EVGA X58 Classified - Trophy Board
by Rajinder Gill on May 8, 2009 3:30 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
Our retail board arrived last week and now we aim to tie up the loose ends we left in our first look using the engineering sample (ES) board. The loose ends revolve around cooling, additional heavy OC stuff (for the intended audience), and functionality.
Not many people can afford a $449 motherboard. In fact, we seriously doubt anyone in his or her right mind would pay that much for a motherboard not installed in a server responsible for a company's business. However, there are the few, the proud, the extreme benchmarking crowd who swoon over products like this one.
We have spent a lot of time with this board. Probably too much time, once we looked over the logbook and thought back to the first day our early engineering sample board arrived in the labs. We were there during the development phase and stuck with it all the way through to its release. We never regretted the journey and sound like sentimental fools at this point, but it's not too often a product like this comes along in our business.
It is an interesting product and one we cannot put down long enough to write a ten thousand-word diatribe for it. This board is a beast; it makes no apologies for its cost, its purpose, or in your face configuration. It only asks that you have enough knowledge about overclocking to get the most out of it. That really is the crux of this board as it is all about overclocking.
For those not interested in extreme overclocking or wanting a trophy board in their pimped out case, there are much better values in the land of X58. Keep this in mind as our follow up today concentrates on overclocking and not general performance. The board performs just as well as any other X58 motherboard when it comes to running Excel or transcoding the latest movie. In 3D gaming, it is a couple of percent slower than the boards without the NF200, but that penalty is never noticeable without a benchmark.
If this is a deal breaker for you and you would like to play with the Classified design sans NF200, you will be pleased to know this option is now available on a non-NF200 model (E760) that comes in at a slightly lower price of $399. We cannot address the performance loss or overclocking ability of A vs. B at this point, as our non-NF200 Classified board has not arrived. However, we will hedge our bets that performance figures in most standard hardware configurations will be the same as what we have already experienced, with the NF200 GPU intensive stuff 1-2% behind the non-NF200. We think one advantage the NF200 board might have is in extreme overclocking as the load on the X58 is reduced, but more on that later.
For now, let's look at what the NF200 Classified can do in full retail form when teamed up with the right components and is properly tuned.
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takumsawsherman - Tuesday, May 12, 2009 - link
Which video cameras have a better interface than firewire? Which audio recording devices? Even removable hard drives benefit from the extremely sturdy Firewire 800 connector. eSATA shows it was designed as an afterthought. As to why bother, they obviously bothered with Firewire 400, but couldn't spend the extra $5 to give the board everything. The same reasoning seems to be why there is no PS/2 mouse port.Of course, you are coming from a perspective of someone who doesn't know people who dabble in audio or video unless they own a mac. But there are plenty of audio people who use a PC. Why should they get the short end of the stick if they buy a $450 motherboard when the lowliest Mac buyer does not?
Rajinder Gill - Sunday, May 10, 2009 - link
The fact remains that most people game and overclock are not intrested in Firewire. If there were a demand for such things on boards like these it would already have been 'upgraded'. Fact is most people who are serious about music editing/development will prbably not be spending $400 on a overclocking or sub-zero cooling oriented motherboard - they'd excercise far better intelligence by looking at a dedicated solution.takumsawsherman - Sunday, May 10, 2009 - link
Well, this board has firewire. It just has the cheap version. Again, considering the difference in cost (minimal) and considering the huge price of this board, why cheap out when it comes to peripherals?In my opinion, this board is useless whether or not it as FW800. I just find it disturbing that some are willing to accept paying a premium and getting a product that doesn't even upgrade to the port that's been around for 5 years and is found on $600 computers aimed at Grandma. It's shameful and cheap.
Rajinder Gill - Sunday, May 10, 2009 - link
The people that would buy this board care about sub-zero and i7 over 5GHz the way you do about Firewire..lolRajinder Gill - Friday, May 8, 2009 - link
hi,We're in the process of intorducing someone new to that segment of reviews. The frequency of articles has been a bit lop-sided at times simply becasue we've been spread a little thin. The high-end perf stuff is my end of things so you've see stuff going up a little more frequenctly as a result (there's less of this stuff in general making it a little easier). Hopefully we should be up to speed on the more everyday stuff soon. I know Gary's working on another round-up, so please beare with us.
regards
Raja
Busboy2 - Friday, May 8, 2009 - link
I think you should see how far you can push an i7 965 on liquid nitrogen.... I really want to see those results... I figure if someone is spending this much on a board they are going to get the best processor.bupkus - Friday, May 8, 2009 - link
Will newegg carry it? I want to enter an automated notification for when the price reaches $79. ;)hemipowered - Friday, May 8, 2009 - link
If you are talking about the classified, It is already there bought mine like a month ago.Elenseel - Friday, May 8, 2009 - link
You might have to wait a while for this one...hemipowered - Friday, May 8, 2009 - link
I bought a Silver Stone ST850 power supply, It worked very well with my X58 Classified