Test System & Memory Bandwidth

Core i5 Test System Specs
- Intel Core i5 750 (LGA1156)
- x2 Corsair CMG4GX3M2A2000C8 DDR3-1333 (CAS 8-8-8-24)
- Asrock P55 Extreme
- Asus P7P55D Deluxe
- DFI LanParty DK P55-T3eH9
- ECS P55H-A
- EVGA P55 FTW
- Gigabyte P55-UD6
- MSI P55-GD65
- OCZ GameXStream (700 watt)
- Seagate 500GB 7200-RPM (Serial ATA300)
- HIS Radeon HD 5850 (1GB)
Software
- Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate (64-bit)
- ATI Catalyst 9.10

The MaxxPI² memory bandwidth results were very close among the various P55 motherboards with a 4% margin separating the fastest and slowest boards in the write test. The Gigabyte P55-UD6 produced the best write result, while the DFI LanParty DK P55-T3eH9 was about 4% slower.

Looking at read performance the Asrock P55 Extreme was the slowest of the bunch, while the Gigabyte P55-UD6 was again the fastest by a 4% margin.

The next MaxxPI² test looks at CPU cache performance where the results were very much the same for all seven motherboards. The Turbo Mode appears to be just as efficient on the value boards as it is on the more expensive high-end boards.

EVEREST Ultimate Edition gives us a second opinion on memory bandwidth performance and the results are even tighter with no more than 200MB/s separating the fastest from the slowest motherboards in either the read or write tests.