nForce 2

[First]

We'll be posting an nForce 2 article (pics, benchmarks, memory/stress tests, etc.) on the AT front page pretty soon, and I was just wondering what you guys would like to see covered (feature-wise, performance-wise, price-wise, anything).

Thanks for the input.

EDIT: Btw, you should see several (anywhere from 1-6) nForce 2 motherboard reviews throughout October. However, there could be delays to the chipset or certain retail nForce 2 boards that are obviously beyond my control. BUT, you will certainly see, at the very least, a large nForce 2 review.

 

[Vette73]

Wel here is a basic set I look for...

1. How is it different from nForce 1
2. Does it have a 1/5 divider, and how well does it overclock as the nForce 1 was not good at that
3. It the on-board Video that much better or about the same (with AND without Dual Channel Memory)
4. Will it do DDR400?? No really DO IT
5. Whats the price of the Chipset compared to VIA's kt400 and KT333???
6. What on-board stuff will it have that nForce 1 didn't, USB2.0, serial ATA, Firewire????
7. Support for the Barton??

8. Does it get its CPU Temp from the Die? and will it shut down if it gets to hot THANKS Soulkeeper, I forgot that.


I am tired but that is a good start

Thanks

 

[CrazySaint]

I'm very interested in how well it overclocks. I've heard that the FSB/AGP/PCI busses will be independantly adjustable, which could make it the AMD-platform dream OC chipset. Other than that, Marlin's list looks pretty good.

 

[DAPUNISHER]

In addition to the info already requested, I would like to know the complete list of manufacturers who'll be offering up nForce2 based boards and if possible which companies submitted the ones rejected by AMD (fat chance I'm certain). BTW, Thanx for taking the time to get input from us grunts in the trenches

 

[RanDum72]

Also maybe look at the built-in sound (and compare it to nforce 1 and other sound cards), check if it still has the 4 mounting holes for heatsinks like the Swiftech and Alpha.

 

[Xernex]

Although I'm sure you will cover it make sure you discuss what CPUs it will support. Like current XP's to to future Bartons etc. Aswell as its other upgrade possibilities.

 

[CyNics]

Memory configuration. Some nforce1 board, you need to install your memory in DIMM1 & DIMM3 to make it works/stable. Some you need to install in DIMM1 & 2 or DIMM2 & 3. Does that happen in nforce 2?

 

[RanDum72]

Actually, you need to install memory in order of DIMM 1, 2 and 3 in all nforce mobos. If you install a double-sided stick on DIMM 3, it will revert to pc1600 mode. Some people said that you need to install memory of the same size on DIMM 1 and 2 but in my experience with Abit and Asus boards, it doesn't really matter. The rough rule was double-sided memory on 1 and 2, single sided only on 3 for maximum performance.

 

[tryanasaurus]

When, when, and when?

 

[Soulkeeper]

1) Yeah I second the PCI bus divider,
that is one of the most important things on my list.
I wanna know if I can run with a 200 fsb (or more) without running the pci stuff outta spec.
that is what it's all about
2) also the temp reading method (from die or not?)
3) head to head performance comparison with the kt400 when the mem speed/timings and the fsb are the same; so we can see what advantages one architecture might have over another.
4) overclocking performance
5)there's more but that is the important stuff to me......

i'll prob post more ideas later if i come up with some.... heh

 

[chucky2]

I'd like to see an nForce1 in the benches/stability tests. Preferably an Asus A7N266-C with the latest BIOS and 1.13 (or later if they become available) drivers.

Also, it would be nice if you showed benches with the onboard sound disabled, enabled, and disabled with at least another add-in soundcard like a TBSC, Game Theater, Audigy, etc. That way we could see the performance of the board without any sound, with its built in sound, and how it compares to KT400/KT333/KT266a (jezz VIA...) with an add-in sound card.

Would would be really cool also would be disk transfer tests, and also some high level loading of the busses.

For example, I did a search of "nForce" over at MURC, and someone brought up an interested point that only Sis and Intel chipsets did very well when used with tons of data. VIA choked and they weren't sure about nForce. Anyways, that would be a pretty unique test for not just the nForce2, but also nForce1 and KTxxx.

Thanks for all the great work!

Chuck

 

[HemoPhilic]

Going with Marlin 1975's #4 could you test multiple sticks of pc3200? I've seen advertisements of "3GB DDR400!!" and would like to see which memory manufacturers allow nF2 to do that, if it in fact can do it to begin with.

Stress testing for stability over a 24hour+ period. I have nF1 and it's very stable. I'd like to see if nF2 can make it a trend.

Some screens of the advanced chipset bios menus.

Give the north and south bridges a touch test to see if they are hot while being stressed.

You're overall impression with the feel/snappiness of the machine.

Thanks for the oppurtunity to input!

 

[Tab]

My questions, some are not really related to the nforce2 but mobo's in general

1)How come AMD recently rejected its Chipset design?
2)How does it differ between the Kt400/333
3)What does this 1/5 divider stuff mean?
4)What companies are making them?
5)What is the price range?
6)Will it fully support DDR 400?
7)How will the DDR 400 be with the new XP 2700+?
8)How does it read the proccesser tempature?
9)What extra features?
10)Can you have all the DIMMs full with 3200PC and all at the same Mhz?

