nForce4 Ultra Roundup: Charting the Mainstream
by Wesley Fink on July 5, 2005 10:28 PM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
Standard Performance Test Configuration
If you are interested in more information comparing AMD (x2) and Intel (Pentium D) Dual-Core processors, LGA 775 Prescott, Athlon 64, P4, and P4EE, please see our in-depth comparisons in the recent reviews:AMD Athlon 64 FX-57: The Fastest Single Core
Athlon Dual Core: Overclocking the 4200+
Intel's Pentium 4 670: Just Another Speed Bump
AMD's Athlon 64 X2 4800+ & 4200+ Dual Core Performance Preview
AMD's Sempron 3300+: 90nm Budget Computing
Dual Core Intel Platform Shootout - NVIDIA nForce4 vs. Intel 955X
Intel Dual Core Performance Preview Part II: A Deeper Look
Intel Dual Core Performance Preview Part I: First Encounter
Intel Pentium 4 6xx and 3.73EE: Favoring Features Over Performance
Intel's Pentium 4 570J - Will 3.8GHz do the trick?
Pentium 4 3.46 Extreme Edition and 925XE: 1066MHz FSB Support is Here
AMD Athlon 64 4000+ & FX-55: A Thorough Investigation
Intel 925X: Exploring the Overclock Lock
Intel's 925X & LGA-775: Are Prescott 3.6 and PCI Express Graphics any Faster?
Intel 925X/915: Chipset Performance & DDR2
Socket 939 Chipsets: Motherboard Performance & PCI/AGP Locks
AMD Athlon 64 3800+ and FX-53: The First 939 CPUs
Intel's Pentium 4 E: Prescott Arrives with Luggage
| Performance Test Configuration | |
| Processor(s): | AMD Athlon 64 4000+ (2.4GHz) Socket 939 |
| RAM: | 2 x 512MB OCZ PC3200 Platinum Rev. 2 |
| Hard Drive(s): | Seagate 120GB 7200 RPM SATA (8MB Buffer) |
| Video AGP & IDE Bus Master Drivers: | NVIDIA nForce 6.56 |
| Video Cards: | NVIDIA 6800 Ultra (PCIe) NVIDIA 6800 Ultra (AGP) |
| Video Drivers: | NVIDIA nForce 71.89 |
| Operating System(s): | Windows XP Professional SP2 Direct X 9.0c |
| Motherboards: | Abit AN8 Fatal1ty Biostar NF4UL-A9 Chaintech VNF4-Ultra DFI LANParty UT nF4 Ultra-D ECS KN1 Extreme Epox 9NPA+ Winfast NF4UK8AA (Foxconn) |
Tests used OCZ PC3200 Platinum Rev. 2, which incorporates Samsung TCCD chips. These same chips are available in memory modules from G. Skill, Corsair, Geil, Mushkin, PQI and others. Please refer to Athlon 64 Memory: Rewriting the Rules for more information on Athlon 64 memory performance.
All boards were tested with the NVIDIA 6800 Ultra PCI Express video card, which is a very good match to the nForce4 Ultra chipset. Since the Biostar NF4 UL-A9 also supported an AGP slot, we ran comparison benchmarks with an NVIDIA 6800 Ultra AGP video card. Our past tests have shown performance of the AGP-8x and PCIe 688 Ultra to be virtually identical. This allowed us to gage the performance hit of the Biostar AGP configuration, which is derived from PCI/PCIe and not a true AGP 8X slot.
All game benchmarks were run in 1280x1024 video mode without Anti-Aliasing and Anisotropic filtering wherever possible. Some benchmarks, like Aquamark 3, use a standardized 1024x768 setup to generate comparable benchmark results. A few other benchmarks have AA or AF turned on by default, but since we are using the same benchmark setup for comparison, the usefulness of the benchmark for comparison is not compromised.
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yacoub - Wednesday, July 6, 2005 - link
#33 - Wesley, that's awesome news. Can you post that somewhere more important so buyers know to be on the lookout for it? =)kyparrish - Wednesday, July 6, 2005 - link
Good article!I'm seriously considering dumping my DFI S754/NC 3200+ setup for that Epox board and a cheap S939 A64 :)
Wesley Fink - Wednesday, July 6, 2005 - link
#29 and #31 - UPDATE: I have talked with contacts in the Memory Industry and Samsung TCCD is now available again from Samsung. TCCD disappeared for a few months but production didn't really stop. TCC5 is DDR466 and TCCD is DDR500, but both chips come off the same line and are binned for speed grade. Samsung stopped binning for DDR500 grade until recently - and left this job to the memory makers.Recently Samsung has told memory makers they are binning once again for DDR500/TCCD and the TCCD chips are available again. It will take a few weeks for the pipelines to fill but TCCD is not dead. Some companies are staying with TCC5 at a lower cost and binning for the top performance unless the yields start to go down.
Wesley Fink - Wednesday, July 6, 2005 - link
#24 - The base nForce4 is sometimes called the nForce4 X4 and runs at 800 HTT, while the Ultra and SLI run at 1000HT. When 1000HT was first introduced we found no real difference in performance at 800HT and 1000HT. What the 1000HT did provide was quite a bit more overclocking headroom. A reader may have an example of where 1000HT outperforms 800HT but the real world difference is negligible.#28 - There are now more than 60 BIOS releases for the DFI nF4, many customized for particular memory types. Only 3 have been posted to their website. For the latest DFI nF4 BIOS a good place to check is www.xtremesystems.org or the BIOS Files Forum at www.bleedinedge.com. There is now a 7/04 BIOS that is reported to be more stable in upper memory ratios (433,466,500) with Rev. E chips.
#29 - You are overstating the TCCD situation. Corsair still sells TCCD, as do several other memory vendors. There is no doubt TCCD is drying up everywhere but Corsair, and that will continue. New TCC5 dimms that are said to perform like TCCD are in process in at least one memory company. We have requested these new TCC5-based dimms and will share our findings as soon as we receive the memory. There are also some new BH5 dimms that we thought were gone forever. We have even seen the new BH5 binned and advertised as DDR500 2-2-2 at higher voltages around 3.3V.
yacoub - Wednesday, July 6, 2005 - link
Well, while this review -has- convinced me to go with the DFI board over the Chaintech, that is purely due to the audio CPU usage issues of the onboard vs daughterboard. I'm shocked at how much difference that makes.That said, most of the memory testing (and thus most of the review) was meaningless to me (and everyone else who doesn't have access to TCCD memory anymore). =/
Wesley Fink - Wednesday, July 6, 2005 - link
#17 - Thanks for pointing out the errors. They have been corrected. Do you want a job proof reading :-)yacoub - Wednesday, July 6, 2005 - link
Regarding the tRAS recommendation:Can we petition Anandtech to stop using memory that the consumer can't get anymore? (Namely TCCD-based Plat Rev2.) Go pick up some TCC5 and do your tests with what the consumer is actually going to be receiving so your tests actually mean something.
mongoosesRawesome - Wednesday, July 6, 2005 - link
What BIOS version did you use with the DFI? It reads: "Award 7/01/2005 Release" in your list of features for the DFI, but I could not find that BIOS release on their website.AsiLuc - Wednesday, July 6, 2005 - link
Sorry I meant: GA-K8NF9http://www.giga-byte.com/MotherBoard/Products/Prod...
AsiLuc - Wednesday, July 6, 2005 - link
I'd liked to see the Gigabyte GA-K8NP9 reviewed, because it has passive southbridge cooling (silence :) ) and is cheap.