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When thinking about motherboards, many people think of popular companies such as Intel, Abit, Asus, etc. They have provided quality motherboards for many years now and are brands that can be trusted. What I wasn't aware of is that the fact that Tul makes motherboards as well. With the recent review of Tul's PowerColor Radeon X800XT as well as other reviews I had seen of their products, they have made excellent graphics cards with their award winning PowerColor series. Now, Tul has brought the PowerColor series name to their motherboards as well. I was surprised when I first learned that Tul made motherboards, because they have released quite a few of them already. I suppose that many of us have not really heard about their motherboard products because we simply have not heard much news about them. Today, we had the chance to review Tul's PowerColor A350-VF motherboard. |
There are two important aspects that we will examine in this motherboard. The most important aspect about this board is that this motherboard is based on ATI's 9100 Pro IGP chipset. Second, in this review, we will examine the quality and features of this board. This can easily be determined by benchmarking it in a variety of tests and comparing it with a chipset similar in features with Intel.
The 9100 Pro IGP Chipset
It is quite obvious that ATI makes excellent graphics cards. ATI decided to bring their knowledge of graphics cards into the integrated realm of motherboards. The 9100 Pro IGP is a breakthrough because it provides the most advanced integrated graphics solution on motherboards today. With full support of DirectX 8.1 and pixel shading technology, it is capable of providing a rich graphics experience. This chipset is very flexible because it is compatible with the latest processors and technologies. This was created to provide an all around package that is very affordable. Here is a specific list of features you can expect to find in the 9100 Pro IGP (obtained from ATI's website):
CPU Interface
-Up to 800 MHz CPU FSB for Intel® Pentium® 4 Processor
-Supports Intel® Hyper-Threading™ processors
-In-Order Queue (IOQ) depth of 12
-Supports Dynamic Bus Inversion (DBI)
-Supports system bus interrupt delivery
System Logic Features
-Integrated master clock generator with spread spectrum support
-AGP 3.0 compliant AGP 8X interface with Fast Write support
-266MB/second point-to-point interface to ATI IXP in A-Link mode
-Unified Memory Architecture (UMA)
-Dual channel 128-bit DDR SDRAM memory interface
-DDR400 SDRAM support provides up to 6.4 GB/second bandwidth
-Up to 4 GB DRAM support with two unbuffered DIMMs
-16 MB to 128 MB of main memory configurable as display memory
-Up to 8 USB2.0 ports
-Up to 2 SATA ports
-Two independent IDE channels with support of mode 0 to 4, and ATA 100
-Supports LPC based Super I/O
-Integrated 3-COM™ Ethernet controller
3D Graphics Features
-HyperZ™ memory optimization technology
-Hardware with Pixel Shader 1.4 support
-Supports up to 2048x1536 @ 32bpp.
-Supports 3D textures and Microsoft® DirectX® texture compression
-Anisotropic texture filtering and Full Screen Anti-Aliasing (FSAA)
Video Features
-Video scaling and filtering with advanced 4-tap horizontal and vertical filter
-Integrated hardware motion compensation and iDCT
-Enhanced MPEG-2 hardware decode
-Hardware DVD sub-picture decode
-Video deblocking with FULLSTREAM™
2D Graphics Features
-Highly optimized 128-bit 2D Engine
-Hardware cursor up to 64x64x32 BPP
-Supports a maximum resolution of 2048x1536 @ 32bpp.
