DFI LANParty UT RDX200: Board Layout
DFI has made sure that you still recognize the LANParty UT box - using the same theme that worked well on their nForce4 series.
Instead of the blue color used for NVIDIA, the ATI chipset RDX200 is done in ATI reds. UT is used for the full LANParty boards without the full LANParty package. Everything board-related is here with this 6-layer board, but you will not find a FrontX box or nylon carrier. You will, however, find all the matching UV reactive cables that distinguish a LAN P arty motherboard.
In addition to all the necessary cables with yellow UV sleeves, you will find an updated Karajan audio module. The significant update here is the Azalia High Definition audio chip that is isolated on the module for improved signal-to-noise performance. This is the first retail AMD motherboard to feature Azalia HD, which is a prominent and unique feature of the ATI Rx480/482 chipset.
The Karajan module integrates into the rear IO ports, providing 6 mini jacks for the audio system.
Click to enlarge.
Those familiar with DFI LANParty boards will immediately recognize the black color scheme with Dayglo yellow and orange slots and connectors. Some buyers love the color scheme and look for side-window cases and UV lights to show it off. Others wish that DFI used something a bit more sedate. Whatever you think of the color scheme, our past experience has been that underneath the color is an incredibly full-featured motherboard with adjustments not available on any other motherboard. DFI tells us that all capacitors are 100% Japanese to assure the highest quality.
Layout is unusual compared to other recent motherboards, with the 4 DIMM slots located between the CPU and IO ports. While we have not seen this location used on other boards, in practice, it works very well to keep air flowing and components cool.
The 24-pin and 8-pin/4-pin power connector are together at the right board edge. You can use either standard 4-pin or the more robust 8-pin connector on the DFI. This location keeps bulky power cords out of the way of other components.
IDE and floppy connectors are ideally located on the right edge of the board - where they belong. We are grateful that DFI did not follow recent practice and place the floppy port at the bottom of the board. The floppy is a side edge connector, so you may need to install the floppy cable before mounting the board in smaller cases.
In addition to the 4 SATA connectors provided by the ATI SB450 south bridge, DFI has added 4 more SATA ports powered by a Silicon Image 3114 controller. The puzzle here is that all 8 ports are SATA1. We have to wonder why DFI bothered to add more SATA ports when they all end up being SATA 1 - no SATA2 ports.
Momentary switches for power and reset have almost become a trademark with DFI LANParty motherboards and the RDX200 is no exception. The battery, switches and "Clear CMOS" jumper are all clustered in the same area at the bottom right corner of the board.
DFI also included Firewire powered by the well-regarded VIA VT6307 chipset. Dual Gigabit LAN is also a feature, but only one LAN port is the faster PCI Express.
You should also consider what is
not on the DFI RDX200. There is no paddle card to fumble with in changing from one to two video cards. The switching is automatic, and unlike other auto-switch video solutions, it doesn't appear to hamper the board's overclocking abilities.
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bigtoe36 - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
having tested the RDX200 at the same time as Wesley I am able to confirm that i was able to run cas1.5. Now on the NF4 LP boards oskar enabled what seemed to be cas1.5, infact this option gave no performance increase over the cas2 option. On RDX200 he has though found a significant speed increase by using the 1.5 option.Running OCZ PC4800Plat's with drive srength at 9 and 1.5-2-2-5 timings a 100MB/s increase in available memory bandwidth was seen over setting 2-2-2-5. I was however forced to use 3.1Vdimm to achieve this at 200fsb 1:1. Another point is that BH5 and VX (UTT CH5) would not do cas1.5, it seems to be a samsung TCCX tweak only.
mongoosesRawesome - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
thanks for the infoLeper Messiah - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
Used to be buy an nVidia mobo and an ATi graphics card. Funny how things have changed...but 4DS at 1T is awesome if you aren't OCing your RAM, but 250-2-2-2-7 2T is going to be faster than 203 2-2-2-7-1T.Madellga - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
Thanks for the good review Wesley. One thing I always missed on your reviews was what kind of BIOS settings you used.It took me a long time to get my DFI-NF4 up and running. You know better than anybody that tweaking is time consuming - specially with so many settings on the BIOS.
Make this an habit and keep posting the BIOS settings used on the reviews.
mongoosesRawesome - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
Isn't that integrated into the A64 memory controller and don't the Nforce 4 DFI boards support those DDR speeds?
Wesley Fink - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
The additional ratios are available in the AMD Athlon64 Rev. E Memory Cntroller and can be implemented on any Socket 939 motherboard. However, the BIOS writer has to implement these choices. AMD made them a part of their Reference Board and they will likely find their way to many retail boards. DFI implemented them on the RDX200, but you rarely if ever see these finer ratios actually implemented on nForce4 boards.jr9k - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
2000 points.
Impressive...
until you do some math. 4 dimms at 1T are 2.3% faster than 4 dimms at 2T.
Don't get me wrong, the achievement of running four dimms at 1T is impressive, but the results are not (as we already knew). It's the way of showing things.
Anyway, it is good to see some competition from ATI.
Nice review and nice board
mongoosesRawesome - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
Yea, I agree. A lot of times a big deal is made over only a few percentage points. I would have rather seen FPS in some games. I truly doubt we'd even see 2% in some cases.Spacecomber - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
I had the same sort of reaction to the signifigance of the 1T vs 2T scores. I translated the Aquamark score back into FPS got this.2 DIMM 1T 91fps
4 DIMM 2T 90fps
4 DIMM 1T 92fps
While this capability certainly says good things about DFI's engineering team, I'm not sure that I'd spend a $100 premium on a motherboard just to get this feature.
Overall, this is a board with very good potential, but I wouldn't want to rush out and buy this first release. It sounds like the revision with a different south bridge will be worth waiting for. Hopefully, the price will be mroe in line with the comparable nforce4 boards by then, too.
ksherman - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
I am particularly impressed with the ability to use 4DS DIMMs @ 1T. That is a really nice little feature! Too bad you have to stay near stock speeds... is it possible to do some overclocking, but use divides to keep the memory at 406? or is overclocking the memory the better thing to improve system performance?