Pros: The board works fine and is very stable.

Cons: I am an experienced system builder. The board works fine and is very stable. I have had a very hard time getting Advanced Host Controller Interface AHCI to work using a 250G Samsung (SP2504C) SATA 3.0Gb/s Drive. AHCI will allow the hard drive and Intel ICH7R chipset to do Native Command Queuing NCQ. Asus tech support is as bad as it can possibly be. They do not return phone calls nor do they have any knowledgeable people on hand. I have even had them disconnect my call while talking to them and I was not being rude to them. They will not hang up on you if you ask for their name at the beginning of the conversation. Their level 1 support will tell you that you have a level 3 question. They transfer you to a level 3 technical support department, but all you get is a voice mail to someone that does not return your call. I finally found the answer to my issue by doing a search on (Asus P5w dh deluxe AHCI) follow the first link to get the answer to the problem.

Overall Review: Asus technical support was not any help at all if you are a first time builder I would recommend that you use someone else for your MB. The biggest reason that I wanted this board was that it will provide an upgrade path to the new Intel processor Kentsfield.