Benchmarks
We ran a small array
of benchmarks that
demonstrated performance
of all aspects of the system
and allow easy comparisons in
future reviews. We performed
these on the industry standard
3600 MHz on an un-optimized
fresh install of Windows 7.
SuperPI 8m,
3DMark06,
Everest read:
Everest write:
Everest copy:
Everest latency:
3m 51.894
19973
Marks
SM2: 7706
SM3: 10023
CPU: 5123
10755 MBs
9264 MBs
12282 MBs
43.0
Recommended Award
ASUS CROSSHAIR 4 FORMULA
RRP: $209.99 | Website: http://www.asus.com/product.aspx?P_ID=kPGmtxee5RsQVsXG&templete=2
Test Machine
• Asus Crosshair IV Formula
• 5870 stock using
Catalyst10.2 driver
• Corsair GTX2 2250
• WD VelociRaptor 600GB
• AMD Phenom II X6 1090T
• Antec 1200 OC PSU
• Windows 7 32-Bit
F
or the longest time, The
Republic of Gamers line form
ASUS has been their flagship
series. Although it has “Gamers” in
the title, overclockers everywhere
have no doubt in their minds these
products should really be called
“The Republic of Overclockers”.
The features and build quality of
these boards are aimed at the
high end and offer all the features
overclockers would need to push
their systems past the design
limits. The newest member of the
gang is the Crosshair 4 and if the
last model - the Crosshair 3 - is to
be an indicator, we are in for a treat
in our upcoming testing. The main
difference between the CH3 and
10 The OverClocker October 2010
CH4 is that the latter is built around
the 890FX chipset and is ready for
the new AMD Phenom II X6 CPUs.
Analysis
The benchmark results on this
board looked very strong. Against
last generation’s CH3 board, we
could see the CH4 taking the lead
in 3DMark06 and SuperPI 8M, if
only by a small margin. This was
to be expected though, as the new
chipset was never going to mean
faster or better benchmark results.
It’s really meant for enabling
new options and support for
newer technologies, in this case,
full Phenom II X6 (Thuban) CPU
support. The Everest results were
also decided by small margins
initially. This changed when we
started to increase the RAM speed
on both platforms. When we got
around 2000 MHz on the CH3, it
crashed, yet the CH4 was happy
to keep going with seemingly no
end, right up to 2260 MHz. When
we improved our cooling, moving
onto single stage cascade at -50’C,
putting our proverbial foot down
a little we saw the CH4 shine. The
CH3 struggled to get past 4800
MHz but the CH4 powered the CPU
past 5000 MHz towards 5100MHz
using 1.55VCore.
Impressive results indeed, but
we were only comparing the CH4
against another ASUS board and
wondered what would happen
when we compared it against
the competition. Comparing Pi
32M running at 3600MHz against
the other top boards, we found
that the CH4 had a 25 seconds
advantage after the final loop.
A staggering result so much
so that and we had to rerun the
benchmarks across all three
platforms to ensure our results
were not skewed in anyway. If
you want to run 2D benchmarks
on the AMD platform, you would
be crazy to go with any other
board than this. On the other
hand, 3D benchmarks seemed
to be similar across all three
boards we had tested, with the
largest difference at around
1%. Great results all around,