Now this is a ugly situation concerning VIA motherboards

[classy]

Here is an article that looks at the performance of VIA southbridges. And its results are ugly to say the least. Here's the article, VIA southbridges. It shows the poor results of hard drive performance which we all know about, but it shows why. Apparently the PCI latency patch by George helps performance some. But this is nasty to say the least. I am moving to SCSI and was going to buy a new KT266a board as my foundation and it even serverely affects SCSI as well. This sucks.

 

[Athlon4all]

Posted allready like 5 times.

 

[AkumaBao]

Even though it was posted 4 times, it was the fist time I've seen it. Thanx Classy!

 

[thraxes]

Well my outlook on the world of cipsets has been rooted even further by this: VIA SUX

OKOKOK Bash me flame me do whatever you guys will but that is my opinion and it has been since the KT133 fiasco (sold 5 boards, only 1 is working as it should, all were large brands 1 DFI, 2 Asus - of which one works fine -, 2 Abit. All problems were traced to chipset "issues")
I do not sell VIA anymore unless specifically asked for. I mainly use INTEL and SIS and eventually will try NVIDIA when boards become available.

 

[AZGamer]

The PCI problems have been patched, and they only affected PCI Raid or IDE controllers. Thus, for 99% of people, there wasn't even an issue. Nonetheless, since VIA is a company quick to react to problems, a patch has already been issued.

You didn't notice it until it was stated by a shady foreign site with no backup proof. Don't let this become a fiasco from a zero; it's a non-issue anyway.

 

[Athlon4all]

I agree totally AZGamer. I hand't even bothered to read the article til today. It really, is not that big of an issue to me. I am glad that we know about it, but I'm not gonna just start bashing VIA because of it.

 

[Mem]

<< I am glad that we know about it, but I'm not gonna just start bashing VIA because of it. >>



As soon as somebody post a VIA problem thread the flamers come out of their hiding places,also on the Epox 8KHA+ you can adjust the PCI latency in bios I`ve not needed to since I`m one of the 99% that don`t have the issue ,anyway will probably get more feedback from anti-VIA members here .

 

[oakfan]

<< The PCI problems have been patched, and they only affected PCI Raid or IDE controllers. Thus, for 99% of people, there wasn't even an issue. Nonetheless, since VIA is a company quick to react to problems, a patch has already been issued. >>





<< You didn't notice it until it was stated by a shady foreign site with no backup proof. Don't let this become a fiasco from a zero; it's a non-issue anyway. >>



While the article from the "shady foreign site" (gotta hate those foreigners) was a bit hard line it did bring up some points of interest. As someone who has just started playing with raid I was concerned that my performance was not what I expected. I bet that Promise and Highpoint are also very interested, as reduced performance of for raid may have some impact on their sales.

Will this make me go out & buy a non VIA motherboard - No, but I would like to know if the performance improves.
One last thing - As far as I can see from reading the forums on VIAHardware.com, they have done nothing as yet to fix this problem, the current patch was provided by George Breese.

 

[ACDC]

LoL the harddrive issue is not the ony PCI problem, it can affect other problems such as the soundcard also namely the soundblaster family. Also how did via fix the problem? I thought the PCI latency patch was form a 3rd party, Via should have never released the chipset. They end up fixing the problem alright by releasing a new chipset KT333 or whatever and we will be forced to shell out another 100-160 bucks for the MB. I really regret buying the via chipset and I'll do very thing in my power to never buy a chipset from them again. Don't mean to flame but It really sucks ass when you spend $$$$ on 2 new 60GB ata133 HD's for raid0 and it runs like sh%t because of a broken chipset ;( I really hope that the Nvidia chipset turns out to be decent. BTW I got a new Abit KR7A-RAID 4 sale if someone want this wonderfull chipset.

 

[CraigRT]

Never had a problem with a VIA based board which was related to the fact that it was VIA... They have all been fine...

 

[Workin']

The biggest problem is the people talking about the "issue" are too stupid to even know what the alleged problem is, so they spout off half-truths and whatever alarmist propaganda they read from any biased source. They are also too dumb to even know what they don't know - in other words they think they know everything when in fact they really know next to nothing. They think that becasue they built a computer once they can design core logic, and think that everything should be free, i.e, inexpensive desktop computer platforms should provide better performance than optimized server platforms. Never mind using the right tool for the job. "I spent $100 on this so it should fulfill my every need!! Waaa, waaaa, waaaa, waaa" first of all like $100 is a lot of money (step into the real world sometime, junior), and second of all not even doing any research into what they are buying. Bunch of dumbasses.

Waiting for Pabster to weigh in....

 

[classy]

<< Posted allready like 5 times. >>



Well I read here everyday and I haven't seen it posted. I know problems with soundcards and pci issues with VIA have been posted but not about poor hard drive issues. They do point out why the performance is poor, but not if it can completely be fixed with a patch. It is a good article I think. I am not bashing VIA either but it is important to know if the board may not be able to reach its full potential.

 

[Mem]

<< Well I read here everyday and I haven't seen it posted. >>



Classy believe me it was posted like 5 times,mainly in GH forum,ask Pabster about it anyway it turned into a flaming thread again .

