The ASUS P6T-SE is a nice motherboard. It might not feel as special, or be packaged quite as well as the higher end ASUS offerings but when you’re making such a saving over the other comparable X58 boards it’s acceptable.

The real question is whether it’s got anything over and above Intel’s own P55 type chipset. Yes it’s raw specs are better - it carries triple channel memory controllers vs dual channel and it has dual 16x PCI-E 2.0 slots vs the P55’s dual 8x PCI-E 2.0 slots - but is this enough?

Investing in a board like this will come to around £400 after both triple channel memory and a compatible chip is bought. The price of a top end P55 like the Maximus III Gene along with ram and a cpu will be much the same...


The ASUS P6T-SE X58 motherboard.

Ultimately the choice is up to you. If you find that you do a lot of encoding and raw data crunching then the power of the X58 and i7 combo is very impressive. However, if all you intend to do is game or use the pc as a general workhorse then something like the P55 and i5/i7 combo is probably the better choice. It has better power saving credentials, some newer technical features and will probably clock more aggressively than a P6T-SE + i7 920 combo as well.

Pros:

+ One of the most cost effective X58 motherboards
+ Good layout
+ Fanless cooling solution is effective and obviously silent
+ Software bundle includes some useful programs
+ X58 chipset is very powerful
+ Good gaming and desktop performance

Cons:

- Similar complete system cost when compared to Intel P55 solution
- Gaming and general desktop performance virtually identical to a P55 system

In conclusion the P6T-SE is simply a good, no nonsense motherboard! If you need raw processing power then it’s definitely a good option but for the majority of users i’d imagine a P55 style system may be the more desirable choice. As a result of this i choose to award it our 'Silver' award.

We would like to thank ASUS for providing us with the P6T-SE X58. Discuss this review on our forums