DFI nForce4: SLI and Ultra for Mad Overclockers
by Wesley Fink on February 5, 2005 9:30 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
Board Layout: DFI nForce4
Each new generation of DFI motherboards seem to be improving on board design, and the DFI nForce4 boards feature a very functional layout.
The DFI nF4 places the CPU in the top center of the board and DIMMs at the top. This arrangement worked well in our testing and should work better for those who change memory frequently than the crowded right edge location used on most boards.
The ATX 24-pin and the 4-pin 12V connector are in ideal locations on the DFI nF4. The bulky 24-pin ATX is located on the preferred top right edge of the motherboard, and the 4-pin 12V power connector is right beside it. This board-edge location keeps bulky cables away from the CPU and memory.
The CPU socket is in the top center of the board. PCI slots are below the socket and memory is above the CPU. There is plenty of room around the Socket 939, so most Heatsink/Fans should work fine. A Zalman 7000 overhung DIMM slot 4, but it still cleared our stock OCZ memory and dimms could work in all slots.
The IDE connectors are at our preferred upper right edge of the motherboard, and the floppy connector is a board edge connector about right midline of the board. Both locations are nearly ideal and worked well in our testing. If you use a floppy drive, you might want to connect the floppy before screwing down the board, as many mid-tower cases are tight in the area of the floppy connector. Having said that, we would still choose this floppy location any day over the floppy placed at the bottom of the board.
SATA connectors are to the right of the nF4 chipset and the magnetic levitation fan. The fan is low enough for video cards - both ATI and nVidia - to mount properly. We tried both ATI and nVidia top-of-the line cards to make sure.
Most competitive boards with 2 x16 PCIe video slots use a simple card edge selector that is reversed for SLI operation. DFI uses 6 jumper blocks that must all be moved to switch to SLI mode.
DFI also continues CMOS reloaded, which was introduced with the second generation LANParty boards. This feature allows you to save several different custom BIOS set-ups so that you can recall custom BIOS settings easily for a particular overclock or settings for a different OS. Overclockers and users who run multiple operating systems will really find CMOS Reloaded to be a useful feature.
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LordConrad - Wednesday, February 2, 2005 - link
It's been a year or two since the last time I researched motherboard features, so maybe I'm out of the loop. Isn't it unusual for a consumer level motherboard to offer RAID-5? This is certainly the first such board I've heard of. I wonder if the RAID-5 support is hardware or software based.ChineseDemocracyGNR - Wednesday, February 2, 2005 - link
#17"Few questions can you fit say a x1 pci-e card into a x4 pci-e slot??? "
Yes you can.
eetnoyer - Wednesday, February 2, 2005 - link
#18 Would you consider a 100m sprinter who broke the old world record by 8% to have demolished the record? What you have to realized, is that these boards are performing at the very edge of what's possible today. While a compact car exceeding the Chevy Cobalt's top speed by 8% would make everybody yawn, a car that exceeds the Bugatti Veyron's top speed (252mph) by 8% would be pretty remarkable.Irregardless, this looks to be a very respectable board whether you want to OC or not. For the features that are on the board, $140 for an nforce4 board isn't all that bad. And just like the S754 board, I'm sure the price will come down significantly after a little while.
Trente - Wednesday, February 2, 2005 - link
Man, I remember we used to laugh at DFI back in year 2000; How was it possible for a low-end maker to became the best brand for all die hard overclockers? someone should write a book about it...Manzelle - Wednesday, February 2, 2005 - link
*yawn*Where are the AGP/PCIe boards...better yet, where is DFI's nForce3 939 board...
arfan - Wednesday, February 2, 2005 - link
1. why another board maker don't try to make motherboard likes DFI Ultra have ? Because it's a big oppurtunity to buy Ultra than SLI2. What do u think Nvidia do to make this board DFI Ultra not functionally likes SLI ? Just tweak driver or likes AMD in the past, change chipset in their factory ? so people can't do likes anand do.
Burbot - Wednesday, February 2, 2005 - link
I do not like this phrase from Final Words:We reached 318x9 at 1T Command Rate - performance that demolished our previous best of 295 1T with this same memory.
This is a gain of 8% over old result. Would you consider a car with maximum speed 8% higher than competitor model to be "demolishing" it? I don't think so. I consider this to be a "fair improvement" over previous result, and not a "demolishing" one.
1q3er5 - Wednesday, February 2, 2005 - link
Few questions can you fit say a x1 pci-e card into a x4 pci-e slot???4 volts for RAM but your going to need active cooling, and how do you manage that.
Bozo Galora - Wednesday, February 2, 2005 - link
I dont see what all the shouting is aboutSure its a nice board, but, unless you are an EXTREME overclocker the NF3 is plenty close enough, and the big surprise here is the Epox
johnson - Wednesday, February 2, 2005 - link
I was hoping for a look at results of other memory as well, besides only the ocz ddr400. Perhaps the upcoming round up will use various memory sticks.