Intel D975XBX: Intel brings their Bad-Axe to Market

Final Words

The Intel D975XBX is an interesting solution for the Intel Enthusiast at this time. The performance of the board was average or below in all testing phases while stability was superb. In fact, unless we were overclocking the board past its obvious limits, we never experienced any stability issues. Unlike other boards reviewed recently, we did not find any test issues with our peripheral inventory. The Intel D975XBX exemplifies Intel's trend of offering very stable and secure board solutions with excellent documentation and support.

With that said, let's move on to our performance opinions regarding this board.

In the video area, the inclusion of two physical PCI Express x16 slots that fully supports x8 bandwidth operation for dual graphics cards is a valuable feature for the workstation user or enthusiast. The board fully supports ATI CrossFire mode in our internal testing. We are waiting on a X1900XT MasterCard to arrive for further CrossFire testing, but we did not discover any issues with the X850XT CrossFire solution and 6.1 driver set.

In the on-board audio area, this board offers the Sigmatel STAC9221D High Definition audio codec. The excellent Intel Audio Studio software suite provides Jack-Sensing, S/PDIF Out support, interrupt capability, and Dolby Master Studio support among other options. The audio output of this codec in the music, video, and DVD areas is very good to excellent. The audio quality in gaming was acceptable, but the performance was mediocre considering the lack of EAX compatibility. If you plan on utilizing this board for gaming, then our only recommendation is to purchase an appropriate sound card. Further information about the Sigmatel family of HD audio codecs can be found here.

In the storage area, the Intel board offers a wide variety of storage options with additional SATA RAID ports. The board fully offers Intel's excellent Matrix RAID system and offers Hot Swap, NCQ, and 3Gb/s capability. Intel supplements their native SATA capability with the Silicon Image SiI 3114 SATA chipset featuring support for Hot Swap and 1.5Gb/s operation. The SiI 3114 resides on the PCI bus and Intel's implementation is for RAID 0, 1, and 0+1 operation only. The board offers the standard eight Intel USB ports and two IEEE 1394a ports utilizing the TI TSB43AB23 chipset. However, we believe that Firewire 800 should have been offered on this board, since it was included on the D955XBK.

In the performance area, the Intel D975XBX generated scores that were lower than the other boards in most benchmarks. The overall performance of the board was disappointing at times, but was within range of the other 975x offerings. The stability of the board was superb during testing and the results in certain game benchmarks offer hope for improvement in the future. We will review the performance of this board again when our retail version arrives and then update our findings.

The Intel D975XBX is a board designed and marketed for the Intel Enthusiast, yet it excels at being a full-featured home office or occasional workstation solution. Intel had a golden opportunity to take a very solid design and improve upon it for their targeted enthusiast market. Our expectations of the board were set by the design and performance of the Intel D955XBK.

Intel took a few steps forward with the board and yet at the same time, it took a few steps back. Intel did rectify the D955XBK cooling issues around the MOFSETS and increased the stability of the board with the 5-phase power regulation system. The inclusion of true x8 operability for the primary and secondary PCI Express connectors along with full ATI CrossFire support addressed the lack of performance for multiple GPU solutions. The improved BIOS options and increased voltages are a step in the right direction and shows that Intel is trying to match other suppliers in their ability to increase performance.

However, we feel that Intel made the following errors in the design and execution of a board targeted to the "advanced gamer and power-user". The entire process of setting up the BIOS in the advanced section for overclocking should be simplified. If Intel is serious about targeting the enthusiast user, then the question and answer section in the BIOS needs to be dropped. The process for overclocking the system via FSB adjustments needs to change from a fixed percentage rate to the ability to enter a FSB value. The voltage, memory frequencies, and bus options need to be further expanded. The BIOS needs to be able to self-recover when the board is unable to boot at extended settings. The current shutdown/jumper/startup process ensures frustration on the user's behalf. The bottom line is: if you are going to allow overclocking, then make it as user-friendly as possible.

The inclusion of the SiI 3114 RAID chipset is an error when the excellent SiI 3132 is available at this time. The SiI 3132 is a PCI Express device unlike the SiI 3114 and offers NCQ, Port Multiplier, and 3Gb/s support. The removal of FireWire 800 support that was offered on the D955XBK board is also an error.

We certainly look forward to Intel's next enthusiast board as they definitely are on the right path. Our expectations were quite high for this board, but it has left us with heartache, as it could have been much more.