Asus X58 Sabertooth Review
Sabertooth Up Close
Published: 11th October 2010 | Source: Asus | Price: £155.90 |
Up Close With The Sabertooth
Straight away let's cut to the chase. This is gorgeous. The layout is excellent and we haven't seen as much care taken over the design of an Asus board since the Rampage III Extreme.
The CPU socket is nicely clear of obstructions whilst the power phases still have some beefy cooling.
The RAM slots are the really nice single-latch type and it's nice to see an alternate hue used. One that, as you can see from the ATX24 pin, matches perfectly. No expense spared it seems, as we've seen plenty of otherwise pretty boards be stopped from true greatness by a default colour power connector here and there.
In keeping with the surprising nature of the X58 Sabertooth, it's still packed with the latest hardware bells and whistles. We have SATA 6Gbp/s and USB3.0.
The rear panel contains everything you could expect. Whilst you might consider the single LAN a slight let down the reality is that few people need twin LAN ports and, especially when you look at the price, if Asus have saved a little bit in unimportant areas we prefer than to money spent just to have a big spec sheet.
In keeping with the colour-coded nature of the Sabertooth, the PCI slots are also in the same caramel colour as the rest of the board. It's nice to see the USB headers colour-coded too. If anything, and we're being really picky here, it would be great to see the COM header, fan headers and SATA sockets in the same colour. They've gone the extra mile and stopped just before finish line. Admittedly Asus have still gone further than most.
The southbridge heatsink is very cool. It wouldn't look out of place in a science fiction set, or on the back of a Leopard 2A6.
Finally before we move on, another couple of shots of the colour scheme and heatsinks. The choice of colours really keep nicely with the 'Military Components' theme, and hopefully now you've seen it a few times you can all appreciate the easy-on-the-eye nature of it when compared to the heavily saturated hues we more commonly see.
Most Recent Comments
You could do a wicked cammo computer using that. I was thinking about it the other week as it goes. There's this company in the USA that dips things in this weird cammo stuff and it coats it. They used it on American Chopper once to do a military chopper.
Now, Tom, I'll be waiting on that overclocking vid you promised to make...I'm going to need it. If I can unleash a bit more power you'll make me a happy man!
Nice reviews. Keep it up.
Mine has 65 in idle and is bloody hot when touching it.
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Originally Posted by Black
What is max safe temp on NB? Mine has 65 in idle and is bloody hot when touching it. |
One question, what is best QPI voltage when CPU set at 4 GHz
Is there any VTT voltage?
And should I leave PLL voltage at Auto?
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Originally Posted by Black
Well it is now, but BTW same temp I'm getting with OC and without - not so bad I recon.Under prime and superpi32M at 3.8 GHz I'm getting 80C and this is too much I beleive. One question, what is best QPI voltage when CPU set at 4 GHz Is there any VTT voltage? And should I leave PLL voltage at Auto? |
leave the pll at auto as it shouldnt matter.
If you are getting 80c what cooler/vcore are you using?
Whats you bclk and multi?
I notice when only prime running max I can get on NB temp is 72 C - idle still 65 C.
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Originally Posted by Black
I'm using watercooling for my CPU mate, BCLK 190, multi x20 and vcore 1.225v, RAM 1531 Mhz - 1.64V, QPI voltage 1.25v I notice when only prime running max I can get on NB temp is 72 C - idle still 65 C. |
qpi 1.45 (for 1600mhz)
turn on LLC
you should get 200 bclk with that and a few more tweaks.
Does anyone know if its ok to put a single HD 6870 in the lower PCI express x16 slot, so the regular PCI slot is free for my old soundcard? I think its the "secondary" x16 slot but if I'm thinking if only using one card, all 16 lanes should be available?
Thanks in advance
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Originally Posted by PINS
Hi, Does anyone know if its ok to put a single HD 6870 in the lower PCI express x16 slot, so the regular PCI slot is free for my old soundcard? I think its the "secondary" x16 slot but if I'm thinking if only using one card, all 16 lanes should be available? Thanks in advance |
- what a bad luck.BTW it is working fine into this slot.
Any way - is it all right that after OC I can't see or i can't set Turbo mode?It is visible only when stock clocks.
I am interested in getting this board but I have a question regarding PCIe x1 cards. If I went SLI, one of the PCIe x1 slots will be unusable. I intend to use two PCIe x1 cards (TV tuner and sound card). If I move one of the PCIe x1 cards into the third PCI x16 slot (the black one), it looks as though, according to the manual (p. 2-21), that the two PCIe 2.0 x16 slots won't be affected i.e. both lanes will still be operating at 16x.
I am wondering whether anyone would be good enough to confirm this?
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