915 Motherboard Roundup: Socket 775 for the Rest of Us
by Wesley Fink on December 7, 2004 12:25 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
Standard Performance Test Configuration
If you are interested in more information comparing the LGA 775 Prescott, Athlon 64, P4, and P4EE, please see our in-depth comparisons in the recent reviews:Intel's Pentium 4 570J - Will 3.8GHz do the trick?
Pentium 4 3.46 Extreme Edition and 925XE: 1066MHz FSB Support is Here
AMD Athlon 64 4000+ & FX-55: A Thorough Investigation
Intel 925X: Exploring the Overclock Lock
Intel's 925X & LGA-775: Are Prescott 3.6 and PCI Express Graphics any Faster?
Intel 925X/915: Chipset Performance & DDR2
Socket 939 Chipsets: Motherboard Performance & PCI/AGP Locks
AMD Athlon 64 3800+ and FX-53: The First 939 CPUs
Intel's Pentium 4 E: Prescott Arrives with Luggage
| Performance Test Configuration | |
| Processor(s): | Intel 560 (3.6GHz) Socket 775 AMD 3500+ (2.2GHz, 90nm) AMD FX55 (2.6GHz) Socket 939 |
| RAM: | 2 x 512MB Crucial/Micron DDR2 533 2 x 512MB OCZ PC3200 Platinum Rev.2 (Samsung 2-2-2-5) |
| Hard Drive(s): | Maxtor MaXLine III 250GB (16MB Cache) Seagate 120GB 7200RPM SATA (8Mb buffer) |
| Video AGP & IDE Chipset Drivers: | Intel Chipset Driver 6.0.0.1014 Intel Application Accelerator 4.0.0.6211 NVIDIA nForce version 4.24 |
| Video Card(s): | AMD X800 XT PCIe nVidia GeForce 6800 Ultra PCIe |
| Video Drivers: | AMD Catalyst 4.11 nVidia 61.77 Graphics Drivers |
| Operating System(s): | Windows XP Professional SP1 |
| Power Supply: | OCZ Power Stream 520W |
| Motherboards: | Abit AG8 (915P) Albatron 915P Pro (915P) AOpen i915Pa-EFRII (915P) Asus P5GD2 Premium (915P) Biostar P4TGP 775 (915P) DFI LANParty UT 915P-T12 (915P) ECS PF4 915P Extreme (915P) Epox 5epa+ (915P) Foxconn 915A01-P-8EKRS (915P) Gigabyte 8GPNXP-Duo (915P) Jetway 915 PDBG (915P) MSI 915P Neo2 Platinum (915P) Soltek SL-915GPro-FGR (915G) Intel 925XCV (Intel 925X) Socket 775 Gigabyte K8NXP-9 (nForce4) Socket 939 ATI Radeon Xpress 200 (RX480) Socket 939 nVidia nForce4 Reference Board Socket 939 |
915/925X memory tests with boards using DDR2 (AOpen, Asus, ECS, Foxconn, MSI) used either Crucial PC2-4300U or Micron PC2-4300U memory modules. These are basically the same memory. The Gigabyte and DFI boards, which run either DDR2 or DDR, were benchmarked with DDR2. DDR2 was run at 3-3-3-10 timings at default voltage, which are faster timings than the SPD 4-4-4-12.
915 boards that use DDR (Abit, Albatron, Biostar, Epox, Jetway, Soltek) were tested with OCZ PC3200 Platinum Rev.2, which is based on Samsung TCCD memory chips, at 2-2-2-5 memory timings at JEDEC standard 2.6V. For consistency, OCZ PC3200 Platinum Rev.2 was also used in tests of the FX55, using the fastest 2-2-2-10 timings on that board. OCZ PC3200 Platinum Rev. 2 is based on Samsung TCCD memory chips, which are used in many premium DDR400 2-2-2 memory brands.
The ATI X800 XT PCIe was used for all 915 and Athlon64 benchmarking, since we do not have a working nVidia 6800 Ultra PCI Express card in the motherboard test lab at the present time. Previous benchmarks of the 925X had been run with the nVidia 6800 Ultra PCIe and are included for comparison. Resolution in all benchmarks is 1024x768x32 unless noted otherwise.
