BIOS options and software
Although Nvidia has dropped a number of features found on the nForce 680i SLI from this latest LT design, the board's BIOS remains generally intact—and that's a good thing.

First, the BIOS offers control over the CPU multiplier. This multiplier control even works for standard Core 2 processors, although you can only adjust the multiplier down with those chips. You'll need an unlocked "Extreme Edition" CPU if you want to raise the multiplier beyond its default value.

Once you've settled on a multiplier, you can turn your attention to the board's front-side and memory bus tweaking options. Quad-pumped front-side bus speeds are available between 400 and 2500MHz in 1MHz increments, and you can set target memory bus speeds between 400 and 1400MHz with the same granularity.

On the voltage front, the BIOS will let you crank a Core 2 processor up to 1.6V—0.2V short of the maximum CPU voltage available with the standard nForce 680i SLI BIOS. The LT manages to match its predecessor's support for memory voltages up to 2.5V. However, you don't get access to the interconnect or south bridge voltage options present in the standard 680i SLI BIOS.

Things even out when we look at memory options, which are virtually identical between the LT and standard 680i SLI. Keep in mind that the LT only supports Enhanced Performance Profiles up to 800MHz, though.

Nvidia cuts one last corner on the fan speed front, dropping temperature-based fan speed control for the chassis fan. You do get automatic fan speed control for the CPU fan header, but are only able to tweak fan speeds manually for the rest. That's a little disappointing in light of the LT's active chipset coolers, which should only spin up to full speed when the chipset gets hot enough to need the extra cooling.

We can only hope Nvidia adds automatic chipset fan speed control to the LT's BIOS. A BIOS update should be coming, if only to complete the board's support for Nvidia's own nTune system utility.

In its current state, the 680i LT's BIOS doesn't support nTune voltage or fan speed manipulation. We've long chided third-party motherboard makers for not including the necessary BIOS hooks to fully exploit nTune's capabilities, so Nvidia certainly doesn't get off the hook here.

At least they've included all the hooks necessary for nTune's monitoring app, which tracks a wide range of system variables. This ability to track system variables is handy, but the real draw is being able to use changes in some of those variables to launch different system setting profiles via nTune's custom rules wizard.