Gigabyte 7NNXP (nForce2 Ultra 400): Gigabyte Goes nForce

Gigabyte 7NNXP: Basic Features

Gigabyte makes a smart move by including NVIDIA’s feature rich and powerful MCP-T South Bridge, which, among other things, contains the nForce2 APU (Audio Processing Unit). We discussed the nForce2 architecture in great detail (NVIDIA nForce2 Preview) in the past. To refresh your memory, the APU is defined by three parameters. The first is support for hardware acceleration of 256 2D voices and 64 3D voices, as well as 3D positional audio. The second is full support of Microsoft’s DX8.0 standard. The third and final parameter (by which the APU is defined) is support for Dolby Digital 5.1 and in-hardware Dolby Digital encoding. The great weakness here is that you can’t take advantage of Dolby Digital Encoding unless you’re using SPDIF (which requires proper speakers with a receiver). Thus, you’ll be forced to use the Analog Out port, which does not bypass the mediocre fidelity of the Realtek ALC650 AC’97 codec. In other words, if you plan on taking advantage of the nForce2 APU’s capabilities, you will need the correct speakers and SPDIF ports.

Gigabyte utilizes Intel’s PRO/1000 MT adapter via the 82540EM controller for Gigabit Ethernet. This is what Intel calls their “Desktop” version of the PRO/1000 MT. It is capable of 10/100/1000 Mbps speeds. This is a top notch solution, yet still falls behind Intel’s PRO/1000CT Gigabit solution, which is widely available on the latest 865PE and 875P motherboards and runs through Intel’s new Gigabit bus (CSA), with a dedicated bandwidth of 266MB/s instead of sharing the 133 MB/s PCI bus with other devices.

One feature that is certainly unique in any high-end desktop motherboard is Gigabyte’s patented DPS technology. DPS is a separate, add-in card that gives this motherboard 6-phase power circuitry instead of 3-phase. Gigabyte claims that, in Parallel mode (versus Backup mode), DPS is able to deliver better system stability (especially while overclocked) in addition to longer life of onboard components. While there's no way for us to prove Gigabyte's claim to longer components life without literally testing this motherboards for months/years on end, we can tell you that our FSB overclocking tests did not yield any improvement with DPS installed.

The 7NNXP also includes support for Gigabyte’s much-talked-about dual BIOS technology. Having a backup BIOS is beneficial when you accidentally corrupt your first BIOS chip (i.e. you lose power to your system as you're updating your primary BIOS). Simply switch over to the second BIOS chip, and your machine becomes operational. This feature voids the frustration and inconvenience of correcting the problem through other, time-consuming methods, such as a board RMA or the swap-trick.

The I/O ports configuration of the 7NNXP is fairly standard, aside from the dual Ethernet ports. Included in this setup are two PS/2 ports, two serial ports, one parallel port, four USB 2.0 ports, two LAN ports (one 10/100 and one 10/100/1000), and Mic In, Line In, and Line Out ports, which drive the onboard sound. The IEEE 1394 FireWire support via the Realtek RTL8801 controller can only be found through onboard headers and not through the rear panel, which is a loss in our book. Another unfortunate oversight is the lack of rear SPDIF ports, which would have been exceedingly useful for users who want to take advantage of the nForce2 APU. This would have been more convenient than the bundled SPDIF bracket. Overall this is an acceptable I/O configuration, but it could have been a bit better, especially considering the high-priced nature of this motherboard.

Gigabyte also adds a PCI-bound Serial ATA RAID controller from Silicon Image, dubbed the SI3112A. This controller is used by many motherboard makers, including most of the top tier desktop motherboard makers. This controller supports RAID 0, 1 and 0 + 1 arrays.

One of the most notable features the 7NNXP carries is onboard IDE RAID from ITE, named the GigaRAID IT8212F controller. There are two onboard IDE connectors that are powered by the GigaRAID IT8212F controller, which is capable of RAID 0 (striping), RAID 1 (mirroring) and RAID 0 + 1 RAID arrays. Not only can this controller support a total of four HDDs (hard disk drives), but four ATAPI (optical) drives as well. This is a considerable advantage over other motherboards with Promise or Silicon Image controllers that are only capable of supporting HDDs.