| ASUS A7N8X Review |
|
Page
3 Benchmarks Test
System: The tests:
Max
I was able to obtain and ORB would not let me submit: This board
loves Cpu power the more you give it just keeps on getting faster. Also
note better results would have been obtained if I used the dual channel
DDR instead of just one ram stick. SiSoft
Sandra Memory Bench2400+ Default
SiSoft
Sandra Memory Bench2700+ Default SiSoft
Sandra CPU Bench2700+ Default SiSoft
Sandra Multimedia Bench 2700+ Default As we can
see here the 166 Fsb of the 2700+ really helps in overall system performance.
But to obtain the extreme bandwidth this motherboard is capable of you
really need the two sticks of ram for the dual channel DDR. Audio
Winbench 1.0.1 As you can
see the audio processor does a great job of keeping the load off the cpu. Code
Creatures Benchmark Pro Msi KT3 Ultra
2 As we can see here the Nforce 2 chipset has given a slight gain over the KT333 chipset. 2 fps might not seem like a lot but in this benchmark 2 fps is a lot.
This benchmark is an overall system benchmark, which can show little differences in the changes you have made. 2400+ MSI
KT3 Ultra 2 = CPU: 5789 Mem: 3990 HDD: 767 2400+ Asus
A7N8X = CPU: 5996 Mem: 4290 HDD: 1121 2700+ Asus
A7N8X = CPU: 6578 Mem: 4978 HDD: 1047 As we can
see here The Nfoce 2 chipset made a huge increase over the kt333 Chipset.
In ever category the Nforce2 kills the old KT333 chipset. Just think how
good it would be if we had 2 sticks of ram to take advantage of the dual
channel DDR.
Asus A7N8X
MSI KT3 Ultra 2
From what we can see here the random access times are the same. The next thing we notice is minimum read speed which is much higher on the Nforce2 chipset. Lastly we look at the cpu utilization. This is very weird the Nforce 2 seems to have a much higher CPU usage. The lower the CPU usage is an indication of a stronger chipset. Only thing I can figure is Nvidia needs to work on their chipset drivers.
The A7N8X
Deluxe is all we could want from an nForce2 motherboard, and then some.
If you can’t see yourself spend this much on a motherboard, try
to understand what all this board offers. To begin, you won’t need
to purchase an add-on sound card – nForce2’s APU is already
a powerhouse DSP and the board offers 5.1-channels of audio through either
analog or digital outputs. The two 10/100 Ethernet ports eliminate the
need for a networking adapter. Purchase a switch, hook up your broadband
connection to one of the ports, and share your connection with the other
computers in your home or office. This thing is extremely fast, stable
and well worth the price. I highly recommend this one. Pros Feature Set: It would be hard to deny that the A7N8X Deluxe is one of the most complete motherboards we’ve ever seen. The nForce2 chipset alone offers dual-channel DDR, official 333MHz CPU front side bus support, DDR 400 support, IEEE 1394 support (along with USB 2.0 and ATA-133), two 10/100 Ethernet ports, and Dolby Digital encoding with analog and digital output. ASUS also takes care to integrate Serial ATA support. The package is sweetened by a quantity of headers that allow you to take advantage of the board’s features. Also NVIDIA chipset drivers and audio drivers are in one word excellent. Performance: This thing is fast , really fast. With tons of overclocking options and full voltage controls. We really couldn’t have asked for a better overclocking motherboard. Stability:
Not one time during the testing of this board did we have any problems
what so ever. It remained solid as a rock. Cons S/PDIF Header: While it lists the digital S/PDIF header as an optional feature, like Serial ATA and IEEE 1394 connectivity, ASUS doesn’t include the bracket in the Deluxe package. If you are looking for S/PDIF input, you’ll have to track the header down on your own. Otherwise, the S/PDIF output on the board’s back panel will serve your purposes. ATX power connector: This connector is in the worse possible place. Its very hard to connect your floppy drive in with its location. The CPU socket: is in perhaps the worst location and has the closest capacitors that I have seen on a motherboard to date. This will make it extremely hard to install a heatshink that requires mounting with a zif socket. Though I have an Alpha 8045 it mounted rather easy. Northbridge cooling: I recommend the first thing you do is take off that passive cooling heatsink and buy you a normal chipset heatsink fan along with some Artic Silver 3. Final Score: 9.5/10
|
