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Where's nForce 415-D? Too little, too late?

NFS4

NFS4

No Lifer
Where the heck is the motherboards at?? With KT333/KT333CE and SiS745/746 here (or nearly here) what's up with 415-D? Looking at the numbers, KT333 is 5-10% faster than the KT266 (which was on par with the nForce).

Also, KT333 has native support with ATA-133 and USB 2.0 (USB 2.0 being a big plus IMHO). And KT333CE is shortly going to be a drop in replacement for KT333 adding AGP8x support. ANd since KT333/KT333CE are indeed drop in replacement for motherboard manufacturers with KT266A motherboards, there are BOUND to be 3 - 4x as many choices as nForce or SiS based solutions.

Then there's SiS745 with SiS746 here soon (AGP8x, USB 2.0, Firewire, ATA-133).

And all of the new VIA and SiS boards support DDR333 (I'm hearing that a lot of PC2100 memory can do 166 @ CAS2.5). And with a 1/5 PCI divider, that calls for some 166MHz FSB action 🙂

I guess what I'm trying to say is, is there still any more reason left to wait on 415-D?
 
IMO, 166MHz can only be good after paired up with 166MHz FSB Athlon XPs.

This is what I want from AMD for their CPU:
0.13 Micron die
166MHz FSB
512KB L2 Cache (full speed)

This will sure kick P4's ars.
 
Yep, nforce does look to be a little too late. It was supposed to be out at the end of Jan, now it's the end of Feb and there is no sign of it. If it comes out at $100 I still think it would be a great MB, especially if it can OC good, plus it has the great onboard sound.
 
Well, considering the Abit NV7-133R's specs include:

1. 3 DIMM slots supporting PC1600/PC2100
2. 5 PCI slots
3. nForce Sound
4. Onboard HPT372 ATA/133 RAID controller from HighPoint
5. USB 2.0 controller supporting 4 USB 2.0 ports.
6. Network controller.
7. Is expected to cost around $130.

I'd say that 415-D boards are looking pretty good so far. 🙂

KT333 is only faster than KT266A with PC2700 memory (which isn't official JEDEC approved memory anyway), but I'm sure that KT333 isn't 5-10% faster than KT266A, even with unofficial PC2700 memory (I might be splitting hairs here though 🙂). With PC2100 memory, the KT333 might be a couple % faster than KT266A, certainly nothing noticable.

This 415-D review shows 415-D to be somewhat faster than 420-D using the same type of PC2100 memory. Besides, from looking at the KT333 reviews, any performance difference compared to 415-D is definitely negligible. Even with SiS 735, there's no big real world difference in performance to KT266A, KT333, or nForce.

Btw, I assume you guys are aware that 415-D was released in the UK almost 2 weeks ago.
 


<< Well, considering the Abit NV7-133R's specs include:

1. 3 DIMM slots supporting PC1600/PC2100
2. 5 PCI slots
3. nForce Sound
4. Onboard HPT372 ATA/133 RAID controller from HighPoint
5. USB 2.0 controller supporting 4 USB 2.0 ports.
6. Network controller.
7. Is expected to cost around $130.

I'd say that 415-D boards are looking pretty good so far. 🙂

KT333 is only faster than KT266A with PC2700 memory (which isn't official JEDEC approved memory anyway), but I'm sure that KT333 isn't 5-10% faster than KT266A, even with unofficial PC2700 memory (I might be splitting hairs here though 🙂). With PC2100 memory, the KT333 might be a couple % faster than KT266A, certainly nothing noticable.

This 415-D review shows 415-D to be somewhat faster than 420-D using the same type of PC2100 memory. Besides, from looking at the KT333 reviews, any performance difference compared to 415-D is definitely negligible. Even with SiS 735, there's no big real world difference in performance to KT266A, KT333, or nForce.

Btw, I assume you guys are aware that 415-D was released in the UK almost 2 weeks ago. >>


1) Seriously though, the day that an Abit board debuts at around $130 is the day that I drive a Hyundai😉 Hell, even Abit's MicroATX nForce board debuted at $150+
2) All of those features (besides nForce audio) have been available on KT266A boards for over 6 months now for much less money (MSI K7T266 PRO2-RU, $117)...how about bringing something new to the table?😉 And where is this infamous Abit board?? I've been hearing you talk about it for quite some time now 🙂
3) Last time I checked, the UK isn't the US 😉

Anyway, it's still too little too late IMHO.
 


