Asus Rampage Formula X48 Motherboard Review

Overclocking Results

With the exhaustive network of BIOS options for this Rampage Formula, it would be easy to get discouraged when it came to overclocking. The good news is that you can get into the overclocking without having to know what every option does. For instance, the plethora of memory options, can all be left to AUTO as the system makes rather intelligent selections. Leaving the Performance Level to AUTO also lets the system choose an appropriate level for the FSB/Strap/Memory Ratio that is chosen, albeit a little high that can usually be tightened up manually once you find what is working.

The other good news is that users familiar with previous ASUS X38, P35, or even P965 motherboards; should have a relatively easy time familiarizing themselves with the Rampage Formula BIOS. We have had extensive experience with all recent Intel chipset based ASUS motherboards and were able to dive right in and get things cooling in a hurry. That obviously won't be the case for everyone but for many it should. So without further adieu, let's get started with some of the results we were able to pull off. Since memory frequency is going to play a role in the other overclocks, we'll start there.

Maximum Memory Stability Overclocking

There are going to be many people who think this is absolutely amazing and they are partially correct, 636MHz or DDR2-1272 being 24/7 stable at 2.30v is very impressive. For this kit though, this was achieved on a lowly ASUS P5B-Dlx almost a year ago now. We were fully expecting the Rampage Formula to increase the maximum capable of this old but great kit, but it didn't. This obviously means that this memory is just limited to this frequency at this voltage, not fault of the Rampage Formula. It is clear, obviously, that the Rampage Formula is a formidable memory clocker. Based on our voltage measurements, which can be found near the end of this review in another section, the vDIMM being supplied to the memory is only 2.29v measured by a digital multi-meter (DMM). Everest reports vDIMM a little bit high for this motherboard.

The most amazing aspect of this overclock though isn't the memory, believe it or not. It is the fact that this motherboard is running this type of memory clock at 424MHz FSB with a tRD (Performance Level) of 5 with only 1.42v going to the north bridge. This is not something we have seen previously capable on any P35 or P965 motherboard. To put it mildly, this is an absolutely incredible overclock. Let's now see if the FSB clocking of this motherboard is going to impress us as much as what we just saw.

Maximum FSB Stability Overclocking

It appears that this motherboard just doesn't want to stop impressing us. Sure, in order to stabilize this ridiculous FSB we are running a tRD of 10, but the lofty FSB more than makes up for this based on the inflated Everest bandwidth numbers that we see. The caveat to showing a screenshot like this is that the motherboard isn't the real winner here, the CPU is. In the enthusiast circles, it is common knowledge that the motherboard rarely holds back FSB clocking and the CPU is usually the culprit.

Bearing that in mind, the Rampage Formula certainly seems to have a better tuned BIOS to let the CPU stretch its legs if it can. Our experience with the Maximus Extreme, based on the X38 chipset, was not a favorable one with the FSB limit of most 45nm CPUs reaching only 530MHz. Seeing 580MHz 100% stable with only air cooling is yet another impressive feat for this Rampage Formula. In order to run this high of a FSB, we were running the 333 Strap so that the 1:1 memory ratio was available and despite the high vNB, temps on the NB were well within useable range with just the 120mm fan blowing over the memory and heat sink.

Maximum Overall Stability Overclocking

The last piece of overclocking we are going to look at is the overall system overclock. This is basically what we would end up running with this hardware if it was going to be our 24/7 system. In fact, this setup just might replace the aging workstation that this review is being written on and if it does, these are the settings it will be run at. We decided on this overclock because it was very fast, very low voltage, and very cool running. It has absolutely no problem running without any fans on the memory or the chipset heat sink so in a case with very little airflow, this setup should have no problem crunching all day long.

We could have run it at tRD 6 (Performance Level 6) but chose to go with tRD 7 as it allowed us to lower the NB voltage about 0.05v. Pretty much every sample of the Rampage Formula that comes out of the ASUS factories should have no problem running these motherboard clocks as they are quite conservative in comparison to the clocks that this board was able to achieve in the previous screenshots. Our overall impression of the overclocking was very positive as the board responded as it should every step of the way. Again, our familiarity with the X38 chipset and ASUS motherboards of the past definitely helped but this motherboard didn't seem to come up with any new tricks we needed to learn in order to make it dance.