And the big question...

CAN I HAVE ONE PLEASE!

 

[klah]

Originally posted by: HemoPhilic
Some screens of the advanced chipset bios menus.

I have seen other sites do this and it is helpful. When people ask "how do i change/access x", I can just give them the Anandtech link.

edit: If you are testing the IGP model, benchmark-compare to a KT333 or KT400 with seperate GF4MX card.

 

[Vette73]

Originally posted by: Tabb
My questions, some are not really related to the nforce2 but mobo's in general

1)How come AMD recently rejected its Chipset design?
2)How does it differ between the Kt400/333
3)What does this 1/5 divider stuff mean?
4)What companies are making them?
5)What is the price range?
6)Will it fully support DDR 400?
7)How will the DDR 400 be with the new XP 2700+?
8)How does it read the proccesser tempature?
9)What extra features?
10)Can you have all the DIMMs full with 3200PC and all at the same Mhz?

And the big question...

CAN I HAVE ONE PLEASE!

1. I don't think they rejected the nForce2 chipset, just a Board with it

3. the 1/5 divider makes the Pci/Agp bus run at spec while the Cpu is at 166Mhz FSB

 

[Soulkeeper]

The single most important thing in any of these motherboard reviews to me is checking whether there is a 1/5 and 1/6 pci bus divider
i always look for them in AT reviews and they never check
ohh well...
it's just a question AT'ers have been wanting to know and is very important to overclockers
like that soyo review that was just posted it had no mention of the pci bus divider i'm pretty sure it had a 1/5 but what about a 1/6
i will not buy a motherboard till they start having 1/6 or higher bus dividers (1/7 would be necessary to push the fastest mem/fsb to the max at a 1:1 ratio)

 

[First]

Originally posted by: Soulkeeper
The single most important thing in any of these motherboard reviews to me is checking whether there is a 1/5 and 1/6 pci bus divider
i always look for them in AT reviews and they never check
ohh well...
it's just a question AT'ers have been wanting to know and is very important to overclockers
like that soyo review that was just posted it had no mention of the pci bus divider i'm pretty sure it had a 1/5 but what about a 1/6
i will not buy a motherboard till they start having 1/6 or higher bus dividers (1/7 would be necessary to push the fastest mem/fsb to the max at a 1:1 ratio)

Uh, actually we do mention PCI divider support (if it's listed in the BIOS that is). In fact, I mentioned it in the Soyo review that was posted a couple of hours ago. As I explained on this page of the Soyo review, the board supports up to a 1/6 PCI divider.

But anyway, all motherboards should have an AGP/PCI lock darn it!

 

[Soulkeeper]

i agree heh

 

[Vette73]

Originally posted by: Evan Lieb

Originally posted by: Soulkeeper
The single most important thing in any of these motherboard reviews to me is checking whether there is a 1/5 and 1/6 pci bus divider
i always look for them in AT reviews and they never check
ohh well...
it's just a question AT'ers have been wanting to know and is very important to overclockers
like that soyo review that was just posted it had no mention of the pci bus divider i'm pretty sure it had a 1/5 but what about a 1/6
i will not buy a motherboard till they start having 1/6 or higher bus dividers (1/7 would be necessary to push the fastest mem/fsb to the max at a 1:1 ratio)

Uh, actually we do mention PCI divider support (if it's listed in the BIOS that is). In fact, I mentioned it in the Soyo review that was posted a couple of hours ago. As I explained on this page of the Soyo review, the board supports up to a 1/6 PCI divider.

But anyway, all motherboards should have an AGP/PCI lock darn it!

A AGP/PCI lock, is that a Northbridge (KT333, KT400, P4X400, SiS648 etc..) thing or somtthing the motherboard maker has to do??
And is there any AMD board that has this????

 

[JSSheridan]

I've noticed that manufactures have been putting fans on the some MB's northbridge. Would you please note which MB's include a fan and which ones don't. I'd appriciate it if you could do this, now and in the future.

 

[First]

Originally posted by: JSSheridan
I've noticed that manufactures have been putting fans on the some MB's northbridge. Would you please note which MB's include a fan and which ones don't. I'd appriciate it if you could do this, now and in the future.

Yes, I will and always do mention if there's active cooling (i.e. heatsink and fan) over the North Bridge.

 

[kgraeme]

Can you please indicate whether the drivers in the test are the official shipping drivers? Features such as the ability to independently control speaker levels. A feature that despite showing up in your review over a year ago for the nForce 220/420 didn't make it into publicly available drivers until quite recently.

I found your, and other sites', 220/420 review to be quite misleading on the actual features because of these kind of details. It's NVIDIA's fault, but your site contributed to the misinformation.

 

[kgraeme]

BTW, I actually popped in to the Motherboard section tonight to post a "Where's nForce 2" thread just for fun. (Some of you might have gotten the joke.)

 

[KF]

Does it handle HD's over 128G? Do the VIA chipsets? SIS?

Someone said some of the later Intel 845 chipsets do.

 

[CraigJay]

I would like Anand to fly around the world backwards until the rotation of the earth reverses. Time will then go backwards for three months. Then post the nForce2 review in July 2002 on the same day as the 'paper launch.' Then this post will dissapear because I will have already read the review.