<<

<< Well, considering the Abit NV7-133R's specs include:

1. 3 DIMM slots supporting PC1600/PC2100
2. 5 PCI slots
3. nForce Sound
4. Onboard HPT372 ATA/133 RAID controller from HighPoint
5. USB 2.0 controller supporting 4 USB 2.0 ports.
6. Network controller.
7. Is expected to cost around $130.

I'd say that 415-D boards are looking pretty good so far. 🙂

KT333 is only faster than KT266A with PC2700 memory (which isn't official JEDEC approved memory anyway), but I'm sure that KT333 isn't 5-10% faster than KT266A, even with unofficial PC2700 memory (I might be splitting hairs here though 🙂). With PC2100 memory, the KT333 might be a couple % faster than KT266A, certainly nothing noticable.

This 415-D review shows 415-D to be somewhat faster than 420-D using the same type of PC2100 memory. Besides, from looking at the KT333 reviews, any performance difference compared to 415-D is definitely negligible. Even with SiS 735, there's no big real world difference in performance to KT266A, KT333, or nForce.

Btw, I assume you guys are aware that 415-D was released in the UK almost 2 weeks ago. >>


1) Seriously though, the day that an Abit board debuts at around $130 is the day that I drive a Hyundai😉 Hell, even Abit's MicroATX nForce board debuted at $150+
2) All of those features (besides nForce audio) have been available on KT266A boards for over 6 months now for much less money (MSI K7T266 PRO2-RU, $117)...how about bringing something new to the table?😉 And where is this infamous Abit board?? I've been hearing you talk about it for quite some time now 🙂
3) Last time I checked, the UK isn't the US 😉

Anyway, it's still too little too late IMHO. >>

To answer your responses...

1. Seriously though, it's a well known fact that 415-D boards are going to be ~ $30 cheaper than 420-D boards depending on the manufacturer. Taking your "$150+" into account, it makes some pretty good sense.

2. More like just under 5 months. Even so, what's your point? How is KT333 any different from this Abit 415-D board? Does KT333 bring anything new to the table besides unofficial PC2700 support?

3. Cmon, now we're just splitting hairs now. 🙂
 


<<

<<

<< Well, considering the Abit NV7-133R's specs include:

1. 3 DIMM slots supporting PC1600/PC2100
2. 5 PCI slots
3. nForce Sound
4. Onboard HPT372 ATA/133 RAID controller from HighPoint
5. USB 2.0 controller supporting 4 USB 2.0 ports.
6. Network controller.
7. Is expected to cost around $130.

I'd say that 415-D boards are looking pretty good so far. 🙂

KT333 is only faster than KT266A with PC2700 memory (which isn't official JEDEC approved memory anyway), but I'm sure that KT333 isn't 5-10% faster than KT266A, even with unofficial PC2700 memory (I might be splitting hairs here though 🙂). With PC2100 memory, the KT333 might be a couple % faster than KT266A, certainly nothing noticable.

This 415-D review shows 415-D to be somewhat faster than 420-D using the same type of PC2100 memory. Besides, from looking at the KT333 reviews, any performance difference compared to 415-D is definitely negligible. Even with SiS 735, there's no big real world difference in performance to KT266A, KT333, or nForce.

Btw, I assume you guys are aware that 415-D was released in the UK almost 2 weeks ago. >>


1) Seriously though, the day that an Abit board debuts at around $130 is the day that I drive a Hyundai😉 Hell, even Abit's MicroATX nForce board debuted at $150+

2) All of those features (besides nForce audio) have been available on KT266A boards for over 6 months now for much less money (MSI K7T266 PRO2-RU, $117)...how about bringing something new to the table?😉 And where is this infamous Abit board?? I've been hearing you talk about it for quite some time now 🙂

3) Last time I checked, the UK isn't the US 😉

Anyway, it's still too little too late IMHO. >>

To answer your responses...

1. Seriously though, it's a well known fact that 415-D boards are going to be ~ $30 cheaper than 420-D boards depending on the manufacturer. Taking your "$150+" into account, it makes some pretty good sense.

