Asus A8N32-SLI Deluxe: NVIDIA Dual x16 for the Athlon 64
by Wesley Fink on November 6, 2005 9:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
Memory Stress Testing
The Asus easily handled 2-2-2-7-1T timings at stock speed, as do almost any of the current boards for AMD Socket 939 from NVIDIA, SiS, VIA, and ULi. The board was completely stable at "Auto" voltage or the lowest "2.6V" memory voltage setting.
*7T was determined by MemTest86 benchmarks to deliver the widest bandwidth with the NVIDIA nForce4 chipset. While the board would operate at tRAS of 5T or lower, all benchmarks were run at 7T for best performance.
Tests with all four DIMM slots populated on the A8N32-SLI required a 2T Command Rate with 4 DIMMs in two dual channels. The 2-2-2-7 timings were still completely stable at minimum voltage. This is the pattern seen on every other top-performing Socket 939 board, except the recently tested ATI RDX200. The DFI ATI can actually defy the laws of AMD and run 4 DS DIMMs at a 1T Command Rate to about DDR405. The performance of the Asus is completely competitive with other top-line NVIDIA chipset motherboards for Socket 939.
The Asus easily handled 2-2-2-7-1T timings at stock speed, as do almost any of the current boards for AMD Socket 939 from NVIDIA, SiS, VIA, and ULi. The board was completely stable at "Auto" voltage or the lowest "2.6V" memory voltage setting.
| Stable DDR400 Timings - 4 DIMMs (4/4 DIMMs populated) |
|
| Clock Speed: | 200MHz |
| CAS Latency: | 2.0 |
| RAS to CAS Delay: | 2T |
| RAS Precharge: | 7T* |
| Precharge Delay: | 2T |
| Command Rate: | 1T |
| Stable DDR400 Timings - 4 DIMMs (4/4 DIMMs populated) |
|
| Clock Speed: | 200MHz |
| CAS Latency: | 2.0 |
| RAS to CAS Delay: | 2T |
| RAS Precharge: | 7T* |
| Precharge Delay: | 2T |
| Command Rate: | 2T |
Tests with all four DIMM slots populated on the A8N32-SLI required a 2T Command Rate with 4 DIMMs in two dual channels. The 2-2-2-7 timings were still completely stable at minimum voltage. This is the pattern seen on every other top-performing Socket 939 board, except the recently tested ATI RDX200. The DFI ATI can actually defy the laws of AMD and run 4 DS DIMMs at a 1T Command Rate to about DDR405. The performance of the Asus is completely competitive with other top-line NVIDIA chipset motherboards for Socket 939.
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Phantronius - Friday, November 4, 2005 - link
Holy shit!!! $250 for one of these boards via newegg!!????Capt Caveman - Friday, November 4, 2005 - link
Newegg = ScreweggMwave has it for $195 in stock. And Mwave will call you to let you know that it shipped.
Zebo - Friday, November 4, 2005 - link
Mwave rocks I'm not even sure why people screw around with newegg anymore. I've ordered my last six or so mobo+cpu combos from mwave always cheapest and a free something... game.. app..etc.Asus appears to be back after lackluster non-existant NF3 and recent NF4 boards! I may get this and I don't even run Sli.. $200 is a little hard to swallow with DFI ultra for $120 but I like silent setup.
Jedi2155 - Friday, November 4, 2005 - link
Wat about Monarch?bob661 - Friday, November 4, 2005 - link
Monarch has it for $249 last I checked. I wouldn't buy from Mwave. Like the other dude said their customer service leaves a LOT to be desired. I'll buy from Newegg. Customer service is top notch and their shipping is super fast. I'll also buy from ZZF. Their customer is also pretty good although shipping a bit slower than Newegg.Leper Messiah - Friday, November 4, 2005 - link
See, I've had both good and bad expierences with mwave, their customer service is crappy (can't understand asians who have been speaking english for a month tops.) but their prices are good. Too bad newegg gouges on Fedex shipping now.BTW, whats going on with the forums? Haven't been able to log in for a while...
xsilver - Monday, November 7, 2005 - link
thats a bit racist isnt it?they have a totally different pronounciation format in their language so they never get the english accent totally right
conversly, even if you learned chinese for 20years your accent would still sound funny
sxr7171 - Friday, November 4, 2005 - link
When SLI was first introduced last year, we were told that 8x was more than enough bandwidth and that currently video cards can't even come close to saturating that bus. Now we have all this dual x16 hype - for what? Were they lying then or are they lying now? I guess it's good for future-proofing and progress is good, the consumer must be aware of it.ElFenix - Friday, November 4, 2005 - link
if they're claiming a goodly reduction in energy usage due to the 8 phase design i'd like to see if it bears out.SnakeJG - Friday, November 4, 2005 - link
I would really love to see you guys test this out by comparing the power draw of different SLI systems, and seeing if the 8-phase design actually saves noticable power.