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18-Jun-01 - Review by: Hagar 133 FSB is the go! AMD and VIA Technologies have recently changed the Socket-A platform to a 133 MHz Front Side Bus in response to the challenge provided by Intel with the new P4. AMD have responded by tweaking and prodding their line of CPUs by increasing the processor speed and by increasing the memory bandwidth with a higher FSB. A higher FSB is acknowledged to be the way to increase memory bandwidth and performance as its widely recognised that memory bandwidth is the latest bottleneck in the modern computer. Intel even did this a coupla years ago with the P3 EB processors so its a proven technology. VIA technologies have supported this move by AMD with modifications to the KT133 chipset. These modifications have produced the KT133A, which is certified to run at 133 Mhz FSB (previous KT133 chipsets would max out around 110 Mhz). While I'm principally reviewing the Epox 8KTA3, I'm testing it with the newest Athlon available here in OZ (the 1.33 Ghz C Tbird). The benchmarks Ive included relate to the Athlon more than the mainboard, but I must say that I did not experience one crash with this mainboard. I dont want to bog you down with details so therell be a limit to the number of words and graphs, just the main ones like Sandra, 3D Mark and Quake 3 Arena. These are not manufacturer review items either. This is a review of items bought and owned by the reviewer. Thus anybody could duplicate the results with little in-depth knowledge of BIOS RAM timings or such trickery and with easily obtainable information from the net. The constants in the test are Windows 98SE (Win2k at the end just for interest), Corsair CAS2 RAM (128 mb bought from Realtime Systems), Leadtek Geforce 2 GTS (standard clock settings), SBLive! Value, Seagate Barracuda 20Gb ATA66 HDD (7200 rpm). Video drivers in Win 98 were the new NitroSet 1.01 from Rizenet (just because I like fiddling), which combine files from the 10.80 & 11.01 beta Detonators (Rizenet's NitroSet 1.0 was used for Win 2K). VIAs 4.29 final Beta 4-in-1s were used for the mainboard drivers in Win98, while the native Win 2K drivers augmented by the Microsoft SP2 Hotfix and ATA66 registry hack where used in Win 2K. DirectX 7a was used with Win 98SE and DirectX 8 was used with Win 2K. The BIOS settings were adjusted with the help of the great article at Adrian's Rojaks Pot. All in all, a combination that could be built for about $2500 by shopping around the swap meets, and representing what a lot of OCAU members would have or like to have. The Epox cost me $230 and the Athlon was $455 (currently a bit higher due to a shortage of 1333 C parts). EPoX EP-8KTA3. ![]() The EPoX EP-8KTA3 motherboard "+" model shown has extra HPT370 RAID, review unit does not click image to enlarge - borrowed from Epox. The 8KTA3 utilises the KT133A chipset with the 686B southbridge (the 8KTA3+ has the addition of on-board RAID support). Thus we have support for 133 Mhz FSB processors, ATA100, USB, SDRAM and on-chip hardware monitoring. The expansion layout is also good with a 4 DIMMS/AGP/6 PCI/1 ISA set-up. No AMR riser is visible (waste of space). As is usual, there are two IDE channels supporting 4 devices. In addition, up to 4 USB devices can be connected, though a rear motherboard connector is supplied for only two of these. If you want more, youre in luck, because Epox supply the plate and plug in outlets for the extra two. The layout of the board is a mixture of mostly good with some not so good. Whats good is the rotational positioning of the CPU socket. In comparison to the ASUS A7V, for example, the HSF clip pulls down at the 3 oclock position (ASUS is at the 12 oclock position), which makes it a lot easier to use a pair of long nose pliers to unhook the clip (as us overclockers are want to do) and avoid the crunched core syndrome. Youll also notice that the power supply regulator capacitors are a reasonable distance away from the socket good for humongous heat sinks. The main board power connector is also in a good position. Also good is the DIMMS/AGP slot situation (usually have to remove AGP card before removing DIMMS because the retaining clips for the DIMMS hit the AGP card at anywhere more than the locked position) with the Geforce 2 in the AGP slot, you can remove DIMM 1 quite easily. Not so good is the positioning of the IDE connectors. Where the IDE connectors are placed is the most inconvenient position they are directly under where most people would put the HDD and FDD. More frustrating is that the second IDE channel is far enough away from the top of the case (where most people position CD-Rs, DVDs, etc) that its a reasonable stretch to reach these devices with the supplied ATA100 cables messy too. Unless youve got a few of these around, its back to the shop/swap meet to get longer ones. AC97 on-board sound is provided which is quite suitable for general usage, given less than hi-fi speaker set-ups most boxes use. The BIOS is an Award BIOS with all the options that weve come to expect of any