Today Pier-Luc takes a gander at the Asus Rampage II Gene X58 mATX motherboard.

This is a great looking board I'd love to have one myself Here is the review:

http://www.neoseeker.com/Articles/Hardware/Reviews/asus_rampage_ii_gene/

Nice Review.

I am considering building my Sis a uATX gaming computer using the Antec NSK-3480 case and I've considered this board.

I don't think she needs core i7 though, does anyone know if ASUS plans on a socket 775 or AMD AM3 version of this board?

Also, can you talk a little about the sound quality? This was the only uATX I saw that didn't have RealTek sound, I wonder how it stands up against Creative X-Fi.

quote milkman_00

Nice Review.

I am considering building my Sis a uATX gaming computer using the Antec NSK-3480 case and I've considered this board.

I don't think she needs core i7 though, does anyone know if ASUS plans on a socket 775 or AMD AM3 version of this board?

Also, can you talk a little about the sound quality? This was the only uATX I saw that didn't have RealTek sound, I wonder how it stands up against Creative X-Fi.

First of all, thanks!

I'm sure they have a mATX in the works for AM3, but whether it will be part of the RoG series, I do not know. I don't expect anything new on the 775 platform, especially in the higher end.

I would love to comment about sound quality, but my speakers aren't too good and I'm not anything near an audiophile. I can tell you it sounded good to me, but then again, I always thought integrated sound was good enough

Well actually it seems they are releasing a 775 version, called the Maximus II GENE.

No word on an AM3 version though, and I was wanting to get her a X3 720 too

ETA: I hope you review the Maximus II GENE as well, most reviews of the Rampage II GENE say the northbridge gets very hot and in a uATX case there's not much room for cooling so I hope a 775/AM3 wouldn't have this problem. Also, it'd hopefully be $50 cheaper.

I just reread your review and noticed the board doesn't have a PS/2 mouse port...lol that's a nice start for finally removing these legacy ports...I always wondered why a uATX board in 2009 would make room for VGA, PS/2, Floppy, and IDE ports. I'd love it if they took that space and replaced it with something useful, like a wireless G chip.



This message was edited by milkman_00 on May 01 2009.

This message was edited by milkman_00 on May 01 2009.

I have a Rampage 2 Gene running the I7 920, 9GB DDR3, and a GTX 260 graphics card. The ASUS Essentio available at Best Buy. I had a huge overheating issue on the North Bridge, around 70 to 80 Celsius. South Bridge was not much better. Asus utility was poping up warnings and the like. So I cracked the case and saw the North Bridge and South Bridge had a heat sinks on them that looked like the 90's. No heat pipes? No fans? No...... nothing? Just a BS aluminum fins? Well there's the problem. Picked up a 120mm, 100 CFM intake fan, and a Spin-Q CPU fan and that fixed it. The spin-Q blows exhaust onto the North Bridge and cut off about 30 Celsius. 68F drop is OK in my book. SB is about 10 Celsius cooler... Least I won't get kicked out mid-game anymore. If I have anymore problems I will switch out the MB for a P6T or something similar.

Glad to see you were able to fix this, the board does need some air flowing over the heatsinks