The Intel P55 motherboard

The Intel P55 reference motherboard

So for the reference test Intel also submitted a P55 motherboard. We'll conduct our 'reference' tests with it.

It would be really bad taste to not show it to you guys as, though a little limited, it surely is a good looking one. This is the Intel DP55KG motherboard. It's the most exquisite part out of four other P55 Intel models. Decent connectivity at the rear, 2x eSATA, eight USB ports, digital and analog audio (Intel HD audio 7.1) and a gigabit Ethernet controller which is actually embedded into the P55 chipset.

Here we look at Socket 1156 with the Core i7 870 processor inserted. Good design, proper placement of the 8-pin header.

We are back to dual-channel memory, as such we see 4 DDR3 DIMM slots, a maximum of 1600 MHz is allowed on this motherboard. We spot another eight SATA connectors, no floppy or PATA connector (!). And finally the Intel R&D crew got it right, proper vertical SATA ports that do not block your graphics card.

No extra USB headers or for that matter any other gadgetry, except a Bluetooth connector (?).

Overall a nicely designed motherboard, and the P55 chipset is plenty powerful. Anyway, these are reference motherboards only, in another article we'll cover P55 motherboards and chipset.