board with serious overclocking pretentions. The highlights are adjustable Vcore, Vio, and AGP voltage settings together with CPU Clock and Multiplier settings. Also included are 4 way bank interleave settings for RAM as well as user definable CAS & RAS and DRAM Clock (100 or 133MHz). Change over from 100MHz to 133MHz FSB is achieved by a jumper on-board which alters the range for BIOS CPU Clock settings available. With the jumper in 100MHz FSB position, you get up to 124MHz available. With the jumper in 133MHz FSB position, you can get up to 166MHz FSB. The only drawback is the lack of 1MHz increments in the frequency settings (such as Abit & ASUS). The construction of the board appears to be of good quality with a good package of extras included in the box. You get the floppy cable, 1 ATA100 cable, 1 ATA33 cable, extra USB ports, manual and driver disc. As well as the drivers for chipsets and sound, you also get PDF manuals, Acrobat reader and Norton Systemworks. Systemworks includes Norton Anti-virus, Norton Utilities and Nortons Ghost (which I find of great utility pun intended). My experience with installing and running the board was very positive. The board proving to be very quick and stable when pushed. The lack of 1MHz increments was a frustration as the range I wanted to use had huge gaps ie. 136MHz to 140MHz to 145MHz with nothing in between. All in all I would definitely recommend the board to everybody. Its currently around the AUD$230 mark at the swap meets in Melbourne and is consistently $30-40 below the cost for the ASUS A7V133 and the Abit KT7. Ive built a few systems around them with everything from Durons to big T-birds, and they really run well and stable. One interesting note: the chipset drivers supplied by EPoX for Windows 2000 do not utilise the VIA IDE busmasters. Some impromptu testing with Sandra indicates that the native drivers for Windows 2000 boosted with the Microsoft ATA100 SP2 hotfix are still better than the new VIA 4-in-1s (v4.29). Another interesting point is that the drive index decreases (about 30% for C to G if youve got that many) for partitions further away from C a consideration for Dual boot systems. Agg note: I don't know that it's fair to compare this board, with no RAID controller, to the A7V133 which has a raid controller onboard (or the KT7A-RAID which I suspect is what Hagar found it $30 cheaper than). I'd be more inclined to compare it to the A7V133-C, Abit KT7A, IWill KT266 etc.. KT133A boards without RAID controllers. Having said that, a quick squiz around the usual suspects of online vendors shows the Epox to be definitely at the bottom end of that group price-wise. 1.33GHz AMD Athlon Processor. I mentioned earlier about the frustration of the missing 1MHz steps in the BIOS. Where I ended up at 1470MHz (140MHz x 10.5) was because the chip wouldnt take 1522MHz (145MHz x 10.5) the next step in the adjustments. The jump between 140MHz FSB and 145MHz FSB was too much. I couldnt eek out a few more MHz above 1470 because I didnt have the ability to go for 142MHz or 143MHz FSB. It would be nice if EPoX release a BIOS revision to allow me to do that (I believe that the new 8K7 with DDR and AMD 760 chipset does have 1MHz adjustment). I will be trying to squeeze a bit more out of it in the fullness of time (ie when I get a bit of time away from work!) Benchmarking the system. ![]() 3DMark2000 ![]() 3DMark2001 3D Mark showed a smallish increase of between 5 to 7%, maybe indicating that the Geforce 2 was the limiting factor in D3D. ![]() OpenGL Quake3 Demo1 In Open GL Quake 3, anywhere between 12 and 17% increase - possibly again due to the Geforce 2 holding the CPU back? The highest gain of 16.7% was at the lowest resolution, while the lowest gain of 11.8% was at the highest resolution - tending to indicate that the video card was beginning to max out. ![]() Sandra 2001se CPU ![]() Sandra 2001se Multimedia ![]() Sandra 2001se Memory The gains in SiSoft Sandra are what you'd expect from a nearly 47% increase in speed (the memory benchmark is independent of CPU speed). Just for a laugh I used the old Quake II timedemo benchmark - 336.4 fps is not hanging around (640x480x16)! Of interest is the comparison of Win98SE to Win2K at the overclocked speed. It shows that Win2K is marginally faster in Open GL and D3D (DX8) than Win98 (DX7). Conclusion Of interest is the comparison between Win98SE and Win2K. With Direct X8 it appears that Win2K is now a viable platform for the newer games. It even has a utility to allow it to emulate Win98 to allow games to install on it. The Athlon is fast, but I now probably need to buy a Geforce 3 to keep up with it. Given the price, a 1 Ghz unit would be better value for money at around the $300 - 320 mark (especially the later steppings) - considering the modest increases in performance available with the 1.33 T'bird. However, the extra money is of little consequence if you can boast the fastest under the bonnet (purely for research mind you!). Now where can I get a cheap GeForce 3? |
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