915 Motherboard Roundup: Socket 775 for the Rest of Us
by Wesley Fink on December 7, 2004 12:25 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
Foxconn 915A01: Overclocking and Stress Testing
FSB Overclocking Results
| Front Side Bus Overclocking Testbed | |
| Processor: | Pentium 4 Prescott LGA 775 560 ES (2.8GHz-3.6GHz) |
| CPU Voltage: | 1.425V (1.3875V default) |
| Cooling: | Thermaltake Jungle 502 |
| Power Supply: | OCZ Power Stream 520 |
| Maximum CPU OverClock: | 216x18 (3888MHz) +8% |
| Maximum FSB OC: | 216FSB x 14 (+8%) |
The whole reason for FSB and voltage adjustments is what they can actually do for the board's performance. As you can see, Foxconn has made no efforts at all to provide overclocking above and beyond the 10% level. In fact, the best that we could do at any ratio was an 8% OC to 216. This is the worst overclocking performance of any 915 board in the roundup. The Foxconn is a decent performer at stock speeds, but if you are looking for a 915 overclocking solution, you really need to look elsewhere or learn a great deal about using PCI speed adjustments to reach higher overclocks.
Memory Stress Test Results:
The memory stress test measures the ability of the Foxconn 915A01 to operate at its officially supported memory frequency of DDR2-533, at the best performing memory timings that Crucial/Micron PC2-4300U will support. Memory stress testing was conducted by running DDR2 at 533MHz (stock 3:4 ratio) with 2 DIMM slots operating in Dual-Channel mode.| Stable DDR533 Timings - 2 DIMMs (2/4 DIMMs - 1 Dual-Channel Bank) |
|
| Clock Speed: | 266MHz |
| Timing Mode: | 3:4 (200:266 - Default) |
| CAS Latency: | 3.0 |
| Bank Interleave: | Auto |
| RAS to CAS Delay: | 3 |
| RAS Precharge: | 3 |
| Cycle Time (tRAS): | 10* |
The Foxconn matched the other boards in the 915 roundup in being able to run with complete stability at 3-3-3-10 timings with two DDR2 DIMMs. The 915A01 was completely stable at these timings at the default 1.8V.
Filling all four available memory slots is more strenuous on the memory subsystem than testing 2 DDR2 modules on a motherboard.
| Stable DDR533 Timings - 4 DIMMs (4/4 DIMMs - 2 Dual-Channel Banks) |
|
| Clock Speed: | 266MHz |
| Timing Mode: | 3:4 (200:266 - Default) |
| CAS Latency: | 4.0 |
| Bank Interleave: | Auto |
| RAS to CAS Delay: | 4 |
| RAS Precharge: | 3 |
| Cycle Time (tRAS): | 10 |
| Command Rate: | N/A |
When all 4 DDR2 slots are filled, the Foxconn required slightly slower timings than the top boards in the roundup, requiring 4-4-3 timings for complete stability instead of the 4-3-3, which worked well on most 915 boards. This is the same memory pattern seen with the 925X Foxconn board when we tested that board.
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coldpower27 - Tuesday, December 7, 2004 - link
Of course the Pentium 4 560 is gonna be outperformed, The Pentium 4 560 is designed to compete at the 417US price point while the Athlon FX 55 is designed for the 827US, were talking double the P4 560 in price. i believethe closest competitor for the Pentium 4 560 in price is probably the Athlon 64 3700+ even though it is on Single Channel DDR.danidentity - Tuesday, December 7, 2004 - link
Even the 3800+ could be included, but that is still about $180 more expensive than the 560, according to Newegg.danidentity - Tuesday, December 7, 2004 - link
I know comments like I'm about to make have been made before, and I am not biased, but I wanted to reiterate.Why is the FX-55 even part of the benchmarks in this review? Why not a 3500+? The FX-55 is TWICE the price of the Pentium 560 according to current Newegg prices.
I know the argument will be that the FX-55 and the 560 are two of the highest performing chips from the two camps. But the fact of the matter is that most people shopping for a 560 aren't going to be shopping for a FX-55. It's in an entirely different class.
mongoosesRawesome - Tuesday, December 7, 2004 - link
Can you do a comparison between soundstorm and dolby digital live? What is the bitrate of the encoding? Frequency range? Overall quality?It seems like this may be the second time I pass on AC3 encoding though. Last time I chose a northwood platform over AMD and NF2, and this time I'll likely choose the NF4 over intel and dolby digital live.
Would be nice to be able to easily hook it up to my klipsch dolby digital decodor though...
anandtechrocks - Tuesday, December 7, 2004 - link
Thanks for the great review!MAME - Tuesday, December 7, 2004 - link
AMD >>>>>>>>>>>>> *