2. More like almost 5 months. Even so, what's your point? How is KT333 any different from this Abit 415-D board? Does KT333 bring anything new to the table besides unofficial PC2700 support?

3. Cmon, now we're just splitting hairs now. 🙂 >>


1) It can't be a FACT if you don't have anything to show for it other than rumours from The Inquirer😉 I don't see how an Abit board with 5 PCI slots, onboard ATA-133 RAID, onboard USB 2.0, and onboard LAN is going to debut cheaper than Abit's MicroATX nForce board which has only 3 PCI slots, onboard video, and onboard LAN. Come on, let's not be ridiculous here😉 BTW, the Abit MicroATX board is still $138.

2) First off, the KT333 has native ATA-133 and USB 2.0 support. You don't have to use a crappy Highpoint controller to get the ATA-133 support. And as far as I know, since the USB 2.0 and ATA-133 is incorporated into the southbridge, it uses VIA's V-Link bus instead of taking of PCI bus time (as onboard NEC USB 2.0 and Highpoint RAID would just be two more PCI devices tacked on).

And the point is , we have SO MANY more choice to choose from with KT333 boards b/c every manufacturer has a KT266A design...this is just a drop in replacement.

3) I know 😉
 
does the kt266a have 1/5 pci divider? if so, really, whats the difference between kt333 and kt266a? guaranteed to run at 166 mem i guess. if your ram will get there.

the coolest thing i've seen with nforce is that pci is locked at 33mhz, so you don't even have a chance of having your hard drive hold back your overclocking.


and to add to the athlon wish list, make it a 256 bit bus to cache, not this 64 bit BS. 256 bits to cache, even if it could only be accessed every other cycle, kept the p3 in the game.
 
The Nforce has a fixed pci frequency. That's the nicest feature in my own opinion. The KT333 is not going to be a hit in the enthusiast market because it doesn't have a /5 divider. Which means your pci deviced will be running out of spec when overclocking.

I have 50 Gig+ mp3 on my harddrive. It's taken me years to download. No way I'll chance running my drives on an out of spec bus.

Anyway. The Asus 415 board is available here in Sweden now for about $147. That includes very nice onboard sound and a NIC.

hmm.. just thought of something... The onboard IDE controller.. would that be running on the pci bus or....?

In case it does the Nforce will definitely be the best overcklockers board for the XP..You could get some good DDR and perhaps run @ 166 mhz mem AND FSB! .. The AGP would be out of spec but 83 mhz ain't that bad. If not.. well.. then it sux just as bad as any other chipset. Unless you wanna spend money on a separate controller.



 


<< Where's nForce 415-D? Too little, too late? >>

If the nForce didn't even exist at this point, it would be like the same thing. It's a fart in the breeze as far as I'm concerned. Maybe the hype for nF2 will materialize into something better.
 


<<

<< Where's nForce 415-D? Too little, too late? >>

If the nForce didn't even exist at this point, it would be like the same thing. It's a fart in the breeze as far as I'm concerned. Maybe the hype for nF2 will materialize into something better. >>


A fart in the breeze?? I've never heard that one before.
 


<< A fart in the breeze?? I've never heard that one before. >>

Heh, I'm sure it's as old as dirt. Think I first heard it in a book by Gary Gygax. I can claim no credit but it is a beautiful phrase!
 
1) It can't be a FACT if you don't have anything to show for it other than rumours from The Inquirer I don't see how an Abit board with 5 PCI slots, onboard ATA-133 RAID, onboard USB 2.0, and onboard LAN is going to debut cheaper than Abit's MicroATX nForce board which has only 3 PCI slots, onboard video, and onboard LAN. Come on, let's not be ridiculous here BTW, the Abit MicroATX board is still $138.

We'll see. But when I turn out to be right...😉

2) First off, the KT333 has native ATA-133 and USB 2.0 support. You don't have to use a crappy Highpoint controller to get the ATA-133 support. And as far as I know, since the USB 2.0 and ATA-133 is incorporated into the southbridge, it uses VIA's V-Link bus instead of taking of PCI bus time (as onboard NEC USB 2.0 and Highpoint RAID would just be two more PCI devices tacked on).

How the heck are Highpoint controllers "crappy." Have you seen any reviews comparing VIA's own native support versus Highpoint? Unless I'm smoking crack, Highpoint usually performs better. And what's V-link's throughput, like 266MB/s? Even though that would be faster than going through the PCI bus, like I said before, it doesn't result in a real world gain.
 
