Hardware MSI P55 GD65 Review

but none of them make that as their major selling point.

anyway, yes, my point does seem stupid, now that i've posted out "loud"

bindi seems to be handing out BIOS'

 

Richard,

You wrote in "First Look: MSI P55 GD65":

This time you didn't mention that at all. Is this still true? I noticed you wrote

Board Features
- Two Gigabit Ethernet controllers: Realtek 8112L and 8110SC

That's different from the manual (it says dual RTL8111DL). RTL8110SC is a "PCI" Gb LAN controller (that's a big chip, but I don't see it in the picture you posted) and if this is true, there should be no limitations you mentioned in the First Look.

BTW the ASUS board uses 8112L+8110SC to avoid exactly the same limitation.

 

Welcome!

No, I was wrongly informed (at the time) the P55 chipset had only four-six PCI-E lanes not eight. It, like every board that's setup the same, won't have to switch.

 

Yes, P55 has 8 PCI Express 2.0 lanes (but the bandwidth is the same as PCI Express 1.x!). The MSI board uses

- PCI Express x1 slot
- PCI Express x1 slot
- PCI Express x4 slot
- RTL8111DL Gb LAN PCI Express controller
- RTL8111DL Gb LAN PCI Express controller
- JMB363 2xSATA+1xPATA PCI Express controller
- Total: 9 PCI Express lanes

This is simply impossible! I suspect that if you use the PCI Express x4 slot, then one of the two PCI Express x1 slots will be unusable. (Can you experiment that? Insert a graphics card to the PCI Express x4 slot and a TV tuner or a sound card to a PCI Express x1 slot should be enough.)

Or it could be that the MSI board actually uses

- RTL8112L Gb LAN PCI Express controller
- RTL8110SC Gb LAN "PCI" Express controller

instead of 2 x RTL8111DL PCI Express controller and circumvents the issue. RTL8110SC is as big as the VIA IEEE 1394 controller chip and you would see it immediately with your naked eyes. Here is a picture from your P7P55D Deluxe review:

http://images.bit-tech.net/content_images/2009/09/asus-p7p55d-deluxe/2.jpg

Which is true??

BTW ASUS chose the latter route and GIGABYTE the former.

 

Oops,

- RTL8110SC Gb LAN "PCI" Express controller

should be corrected to:

- RTL8110SC Gb LAN "PCI" controller

 

It looks like I found the answer. From the GD80 manual:

Basically GD65 is a stripped down version of GD80 and this should also apply to GD65. Not important for most users, but should be noted.

 

I totally loved those V check points !

I hope every manufacture includes that on every MB of this calibre.

 

I upgraded from the 1.3 bios to 1.4 beta 4, now i can use EIST and Turbo boost without the computer crashing and i got much better memory banwidth! Only problem is the phase control, all the leds are lit all the time, anyone else noticed this?
bios 1.4b4: http://support.msicomputer.co.uk/index.php?_m=downloads&_a=viewdownload&downloaditemid=28&nav=0,1

 

How do you change the CPU fan speed with this board? I have my Titan Fenrir running at 2200rpm so it isnt the quiest thing in the world and i would like to lower it what speed do you recommend? I'm still using the 1.2v bios dont see a need to update it....