce 9800GTX and 9800 GX2.

Asus's M3N-HT Deluxe/Mempipe supports both AM2 and AM2+ AMD processors. To get the best out of the board you really need to use a Phenom processor, as this allows you to get the full benefit of the HyperTransport 3.0 interface which is theoretically 10,400MBps (but current Phenoms work at the lower end of the HT 3.0 specifications, at 7,200MBps).

Four DIMM slots support 1066/800/667/533MHz DDR2 memory up to a total memory capacity of 8GB, although 1066MHz support is only supported by AM2+ CPUs.

Passive heatsinks are used throughout; both bridges and the MOSFETS, although Asus bundles a small fan in the box should your overclocking efforts start to cook the Northbridge. Also a pair of passive coolers are provided for two memory modules and these will even fit standard sized modules with their own heatsinks, although you might run into problems with the massive heatsink-equipped modules like Corsair's DHX series.

Three x16 PCI-E 2.0 slots are provided which allow 3-way SLI setups to be used, but they only work at full x16 speed in the standard dual card SLI setup. When three cards are used, one slot runs at full speed while the other two run at x8 speed.

For expansion purposes there are two PCI slots along with a single x1 PCI-E slot, which is about all you need as the board comes with integrated Gigabit Ethernet and eight-channel audio (ADI AS1988B chip) which also feeds the S/PDIF out port on the rear I/O panel. In any case, there just isn't enough room on the board for any more slots.

Six SATA 3GBps ports are edge-mounted at ninety degrees, making for tidy cable runs, and there is support for RAID 0, 1, 0+1, 5 and JBOD (Just a Bunch Of Disks) RAID arrays. A Marvell 6111 controller looks after the e-SATA port on the rear panel.

A really useful feature is what Asus calls Express Gate, a Linux utility with a five-second boot-up time allowing you to surf the 'net, use Skype and access webmail without booting into Windows.

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The 8800 GS will be based on the G92 core powering both the 8800 GT and GTS and is expected to run with 757MHz core, 1,438MHz shader, and 1,700MHz memory clock speeds. As well as being slower than the GT the GS also sacrifices 16 stream processors, leaving it with 96 of these and also meaning the card has a reduced number of texture units: 48 down from 56 and ROPs: 12 as opposed to 16. Further to this the card uses a 192-bit memory interface so we once again see unusual memory sizes; this time 384MB and 768MB GDDR3 options.
As with all of nVidia's current graphics chips, DirectX 10.1 support is still missing, but that is unlikely to be a problem for a fair while yet. Expreview, the site which managed to get the early scoop on the card, reckons that performance is about 25 per cent less than that of the 8800 GT, which falls in with the idea of it being a rival to the Radeon HD 3850 and available information also suggests that pricing should also fall into 3850 territory - how surprising (review by Hugo Jobling at http://www.trustedreviews.com)

Computex 2008: Sapphire develops 3D gaming graphics driver

Posted at: 8:37am 3rd June 2008 by Clive Webster in Taipei

New graphics driver to make games 3D, plus new Sapphire 3D screen to run them on.

New 3D gaming technology was on show at Computex, Taiwan today with Sapphire demonstrating two systems using it's new stereoscopic graphics driver and Sapphire-branded 3D monitors. The new driver 'polarise a stereoscopic image, which can be displayed on a two-layer LCD screen' said Bill Donnelly, Global PR Director for Sapphire Technology.

By using a special pair of polarised sunglasses, each eye can only see one of the two layers of the LCD, and when the brain combines the two images from both eyes, it makes the image on screen appear 3D. This is the same technique Nvidia uses for its Nvidia 3D Stereo driver to achieve the same effect.

Donnelly was keen to explain that the new driver is a Sapphire innovation, "ATI doesn't [have a stereoscopic driver]. We've done a proof of concept working with a different monitor manufacturer [than Zalman], using our own driver set to integrate with the ATI driver to deliver 3D not just in games but in the workstation market.'

Donnelly couldn't tell us which monitor manufacturer Sapphire had teamed up with, though the very fact that it was definitely not Zalman is interesting in itself - as Zalman has its 3D Trimon screen that we've seen working with Nvidia cards.

What we can say is that the results of the new driver are impressive, especially as Sapphire has had to write its own driver add-on to get it to work. Only a Ruby demo was playing, but the 3D technology certainly works.

Uncoincidentally, Sapphire was also showing off some Sapphire-branded dual-layer 3D monitors to show the new driver in action. Expect to see Sapphire screen and card bundles for gaming and workstation use soon, as while Donnelly pointed out that`"at this stage it [the stereoscopic driver] is a proof of concept" he also said that, "we're expecting to bring something to market in the next couple of months."