P7P55D-E Premium vs. P7P55D-E Deluxe

[jhwf44]

These are two new Asus boards. They both feature USB 3.0 and SATA 6.0.

I'm trying to determine the difference between the two...

The only advantage I see of the Premium is that it has the "48 hybrid phase". Is this just better for overclocking? I thought the Premium would be better in all ways, but the Deluxe has eSATA and also an additional PCIe slot, but only the "24 hybrid phase".

What would you recommend? The premium is only $20 more on newegg

 

[Corsairs]

I've been looking at these two boards as well. Going by the info on ASUS's site, I came away with the same differences between the two boards as you did (I also note that the Deluxe has 2 additional mid-board USB ports). The 32+3 phase power of the Premium would theoretically make it a better overclocker than the 16+3 design of the Deluxe, but in practice I don't know what (if any) difference that would make. If it were me, I'd probably target the cheaper of the two boards.

 

[computer]

You can compare any of them here and adding each mobo to the "Compare" list. I was trying to figure out the same thing, and I came to the conclusion the E-Deluxe was the TOTL since it has more features. But then you mentioned the 48 phase power for the Premium and now I'm confused as ever.

I also found out that the SATA 3 (6gb) is a disappointing joke. That's far from ready. Various benchmarks are showing it's actually slower in many cases. The only benefit is enormous burst speeds in tests like HDTach that have that feature. PCMark showed it was slower in most tests. I guess that's good since I just bought another SATA2 HD.
-Clint
Happy New Year to all & God Bless

 

[nipplefish]

You can compare any of them here and adding each mobo to the "Compare" list. I was trying to figure out the same thing, and I came to the conclusion the E-Deluxe was the TOTL since it has more features. But then you mentioned the 48 phase power for the Premium and now I'm confused as ever.

I also found out that the SATA 3 (6gb) is a disappointing joke. That's far from ready. Various benchmarks are showing it's actually slower in many cases. The only benefit is enormous burst speeds in tests like HDTach that have that feature. PCMark showed it was slower in most tests. I guess that's good since I just bought another SATA2 HD.
-Clint
Happy New Year to all & God Bless

Are you sure you aren't referencing one of the older SATA3 solutions? Older boards had the SATA controller tied in through a single PCIe 1.0 lane, which wasn't enough bandwidth. The higher-end ASUS boards implement a PLX chip to solve this.

Engineers at ASUS came up with a better looking solution that involves the addition of a PEX PLX8613 PCIe bridge chip onto the motherboard. The bridge chip allows the Marvell 9123 to connect to the P55 Express chipset via a single PCIe 2.0 x1 lane for a maximum bandwidth of 500 MB/s. That is still not has high as the 600 MB/s limit of SATA 6G, but more than twice the performance of the other way of doing it, which was limited to just 250 MB/s. The PLX chip then connects directly to the Intel P55 chipset via x4 lanes of PCIe 1.0 that provide as much as a 1 GB/s of bandwidth, which is more than the Marvell 9123 controller can ever handle due to design limitations.

You aren't going to see any real performance benefits from SATA3 until there are drives that can actually utilize the bandwidth, i.e. SSDs.

 

[Jd007]

Yeah SATA3 has no effect on mechanical hard drives whatsoever, even the large capacity high density drives. Only SSDs, and more specifically SATA3 compatible SSDs can see an increase in performance, and last time I checked, there's only like 1 drive currently scheduled to release, and even this drive doesn't fully utilize the full bandwidth of SATA3, only slightly above the theoretical max of SATA2.

And between those two boards, the expansion slots layout is different. Look at which type of expansion slots you may use the most and pick the appropriate one (keeping into account the blockage that may occur when you install huge multi-slot video cards).

As for the difference in power phase, anything above 6 is plenty and anything above 10 I'd say is overkill and will see no real use difference at all. Motherboard companies engage in advertisement wars with these numbers to boast a "better" design but in reality they offer no performance/reliability gains (while adding to the total cost of the board).

 

[Makaveli]

You can compare any of them here and adding each mobo to the "Compare" list. I was trying to figure out the same thing, and I came to the conclusion the E-Deluxe was the TOTL since it has more features. But then you mentioned the 48 phase power for the Premium and now I'm confused as ever.

I also found out that the SATA 3 (6gb) is a disappointing joke. That's far from ready. Various benchmarks are showing it's actually slower in many cases. The only benefit is enormous burst speeds in tests like HDTach that have that feature. PCMark showed it was slower in most tests. I guess that's good since I just bought another SATA2 HD.
-Clint
Happy New Year to all & God Bless

I would have to agree with this all the benchmarks also agree. And they also show the ICH10R destroying the current SATA 3 implementations. I think there is a good reason intel is waiting until 2011 to release their first chipset with support for SATA 3 and USB 3.0!

