ASUS Striker II Formula motherboard review

Since the rebirth of Intel as the front-runner in the processor market courtesy of their Core 2 architecture, so Intel have also become kings of the motherboard chipset market once again, putting themselves ahead of third-party chipset manufacturers across much of the gamut of offerings, with particular dominance at the mid-range and high-end.  Despite that relative dominance, there are still areas where third-parties can find a wholesome niche for themselves, and nowhere is this more true than with regard to NVIDIA's Intel chipset offerings.  While at the low-end the graphics giant can leverage their GPU experience to create motherboards featuring powerful IGPs (Integrated Graphics Processors), at the high-end they have one even more powerful weapon in their arsenal - SLI.  With NVIDIA currently keeping their licensing for SLI-supporting chipsets strictly under wraps, the only way for enthusiasts to enjoy NVIDIA's multi-GPU configurations is via an NVIDIA chipset.

With that in mind, enter NVIDIA's nForce 780i SLI chipset - an SLI-capable (obviously) chipset with support for Intel's latest 45 nanometre CPUs, and what basically amounts as a refresh to their previously successful nForce 680i architecture.  Today, we take our first look at 780i courtesy of ASUS' Republic of Gamers motherboard utilising this chipset, the Striker II formula.  Is SLI its only noteworthy gimmick, or can it compete on more than simply NVIDIA multi-GPU support alone?