Asus P5W64 WS Pro 975X Express Workstation Motherboard Review

With enterprise class hardware like the Asus P5W64 WS Pro motherboard, we get no less than four PCI Express x16 slots for videocards! The capability to support four PCI Express x16 videocards means this system can support up to eight monitors! That is a serious amount of desktop space! Based on the venerable Intel 975X Express chipset, the P5W64 WS Professional is ASUS' most current stab at a workstation motherboard. The multitude of PCI Express x16 slots is possible thanks to an IDT 89HA0324 PCI Express switch. The four PCI Express slots are configured in x16, x0, x4, x0 mode when one videocard is installed. When two graphics cards are installed, say for ATI Crossfire, the four PCI Express slots are split up in x8, x8, x4, x8 mode. Thus each Crossfire videocard would receive 8 lanes of PCI Express.