General Performance Benchmarks
Winstones from PC Magazine were used for testing Mutimedia Content Creation and Business Software performance. PCMark2004 from FutureMark is also included as a General Performance benchmark. PCMark2004 is also used in First Look reviews so results will be included in future motherboard tests to provide a consistent database for performance comparison.Workstation Benchmarks NOT Included
Workstation benchmark results were run on all boards using SPECviewperf 8.01. However, as we found on tests with the earlier SPECviewperf 7.1.1, results were extremely variable on the 925X/915 chipsets. Results are inconsistent, with up to 100% variation from one board to another using the same configuration. Therefore, Workstation benchmarks will be excluded from 925X/915 reviews until we can discover and fix the inconsistent results or we can establish a new suite of Workstation benchmarks.Updates to Performance Tests
AutoGK (Auto Gordian Knot) media encoding tests were run with the latest version 1.60 combined with the latest DivX codec 5.2.1. Results of the 2-pass encoding are lower than earlier tests with AutoGK 1.25/DivX 5.1.1 and are not directly comparable to earlier results.Halo has been updated to Version 1.06 for these benchmarks. Far Cry was updated to Version 1.3 in all 915 benchmarks.
Coding for Performance Results
Since the 915 chipset is capable of supporting DDR or DDR2 memory (and either on the Gigabyte and DFI boards), this becomes an important consideration for many buyers. Owners of fast DDR memory may be interested in minimizing the costs of upgrading by using that memory in a 915 motherboard. Others may be specifically looking for DDR2 memory, or the ability to use both. For those reasons test results are color-coded by memory type. All 915 boards supporting DDR are color-coded yellow gold in the test graphs. Boards supporting DDR2 use orange as their color code in the graphs. Boards that support both DDR and DDR2 are colored dark gold in the graphs, but all performance tests on the dual boards were run with DDR2 memory.Reference benchmarks for Athlon 64 are green - FX55 is dark green and 3500+ is light green - and Reference benchmarks for Intel 925X are blue.
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Live - Tuesday, December 7, 2004 - link
Sorry Didn't see your reply before I posted Wesley.Sure there is some value to be had but not "outstanding". I still don't agree with you but I guess my mind is made up. Intel needs to come out with something new before I go back.
As a roundup it was very good reading tough. I can't wait for the next AMD roundup to hit AnandTech.
Live - Tuesday, December 7, 2004 - link
#12"The P5GD2 is an expensive motherboard, at about $240 on the web, but you can get almost all the same features in the P5GD2 Deluxe for about $50 less."
Thats expensive to me. Compare that to the 134.99 for the 939 Gold Editors Choice winner "MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum"
But thats not the point. If the 915P was substantially cheaper then a 939 system you might call it value for money but is it not. Mind you a 939 board is generally not cheap either but at least it delivers in comparison.
The CPU used in the review that hardly beat the much cheaper 3500+ had a max overclock of 14% and I bet you would find it hard to reach that high without the CPU overheating and start throttling http://www.anandtech.com/news/shownews.aspx?i=2345...
LGA775 CPUs does not offer great overclocking headroom compared to the much cheaper earlier Intel platforms or AMD for that matter. Sure they still overclock but nothing that we haven't seen before at higher cost and temperature. Again not what I would call outstanding.
Wesley Fink - Tuesday, December 7, 2004 - link
#11 - We just ran the 3500+ benchmarks in the same configuration this morning, and we do agree that the 3500+ is a particularly good value in performance for the dollar. However, the larger picture of prices of AMD CPUs compared to Intel show the Intel processors are a good, if not outstanding, value.Our conclusion was based on Anand's value analysis in the 3.46EE/1066 launch review at http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?... There he compared the 3800+ at over $600 to a Intel 560 3.6GHz at about $450 and found the 3800+ the winner but probably not a big enough winner to justify the price premium for the 3800+. At that time, there was no 570 (3.8GHz) and the 3.6 was the fastest Intel CPU unless you considered the $1000+ Xeon-based EE processors. Price changes continue, and with them the value relationships do change.
