The Albatron PX915P-AGPe is an excellent budget solution featuring the unique ability to support both PCIe and AGP graphics cards on the same motherboard. Many users have run into problems when upgrading to a PCI Express system due to its lack of backwards compatibility. While Albatron has cured this problem to a certain degree, their AGPe method is not flawless by any stretch of the imagination. Unfortunately, due to the much poorer performance of AGPe (opposed to conventional AGP 8x) it is a temporary fix at best.The AGPe port is probably fine for much slower AGP graphics cards such as the Radeon 9250. However, for one thing these low-end graphics cards, such as the Radeon 9250, are not ideal for gaming. Furthermore if you were in possession of such a graphics card, parting with it for a newer much faster PCI Express part would not be an issue. Bottom-line is the PX915P-AGPe offers a flexible upgrade path that will allow users to stick with their AGP graphics card until they are ready to make the transition to PCIe.
Although the PX915P-AGPe feature list is quite long, the features themselves are not all state-of-the-art. The audio solution lacks digital audio ports on the I/O panel, the Gigabit LAN controller does not make use of the PCIe bus and the ATA133 RAID controller was also limited to the PCI bus. This could become a problem when using the AGPe port as the graphics card will have to share the 133MB/s PCI bus with a few hard drives in RAID. However, given the ultra low price tag of just $125 US, the PX915P-AGPe is an excellent value motherboard despite the few minor drawbacks.
Those that wish to make the transition to the Intel LGA775 platform and wish to keep their current AGP graphics card, will find the PX915P-AGPe very valuable. However, this is only going to be a useful feature if a PCI Express graphics card is in the making, as it will allow this upgrade to be made without replacing the motherboard again! On the other hand, if you look like keeping your current AGP graphics card for the long haul, I recommend sticking with a real AGP motherboard. Though, if you are in the market for a new graphics card and motherboard, sticking with PCI Express only hardware is the smartest move.
| If you are shopping for the latter, the Albatron PX915P-AGPe is probably not the motherboard for you. Of course if you're not, then it is the only solution that will allow for an easy and cheap transition from AGP to PCIe. Albatron obviously has the user in mind that regularly upgrades and has provided them with a viable upgrade path. Overall, I have found the PX915P-AGPe to be a very impressive product that deserves a lot of recognition for its innovative design. Therefore, I have decided to award the Albatron PX915P-AGPe with the Legion Hardware ?Innovative Hardware?award. |
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Reviewed By Steven Walton
Albatron K8X890 Pro II K8T890 Motherboard Review Launched (2005-02-19)