I would think that the sudden interest in the Northwood Intel CPU's would hurt the whole AMD scene a lot more than competition w/in.

Northwood has got to have hurt AMD MB sales a lot.
 


<< 1) It can't be a FACT if you don't have anything to show for it other than rumours from The Inquirer I don't see how an Abit board with 5 PCI slots, onboard ATA-133 RAID, onboard USB 2.0, and onboard LAN is going to debut cheaper than Abit's MicroATX nForce board which has only 3 PCI slots, onboard video, and onboard LAN. Come on, let's not be ridiculous here BTW, the Abit MicroATX board is still $138.

We'll see. But when I turn out to be right...😉

2) First off, the KT333 has native ATA-133 and USB 2.0 support. You don't have to use a crappy Highpoint controller to get the ATA-133 support. And as far as I know, since the USB 2.0 and ATA-133 is incorporated into the southbridge, it uses VIA's V-Link bus instead of taking of PCI bus time (as onboard NEC USB 2.0 and Highpoint RAID would just be two more PCI devices tacked on).

How are the Highpoint controllers "crappy." Have you seen any reviews comparing VIA's own native support versus Highpoint? Unless I'm smoking crack, Highpoint usually performs better. And what's V-link's throughput, like 266MB/s? Even though that would be faster than going through the PCI bus, like I said before, it doesn't result into a real world gain. >>


After being screwed up the butt by Highpoint with a dual Western Digital Expert 27.3 setup, I'm not going with them again😉 And I've heard enough complaints on this board about the Highpoint controllers.

Also, I would ALWAYS choose native ATA-133 support within the chipset over some third-party chip. And I'd be willing to bet that VIA's onboard ATA-133 performance is better than Highpoints...but we'll just have to wait for disk benchmarks.
 


<< I would think that the sudden interest in the Northwood Intel CPU's would hurt the whole AMD scene a lot more than competition w/in.

Northwood has got to have hurt AMD MB sales a lot. >>

Where? In the overclocking community that represents .00001% of AMD's sales?

The only difference between the AXP and Willamette situation last year compared to the AXP NW situation this year is the overclocking factor, nothing more. This won't effect AMD's OEM sales, small business or education sales, and/or multiprocessor sales.
 
NFS4 wrote:

"And I'd be willing to bet that VIA's onboard ATA-133 performance is better than Highpoints..."

Let me get my little black bookie's tablet out and notate that 😀

You either have a big tax refund you'd like to give out, or you've recently inherited a nice chunk of change. 😛

I'll wager that VIA's south bridge ATA/133 performance will be lower than HPT372/374.
 
And I've heard enough complaints on this board about the Highpoint controllers.

And you haven't heard enough complaints on this board about VIA chipsets? 😉 Really now, until you try it, I wouldn't claim them to be "crappy", especially since we're comparing to VIA.
 


<< And I've heard enough complaints on this board about the Highpoint controllers.

And you haven't heard enough complaints on this board about VIA chipsets? 😉 Really now, until you try it, I wouldn't claim them to be "crappy", especially since we're comparing to VIA. >>


I'll give you that one😉
 
I don't care how late the 415-D is. I like the thought in the back of my mind that Nvidia is out there making dual-channel ddr chipsets! We're not going to buy them anytime soon, so who cares if it comes late 😕 The 420 can definately keep pace with the KT333 and the stability reports so far on nForce sound pretty good. It's hard not to be impressed by what Nvidia has done by entering the chipset market. They are the newcommers, the underdogs and here we are complaining that they aren't on the release schedule of the Goliath of AMD chipsets? Hurray Nvidia! Congratulations on what you've accomplished so far with chipsets!

😉
 
Just got myself an Asus n-FORCE mobo ( after sticking with an Epox 8KHA+, which is a superbly stable board) and I am yet to install it. There are many selling points of the N-force chipset, one is nvidia support ( as in solid drivers and not the dizzying array of VIA 4-in-1 versions), another is the sweet, built-in sound card AND LAN ( spares me two PCI slots ). Technologically, n-Force based mobos are more advanced ( like hypertransport, dual memory buses, fixed PCI divider, etc) and their performance will only get better with subsequent BIOS revisions. Judging from the review over at Ace' Hardware here,, a properly tweaked nforce mobo WILL out run mobos based on the KT266A.
 
