BIOS options and tweaking software
Intel's Core 2 Duo lineup is rife with overclocking potential, making the P5N32-SLI Premium's BIOS particularly important.

Unfortunately, the most current BIOS revision lacks Core 2 Duo multiplier control. That's a little disappointing, although it's something that Asus can certainly add with future BIOS revisions, as it has done with other Core 2-compatible motherboards.

Unless you're going for extreme memory speeds, most Core 2 Duo overclocking exploits won't require CPU multiplier control. They will require plenty of front-side and memory bus options, and the P5N32-SLI Premium delivers those in spades. Front-side bus speeds are available up to 525MHz in ultra-fine 0.25MHz increments, and the BIOS allows users to set a target memory speed between 200 and 800MHz (an effective 400 and 1600MHz, thanks to DDR's clock-doubling properties). Once that target memory speed has been set, the BIOS draws from dozens of available dividers to come as close as possible to the target speed. I'm not a huge fan of the black box approach to applying memory bus dividers—I'd rather have explicit control over those dividers, even if I have to do the math myself—but it does seem like a better option for less savvy users.

On the voltage front, the P5N32-SLI Premium's BIOS serves up control over CPU, memory, HyperTransport, and north and south bridge voltages. CPU voltages are available up to 1.55V in 0.05V increments, with an optional 0.2V kicker for those looking to really push the envelope. Memory voltages go all the way up to 2.55V, also in 0.05V increments.

As one might expect, the P5N32-SLI Premium's BIOS has all the major memory timing options, including control over the DRAM command rate. Interestingly, we've only seen command rate control offered on Core 2 motherboards based on Nvidia chipsets.

Of course, the P5N32-SLI Premium also supports EPP. If you have compatible memory modules, there's less of a need to fiddle with memory timings manually.

Asus does a reasonably good job with the P5N32-SLI Premium's fan speed control options. Temperature-based fan speed control is available for the board's CPU and system fan headers, although users aren't given explicit control over temperature thresholds or fan voltages. The robust fan speed control of Abit's uGuru-enabled motherboards has indeed spoiled us.

If poking around in the BIOS isn't your thing, Asus also offers PC Probe II and AiBooster software for Windows.

These apps bring hardware monitoring and overclocking options to Windows, but they're not nearly as elegant or robust as Nvidia's nTune system utility. Well, make that "nearly as elegant or robust as what's possible with Nvidia's system utility." The Nvidia app requires cooperation from motherboard makers in the form of BIOS hooks for various features, and a lot of those hooks are missing from the P5N32-SLI Premium.

Take nTune's monitoring application, for example. The app is capable of tracking system temperatures and voltages, but neither is reported to it by the P5N32-SLI Premium's BIOS.

Support for most of nTune's tweaking options is also lacking. Asus could have done a much better job here, and although we understand that it has its own tweaking software to push, Nvidia's is better. For one, nTune offers a much more extensive array of overclocking, tweaking, and hardware monitoring options. nTune also has a very slick custom rules application that allows users to associate system profiles with active applications and other system variables. AiBooster and PC Probe II may be better than the average mobo maker's bundled software, but they're nowhere near nTune.