 

[classy]

<<

<< Well I read here everyday and I haven't seen it posted. >>



Classy believe me it was posted like 5 times,mainly in GH forum,ask Pabster about it anyway it turned into a flaming thread again . >>



Oh GH. I was going to say how did I miss it. I don't read there everyday. Oh well.

 

[DoubleL]

Well I have built a lot of VIA chipset boards raid and non raid and not one time had a problem other than bad parts so if it was much of a problem working with computer everyday you would think I would run into it at least once,

 

[AA0]

There are a lot of VIA haters, and basically, because they just want to hate something. Did you ignorant people know that VIA, intel and ALi chipsets also had problems with those awful Live! drivers? They weren't on systems as new as the 686 southbridge is found on, but they exist.

VIAs IDE performance is always below the best, but the last few chipsets are gaining performance quite quickly. ALi has had the best southbridge for a long time, but too bad they can't make a decent northbridge, like the Magik1 being incompatitible with the original Radeon.
VIA isn't great, but neither are anyone else, they all have their issues. Thats what benchmarks are for. Of course places like anand here will benchmark 10 games, and leave out the whole other side, same with video cards.

Every chipset on the market has problems, from the "amazing" nforce, to the intels, and via's.

 

[Tominator]

VIA = POS!

I will NEVER own another chipset with VIA on it!

 

[DClark]

I love my Abit VH6 (Apollo Pro 133A chipset, 686A southbridge).

I get some excellent overall scores from my computer. I get around 20,300 marks for Sandra's HD bench when the reference ATA66 bench is 17,000 marks, similar or better memory benches to Sandra's reference Intel 815 and BX memory scores (on a 133mhz fsb @933mhz I scored 411ALU, 504FPU), and I haven't bothered with a sound card because now onboard sound isn't as crappy as back when it got its' reputation for being crappy. A couple times I've scared the hell out of myself while playing EverQuest when it starts to rain - the thunderclap from my subwoofer is startling when the volume is up a bit too high. My music also sounds great - I found that the problem was crappy speakers, not crappy onboard sound.

 

[AZGamer]

<< There are a lot of VIA haters, and basically, because they just want to hate something. >>





<< VIA = POS! >>



Care to explain why, or just hoping to spread some blind fanatiscism against VIA?

 

[Pabster]

******CONFIRMED******

Pabster is here

Yes, this issue has been hashed and rehashed over and over again the last week-odd. VIA's IDE performance is consistently less than stellar, VIA chipsets are full of bugs and issues, VIA offers little support (the latest "latency patch" isn't even from VIA), and suckers you in to buying a chipset only to release the great "A" revision a short time later.

VIA is suck.

There. Flame suit on!

 

[AA0]

what bugs and issues do VIA chipsets that are not related to Live!? Not many.... they aren't as bad as you want to think they are. Creative drivers suck, there is no way to get around it, they think they are perfect, and they never update them. Anyone buying an Audigy now is somewhat foolish to think they'll get a driver update within a year.


I wish they would stop the A revision thing though, its annoying.

Of all the chipsets I've used, AMDs was the best, and the 2 VIAs were second, KT266A being better than the KT133. ALi was far behind, IDE performance or not, I generally don't spend hours and hours transferring stuff along IDE, and tend not to notice it.

 

[AZGamer]

The AMD 761 still used the VIA 686B southbridge, meaning the IDE performance would be equivalent to the KT133A.

 

[markrb]

I don't doubt that there are issues with the PCI bus in VIA chipsets. I have read this from too many independent sources to just dismiss it as from a shady site.
I have applied the latency patch and my performance has increased a little, but not really that much.
For my home desktop system I highly doubt this issue is any big deal.
I have never had any problems with my two Adaptec SCSI cards or my Sound Blaster Live card on my Via 266a board.
I have no problem buying VIA for my home system.

Having said all that if I am putting together a PC based server I would tend to stick to Intel based systems.
When putting together a server speed is more a secondary issue to reliability and stability under stress.
Another big issue is the time invested in upkeep of the system. On my home system I don't mind installing
new drivers every few weeks, but if I am running a server having to install and reboot a system that often
and taking the chance that the new drivers would cause instability is just not an option.

Unfortunately for AMD having to rely on these third parties to supply the majority of chipsets for their CPU's will keep most corparations from adopting AMD.
Even though I believe that the XP is a superior CPU to the P4.
I really hope AMD will create a chipset creation department on par or better then Intel's. If that happens Intel really has something to worry about.

Mark

 

[AA0]

AMD isn't big enough, they can't afford to make their own chipsets, it keeps them from making cpus, which make a lot more money. The 760 was an amazing chipset, really wish more boards would have used both AMD chips instead of the VIA southbridge. You can put any intel chipset against that.

 

[markrb]

Yeah I know that AMD just doesn't have the resources now, but if they could it would be a wise business desicion if these companies that they rely on can't get their acts together. The more you can control yourself the better.
Imagine if AMD can say "More stable and faster then our competitor." and be able to prove it.
Market share in business machines would skyrocket.
I am not saying that Intel is the Poop on chipsets only that they tend to be more stable and better supported at release.

Mark