A whole new set of BIOS options
The Core i7 brings with it all sorts of new dials for enthusiasts to tweak and a whole new learning curve when it comes to overclocking. Fortunately, Asus and Intel have both done a good job of exposing all the important variables in their respective BIOSes for the P6T and DX58SO.

For most folks—those who don't shell out for thousand-dollar Extreme Edition processors—Core i7 overclocking will involve cranking a motherboard's base clock. The P6T offers a greater range of options on that front, although the 240MHz base clock ceiling on the DX58SO should be more than high enough for all but the most extreme overclockers.

Since the base clock is used to drive the processor core and its uncore component, which includes QPI and memory controller elements, there are plenty of other components that need to be kept in-check when pushing the base clock higher. Asus provides a range of clock speed controls for the memory bus, QPI link, and uncore, er, core. Intel takes a different tact, providing QPI clock control and a set of memory bus and uncore multipliers. Both boards achieve the same end here, just through different means. It is worth noting, though, that the Asus BIOS offers support for higher memory bus speeds than the Intel, at least with a Core i7-965 Extreme. However, both BIOSes run out of memory clock at 1066MHz when paired with a 940 or a 920, due to the slower memory controller frequency of those chips.

Voltage manipulation is often necessary to stabilize more ambitious overclocks, and the Asus and Intel boards offer similar peaks for the more commonly-tweaked voltages, giving users more than enough overvolting allowance with which to hang themselves. In fact, despite Intel's warnings that memory bus voltages higher than 1.65V risk seriously damaging Core i7 CPUs, the P6T and DX58SO each offer memory bus voltage options up to 2.5V.

To Asus' credit, the Deluxe does offer finer granularity in its overvolting controls. The P6T's BIOS also gives users a few more obscure voltages to manipulate, although most folks will probably leave those alone.

What the Deluxe doesn't have, however, is fine-grained control over the Core i7's "Turbo mode," which cranks up the multiplier on active cores when others are idling. The DX58SO lets you set specific multiplier limits based on how many cores are active at any given time, which is a neat capability to have.

As one might expect in this day and age, neither the P6T nor the DX58SO are short on memory timing options. Both boards offer command rate control, and they were quite comfortable running at 1T, even when overclocked.

With most BIOSes offering more than adequate overclocking and memory tweaking controls, we have to turn elsewhere to poke holes. In my mind, comprehensive temperature-based fan speed controls are just as essential to a good BIOS as robust overclocking options. Unfortunately, neither board does well here. The Deluxe fares better than the DX58SO, which offers temperature-based automatic fan speed control for its CPU fan, but no BIOS-level control over how fan speeds ramp. With the Asus board, you get fan speed control for the CPU and system fan headers, and the ability to switch between a couple of fan speed presets. However, there's no way to set explicit temperature targets, base fan speeds, or how aggressively fans will spin up in response to changes in temperature.

Specifics on specifications
We've consolidated all the key specifications of the DX58SO and P6T Deluxe in a handy chart below.