Dang! I hit back and lost my post!!!!

Ok, to sum up. I have to agree that nForce is getting late but it still does have a chance. It still may end up being cheaper than 266A boards. But, I don't think upon release it will be a huge hit.

I do think though that nForce has enormous potential. When I look at the market, I see VIA having a huge market share for the AMD platform, but I feel that VIA is not going to be able to keep up. If you look at where VIA made their name in the past, it was mostly when they were alone (133, they had the only 133fsb compatible platform with SDRAM for the OEM's, and in AMD, they were alone from the Slot A all the way up to ALi MAGiK (AMD 750 doesn't count)) and really, VIA is not alone at all anymore in both P4 and AMD markets. For AMD we have VIA, SiS, ALi, soon ATi, and nVidia, and for the P4, we have the same except take out nVidia and add Intel. I think that what has kept VIA going over the past year was simply put, cold feet from the motherboard manufacturer's to use SiS 735/745 and nForce. Do not get me wroong, KT266A is a great solution, but I feel that in terms of stability, and reliability, SiS and nForce both have the edge over 266A and the only mobo makers have limited SiS and nForce's adoption.

I feel that nForce even as it is now, is a wonderful solution and it I feel is the msot stable platform for any CPU avialable except for Intel's chipsets. And people aren't going to stand for VIA much longer. That's my take. nVidia is here to stay and they I feel over time with SiS will take over VIA's place in the market.
 
I don't profess to be as hip on the technology as a lot of you guys, but I'm really curious about something. This little quote here;



<< Also, I would ALWAYS choose native ATA-133 support within the chipset over some third-party chip. And I'd be willing to bet that VIA's onboard ATA-133 performance is better than Highpoints...but we'll just have to wait for disk benchmarks. >>



"Native ATA133 support" sounds good...but it's a moot point anyway since we're not even near to using up ATA100s capabilities yet.

Also, I assume that you're not taking into account running a RAID 0 stripe on the Highpoint controller? A stripe would beat the daylights out of a single drive on either the HPT372 or Via's KT333. Please don't flame me too badly if I'm out in left field here.

I just ran some SANDRA2002 benchies on my new KT266A rig last night. I'm running a stripe on the HPT372 controller, and my sequential reads are 59MB/s and writes in the low 50'sMB/s range (forget the exact number.) That's pretty darned fast, AFAIK.

That compares very favorably to the high 30s'/low40sMB/s I get with my backup HD, which is a 7200RPM drive on an ATA100 controller card.

OK, that's it. I just wanted to say that....*ducks under the incoming bullets*
 


<< I don't profess to be as hip on the technology as a lot of you guys, but I'm really curious about something. This little quote here;



<< Also, I would ALWAYS choose native ATA-133 support within the chipset over some third-party chip. And I'd be willing to bet that VIA's onboard ATA-133 performance is better than Highpoints...but we'll just have to wait for disk benchmarks. >>



"Native ATA133 support" sounds good...but it's a moot point anyway since we're not even near to using up ATA100s capabilities yet.

Also, I assume that you're not taking into account running a RAID 0 stripe on the Highpoint controller? A stripe would beat the daylights out of a single drive on either the HPT372 or Via's KT333. Please don't flame me too badly if I'm out in left field here.

I just ran some SANDRA2002 benchies on my new KT266A rig last night. I'm running a stripe on the HPT372 controller, and my sequential reads are 59MB/s and writes in the low 50'sMB/s range (forget the exact number.) That's pretty darned fast, AFAIK.

That compares very favorably to the high 30s'/low40sMB/s I get with my backup HD, which is a 7200RPM drive on an ATA100 controller card.

OK, that's it. I just wanted to say that....*ducks under the incoming bullets* >>


I'm not talking about RAID performance😉 I'm just talking about a single drive ATA-133 drive on a VIA IDE controller instead of on a third party RAID controller with its own boot ROM.
 
Ah, OK then. 🙂

Well, personally, I would STILL buy a RAID-equipped board even if I wasn't going to use RAID. Two extra IDE channels are a nice thing to have. Have a good day, NFS4.🙂
 
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