A quick check of prices today shows
Intel 520(2.8GHz)- $160 AMD 2800+(754) - $128
Intel 530(3.0GHz)- $180 AMD A64 3000+ - $152
Intel 540(3.2GHz)- $220 AMD A64 3200+ - $194
Intel 550(3.4GHz)- $282 AMD A64 3400+ - $269
Intel 560(3.6GHz)- $455 AMD A64 3500+ - $270
Intel 570(3.8GHz)- $795 AMD A64 3800+ - $630
AMD A64 4000+ - $716
AMD A64 FX55 - $812
With current prices we would have to agree that there is really no great value advantage to Intel any more. But there is good value in the Intel processors from 2.8GHz (520) to 3.6GHz (560). Certainly the 4000+, at $80 less than the 570 and faster performance, and the FX55 at about the same price as 570 and significantly faster in most benchmarks, are better value at the top. But we still stand by Intel being good value in the middle.
deathwalker - Tuesday, December 7, 2004 - link
"outstanding value and performance for your buying dollar" ?????????? at $240 for a Mobo?..I guess I need to retake Economics 101...Bah...Intel just continues to shot themselves in the foot. A side note not related to this review..Dell must be deep inside of Intel's pocketbook with there contiued refusal to market AMD based products.danidentity - Tuesday, December 7, 2004 - link
#11 - 915P motherboards are not expensive. They are equal or cheaper in price than socket 939 A64 motherboards.LGA775 CPUs offer great overclocking headroom if paired with the right board. Intel CPUs have traditionally have had more OCing headroom than AMD chips. That still holds true, for the most part, today. Especially when talking about the low-end chips, like the 2.8GHz.
Live - Tuesday, December 7, 2004 - link
I'm sorry but I don't see the "outstanding value and performance for your buying dollar"Expensive Motherboards and CPUs with little overclocking headroom compared to the Athlon 64 competition. How does that translate to excellent value and performance? even the much cheaper 3500 comes out on top on most benchmarks.
Sure there are niche markets where the Intel platform excels but for the big majority of us AMD is where its at right now.
I don't think this review is in sync with your conclusion so either list some valid arguments for your point (Since its not there in the benchmarks) or edit the conclusion.
danidentity - Tuesday, December 7, 2004 - link
Wesley, thanks for including tests from a more comparable AMD CPU. Listening to your readers is always appreciated.Wesley Fink - Tuesday, December 7, 2004 - link
#4,#5,#6 - The Athlon 64 results with the FX55 were included for Reference, and not direct comparison. However you do make a good point.The closest A64 we had in the lab to a 3.6GHz 560 was the 3500+ based on the 90nm process. This should provide an advantage to the Intel 560. Since there are complaints here the FX55 is too high end, these new tests tilted toward Intel should balance the playing field. The 3500+ costs about $265 and the Intel 560 (3.6GHz) is about $455, so the 560 is about 70% more expensive than the 3500+.
The added 3500+ benchmarks were also an opportunity to test with the SAME ATI X800XT PCIe we used in benchmarking the 915 boards. Enjoy!
Color codes have been updated and there are now 3500+ results on the Gigabyte nForce4 with the ATI X800XT PCIe in all benchmarks.
Original plans were to include the Intel 570 in this roundup, but much of the testing was already done when the Intel 3.8GHz CPU was launched. This Intel 3.8 is priced at around $800, which is very close to the FX55. You can see how it compares to the FX55 in performance in Anand's launch article at http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?...
CrystalBay - Tuesday, December 7, 2004 - link
It's a pity that all these 4 dimm slot, dual channelMB's have such a rough time doing it. Imagine trying
to run 4 1GB dimms in DC, this goes for ddr1 as well 2.
Glassmaster - Tuesday, December 7, 2004 - link
Now that Northwood and 865/875 are on the way out, only a fool would buy Intel.Glassmaster.