Asrock K7S8X - SiS 746FX based - review on OCW

[Zepper]

Interesting review, but still looks like the Iwill K7S2 is the 746FX mobo to be waiting for.
Here it is: Linkage .
.bh.

 

[Peter]

746FX that is. It'll still be ECS L7S7A2 for me - board is much smaller, yet still has onboard FireWire right there. Since ASRock has been erected to eat into ECS revenues, the price will be about the same

 

[Zepper]

I've considered several ECS mobos, but then I consider the total picture and continue to avoid them. Who else claims that a Duron 950 is a 1400+ except the ECS/PC Cheaps/Amptron group of companies??? And I think the writing's on the wall for Firewire. It's going to be relegated to a niche technology like SCSI. And if I ever find I need it, it's just a $15. add-on card.
.bh.

 

[yodayoda]

well, firewire is niche unless you have a DV camera or a Ipod--two goodies on my xmas list.

 

[Zepper]

Check the Iwill section of the OCW forums. Unless the MSI has something really cool up its sleeve, then the Iwill shades 'em all...
.bh.

 

[Peter]

ah well ... if all else fails, let's pull the "ECS is crap anyway" wildcard. Pathetic.

Anyway, if I can get chipset integrated firewire for free, I'm not going to put my bets on a PCI card (which is more like $40 if you want a good one) that is substantially slower, because it's on PCI not the eight times as fast chipset internal bus.

 

[WetWilly]

That Asrock board continues Asus' trend of making decent SiS/AMD boards and issuing minimally functional BIOSes for them. A7S333 anyone?

I'm interested in a 746FX board as well to replace my MSI 745 Ultra that's doing yeoman's duty (9.5x190MHz); if it had one more PCI slot I wouldn't be looking to replace it. Unfortunately (and I hope not ominously) the Iwill K7S2 isn't on the US site but is on Iwill's Asian/Global sites. I hope that doesn't mean that the US market won't see it.

It'll still be ECS L7S7A2 for me

Peter - what prices do you have for the L7S7A2 with FireWire? Extrapolating from the Asian prices, it looks like the non-FireWire version will be going for ~$75 in the US. If the FireWire version is much more than that, they'll be in nForce territory.

Anyway, if I can get chipset integrated firewire for free

I agree, but I'm not sure of the situation vis a vis the K7S2 since its final price isn't set yet. Last I heard, Iwill was targeting the boards at $70-80; not sure how true it is, but from the K7S2 pics I've seen, Iwill has been stripping the board:

1) The 4-pin 12v connector has disappeared even though the solder points haven't
2) Onboard firewire IS physically present (SiS 963 + Realtek PHY + headers) on all pics, but the board specs list the SiS 963L and no FireWire
3) Iwill is using the Realtek ALC650 for audio, but is only implementing 2-channel sound
4) A non-LAN version has been announced

I'd guess they're trying to cut the costs as much as possible to push the price into ECS/Asrock territory.

I'm not going to put my bets on a PCI card (which is more like $40 if you want a good one)

I'm not sure how you define "good" but 3-port TI chipset FireWire cards (generally considered better than NEC, Agere or VIA) can be had for less than $10. $40 + shipping will get you a FireWire/USB 2.0 combo board with VIA or Agere FireWire controllers. I've been using one of those $10 boards on my 745 Ultra with no problems at all. Then again, if MSI had used the 745's integrated 1394 controller I wouldn't be looking for a new board ...

that is substantially slower, because it's on PCI not the eight times as fast chipset internal bus.

Do you have any benchmarks/reviews to illustrate that? I'm not doubting you at all, but I'd be curious to see how substantially much faster MuTIOL (or nForce2's HT for that matter) FireWire is over PCI when testing FireWire throughput and CPU utilization. For all the reviews I've read of SiS 963/nForce2 systems I haven't seen ANYBODY benchmark native FireWire or USB 2.0 versus PCI versions. It's amazing how so many reviews would overlook that, but that's a whole other issue The only analogous thing that comes to mind is nForce audio which most everyone assumed, without any testing, would have less CPU utilization than PCI audio cards. Of the two nForce audio-specific reviews I've seen, nForce is matched or beaten by the Audigys and even on several benches by a Hercules Fort III. Interesting stuff about nVidia cutting some corners on the DD encoding, too.

Regardless, I hope a decent tweaker's board (like the 745 Ultra) based on the 746FX makes it to market. I like the SiS chipset a lot, but it's getting tough when the SiS mobo makers can't get their act together and boards like the Epox 8RDA+ (nForce2 + MCP2-T + 6 PCI slots) are now available for just over $100.

Peter, BTW - I'll spare you my fresh new "It doesn't work with VIA but works perfectly with SiS" story

 

[mechBgon]

Looks like SiS may have a worthwhile successor to the 735 there. I did wonder a bit at this, however:

[*]EPoX 8RDA+ running in Dual channel DDR266
[*]2 x 256M Kingmax DDR333 module
[*]AMD AXP 2700+

I hope that's a typo, because that's pretty unfair to the nForce2 platform to run it, not only out of sync, but with the memory running slower than the CPU's FSB as well. Talk about your data-starved AthlonXP...

 

[Peter]

There have been plenty of USB 2.0 throughput tests using PCI cards and chipset integrated solutions. Just look at those to get an idea of what the performance difference is.

Prices ... the full blown L7S7A (non-2) that has serial ATA on top of the L7S7A2 is advertized for 89 euros here in Germany (although equally unavailable as yet). Equally full featured nForce-2 boards go for 124 euros and up in the same shop.

With L7S7A2 being the minimized version (no SATA, much smaller PCB) I expect prices to be even lower.

Sure, everyone's free to fit either the 963 or 963L(ight) south bridge, with and w/o firewire support respectively - without having to change the board layout it seems. ECS could do so too, pushing price down even further

 

[Cerb]

Asrock, a subsidiary of ASUS hopes to secure the budget sector to compete head to head with ECS which was rather successful with its low cost integrated solutions.

If that's true, how can you pull the "avoid ECS" card? I don't know about the whole Duron thing, as I've only seen combos that stated actual MHz, no PR. But if Asus feels the need to compete with them...good for all of us. If ECS can pull something as good as the K7S5A out, great. If not, well, it looks like there will be others in direct competition.