Wednesday, August 27th 2014
ASUS X99-Deluxe Leads Company's Mainline
ASUS will address the socket LGA2011-3 motherboard market with three of its brands, the gamer and overclocker-centric ROG (Republic of Gamers), the durable TUF (The Ultimate Force) brand, and its mainline brand, which features a balanced feature-set between the two. Its flagship motherboard will be the X99-Deluxe. Pictured below, this ATX motherboard is one of the most feature-rich ever built by ASUS. It draws power from 24-pin ATX and 8-pin EPS power connectors. The CPU is powered by an 8-phase VRM, and the memory by a 4-phase one. The socket is flanked by eight DDR4 DIMM slots. Expansion slots include four PCI-Express 3.0 x16, one PCI-Express 2.0 x16 (electrical x4), and an additional PCI-Express 2.0 x4.
Storage connectivity on the ASUS X99-Deluxe includes twelve SATA 6 Gb/s ports, one SATA-Express 10 Gb/s port, and a "standing" M.2 slot with PCI-Express 2.0 x4 physical layer. There are 14 USB 3.0 ports in all (ten on the rear panel, four by headers). Network connectivity includes two gigabit Ethernet interfaces (both driven by Intel-made controllers), 802.11 ac WLAN, and Bluetooth 4.0. The 8-channel onboard audio, dubbed Crystal Sound 2, features a high SNR DAC, audio-grade electrolytic capacitors, a headphones amp circuit, and ground-layer isolation.
Storage connectivity on the ASUS X99-Deluxe includes twelve SATA 6 Gb/s ports, one SATA-Express 10 Gb/s port, and a "standing" M.2 slot with PCI-Express 2.0 x4 physical layer. There are 14 USB 3.0 ports in all (ten on the rear panel, four by headers). Network connectivity includes two gigabit Ethernet interfaces (both driven by Intel-made controllers), 802.11 ac WLAN, and Bluetooth 4.0. The 8-channel onboard audio, dubbed Crystal Sound 2, features a high SNR DAC, audio-grade electrolytic capacitors, a headphones amp circuit, and ground-layer isolation.
39 Comments on ASUS X99-Deluxe Leads Company's Mainline
I'm curious to see if ASUS has dropped support for their ThunderboltEX II add-in card or if they omitted it from all boards without an Intel IGPU. Natural curiosity mind you since Apple's new Mac Pro is LGA2011 based and has no IGPU but still somehow was granted Thunderbolt / Thunderbolt II support. I know ASUS has changed the pin configuration or port connection for their "TB_Header". I think I see what looks like a "TB_Header" at the lower far right side but its impossible to tell from this photo.
BTW, for what its worth I majored in Electrical Engineering (EE). One of the classes I hated the most was Thermal Dynamics,.... well, that and Partial Differential Equations,......and anything to do with Chemistry,...... :)
Math, chem, physics, all no problem for me. Environmental Engineering kinda uses all of it, actually, so I should be good. Not worries about the school, but it does take up a significant portion of my time...and I still have physio to do, and 4 kids...It's my youngest's 7th birthday today. Just got back from shopping with him; we give our kids cash and then let them buy what they want, has done well with teaching the older ones about managing money and what things costs, etc... had a blast at the LEGO store. :D
I do have this board for review, very eager to jump in and see what's what. But...I haven't had the time as of yet. This weekend, however....;)
BTW, when I was in college or at least when I started I didn't have any kids but at the end there I did for the last semester or so. However, I was in the US military / reserves and that did eat up some time. My military occupational specialty was 12B / Combat Engineer. That's construction / demolition of roads / bridges and landmine warfare. After school was paid for I was out :)
Many people rack up a lot of debt going to school I'm glad I didn't.
This deluxe board costs about $450
A number of people liked to point out that there were cheaper X79 / LGA2011 boards but from what I recall there were no such cheaper options during the earlier release stage. Cheaper boards came later and were derivative.
So ~$400 for the Core i7 5820K and ~$450 for the ASUS X99 Deluxe is looking like ~$850 not including DDR4 RAM. I guess I can swing that but less would be nice,.... :)
If I can save ~$100 or more on the CPU and even ~$50 to ~$100 on the motherboard too I would be happy with that.
The ASUS X99 Deluxe is listed for about ~$399 on Amazon. The Core i7 5820K is ~$300 plus ~$25 tax. Not too bad at all,....
Hardware-side talking...
About the Dual NICS, I can live with just one.
The reason why I asked is because Im planning on upgrading from a Q9450 Kentsfield so I really want to make sure I grab the best possible components for the next 3-4 years.