 

[nipplefish]

I would have to agree with this all the benchmarks also agree. And they also show the ICH10R destroying the current SATA 3 implementations. I think there is a good reason intel is waiting until 2011 to release their first chipset with support for SATA 3 and USB 3.0!

The only benchmarks I've seen of SATA 2.0 "destroying" 3.0 have been the old implementations limited by the PCIe 1.0 lane. The actual drive used wouldn't have been any slower or faster given the same amount of bandwidth. I'll bet you that given a SATA 3.0 SSD vs. a 2.0 SSD (on a newer motherboard, like the new ASUS ones) the 3.0 would be the one doing the destroying.

Anyway, USB 3.0 has already shown major gains over 2.0. I bought my P7P55D-E Pro as much for the USB 3.0 as for the SATA.

 

[13Gigatons]

Sata 3.0 will do 600 megabytes when properly implemented. USB 3.0 is much slower then that.

 

[user12345]

Hi guys. I'm looking for new motherboard too and I was wondering if both, Deluxe and Premium version of this Asus motherboard has PLX chip to solve the problem of PCI-e speed, when USB 3.0 and SATA 3 are running. Can you answer me this? Much appreciate!

P.S.: sorry for my engrish.

 

[computer]

Are you sure you aren't referencing one of the older SATA3 solutions? Older boards had the SATA controller tied in through a single PCIe 1.0 lane, which wasn't enough bandwidth. The higher-end ASUS boards implement a PLX chip to solve this.

Not sure what you mean. I was comparing the P7P55D* line of boards the OP mentioned.
-Clint
Happy New Year to all & God Bless

 

[computer]

The only benchmarks I've seen of SATA 2.0 "destroying" 3.0 have been the old implementations limited by the PCIe 1.0 lane. The actual drive used wouldn't have been any slower or faster given the same amount of bandwidth. I'll bet you that given a SATA 3.0 SSD vs. a 2.0 SSD (on a newer motherboard, like the new ASUS ones) the 3.0 would be the one doing the destroying.

The review I read that I mentioned in earlier post tested one of the Asus P7P55D with true SATA3 and used the Seagate SATA3 HD. They were essentially even on all tests. On some SATA2 was a bit faster and on some SATA3 was a bit faster. The burst rates were much higher with SATA3 (in the 1000's) and that was the only benefit.

Anyway, USB 3.0 has already shown major gains over 2.0. I bought my P7P55D-E Pro as much for the USB 3.0 as for the SATA.

They also tested the USB 3 on the board. While not as fast as it could and should be, and even slower than I thought, (I thought that being 10 times faster on paper it may be 5 times faster in actual use), it's still about 4 times faster than USB 2. And 4x is huge improvement over USB 2 which is really slow for large files and backups. Now we have to wait for USB 3.0 enclosures and other hardware.
-Clint
Happy New Year to all & God Bless

 

[user12345]

Hi guys. I'm looking for new motherboard too and I was wondering if both, Deluxe and Premium version of this Asus motherboard has PLX chip to solve the problem of PCI-e speed, when USB 3.0 and SATA 3 are running. Can you answer me this? Much appreciate!

P.S.: sorry for my engrish.

Anyone? :$

 

[computer]

Did you go to the link I posted and compare them? Out of the entry level, Deluxe, and 2 Premium's, only the 2 Premium's say this:

Marvell® SATA 6Gb/s controller:
- 2 x SATA 6.0 Gb/s ports (gray)

Also, only the E-Premium says this:

Unique PCIe x4 Chip for Ultra Performance
- True USB 3.0 Support
- True SATA 6Gb/s Support

It would appear only the E-Premium has USB 3.0 according to Asus, and although like I said above both Premiums have that Marvell SATA3 controller, only the E-Premium says that immediately above.

But the Deluxe is the only one that states this:

- Supports EZ Backup and SuperSpeed functions
*Drive Xpert function is available only when the hard disk drives are set as data drives.

All manufacturer's websites are always screwed up. None of them even know what the hell they're selling. The only way to know for certain, is to look at reviews on them.
-Clint
Happy New Year to all & God Bless

 

[user12345]

:hmm:

 

[13Gigatons]

user12345:

Both boards feature the True speeds of USB 4.8Gb/s and Sata 6.0Gb/s. They are using NEC chip for USB 3.0 and Marvell chip for Sata 3.0 and they are sending it through a x4 PCI-express channel.

For those interested:
USB 3.0 = 320 megabytes per second.
Sata 3.0 = 600 megabytes per second.

Sata 3.0 will be required for next gen solid state hard drives or least give plenty of headroom.

 

[user12345]

13Gigatons, thanks a lot!