-Support for Microsoft® Windows® XP alpha cursor
Display Controller
-Dual CRT controllers provide independent dual display support
-Display rotation support
-Comprehensive DDC and hot plugging support
-Integrated high precision 300MHz triple 10-bit DAC supports resolutions up to 2048 x 1536
Flat Panel Monitor Support
-12-bit digital output to support DVI, DFP and VESA P&D via external TMDS
-Supports up to 1600x1200 screen resolution for LCD panels
-Support for VESA defined reduced blanking modes
TV-Out Support
-Integrated TV encoder with composite, S-Video, and RGB interfaces
-Supports PAL/NTSC TV formats
-10-bit DAC with 8-tap filter and ATI-exclusive enhancements
-Macrovision 7.02 copy protection standard
-Supports up to 1024x768 32bpp mode
Optimized Software Support
-Microsoft® DirectX® 8.1 and OpenGL® drivers
-Unified driver support for all RADEON® discrete and integrated graphics products
-Support for Microsoft Windows® XP, Windows® 2000 and Linux
Packaging/Contents
The motherboard was contained in a black box. The motherboard is part of the 'Medusa' series. There is a large Medusa's head at the front of the box. This has no significant meaning other than just a name. The back of the box has a quick description of the features that this motherboard has. It quickly indicates that this motherboard has a powerful integrated graphics solution. When opening the box, I found the contents of the package. Included in this package is a Serial ATA, IDE, and floppy cables. There is a floppy disk containing the drivers if you plan to use your Serial ATA drive in a RAID configuration. The extra software included is a CD containing the complete Cyberlink software suite. This includes PowerDirector SE+ for video editing, MediaShow SE for photo slideshows, PowerDVD for DVD movie viewing, PowerProducer for DVD authoring and burning, and Power2Go for data/music burning. Lastly, there is the typical installation manual and a CD containing the drivers necessary to allow full function of the motherboard.
Although Tul provides the necessary wires, this is more or less an average package for a motherboard. There are no specific features offered exclusively on the motherboard by Tul which is something I would like to see. This would be a good way for Tul to differentiate their products from the major competitors. The Cyberlink software is more of a 'nice to have' rather than a necessity with this motherboard. Other that that, it will still generous of Tul to include it with this package.
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A Closer Look At the Motherboard
This motherboard is specifically designed for the Pentium 4 processor up to 3.4 Ghz as well as Celeron processors. This motherboard supports Intel's Hyper-threading technology for the processors that have it. For Pentium 4 processors, both the latest Prescott and Northwood processors can be used. Since this motherboard supports the latest Prescott processors, it natively supports up to a maximum of 800mhz for the front side bus.
This motherboard supports the both single and dual channel memory. DDR266, 333, and 400 are supported. You can have a maximum of 4GB of memory in the motherboard with each slot containing a maximum of 1GB of memory.
This board has a total of 5 PCI slots and a single AGP slot that supports both 4X and 8X graphics cards. Unfortunately, this motherboard does not support the latest PCI Express interface.
I find it puzzling how there are quite a few new motherboards that only support a maximum of ATA100 while there are many hard drives available in the market that support a maximum of ATA133. This motherboard does support up to ATA133 or 133Mbps UltraDMA. I was glad that this motherboard does support the latest hard drive technology with 2 serial ATA ports with up to 1.5Gbps.
With 8 USB 2.0 ports, you will have plenty of USB ports for all your devices. Keep in mind that only 4 of them are available at the back of the motherboard. The other 4 need to be connected to your computer case assuming that your computer case has that many USB ports.
Many gamers as well as typical users are starting to have more than just 2 speakers these days. This motherboard supports up to 6 channels of sound. This means you can plug in your 5.1 channel speaker system. The CD comes with the drivers to allow this to function. When you have the software installed, an icon will show up at the bottom right of your Windows screen. When plugging in my 5.1 channel speakers, it was able to detect it plugged in. With their simple configuration software, you can set up your speakers to make sure that each speaker is in the right spot. In addition, there are two Firewire ports supporting up to a maximum of 400mbps at the back of the motherboard.
The motherboard has a rather typical layout and did not find much too unusual. There is just enough room where the processor goes. There is a line of capacitors close by that you should be aware of if you happen to have an oversized CPU cooler. Typically, the USB port pins are located toward the edge of the board. I found it slightly unusual that the it was right near one of the PCI slots on both sides. Therefore, it is recommended to place the USB connectors first before placing the expansion device in the PCI slot.
The BIOS
One of the most important aspects of a motherboard is the BIOS. The BIOS makes sure that all your basic functions and capabilities of your computer are working properly. For a gamer, the BIOS is an important consideration because it determines whether they can overclock certain aspects of their computer such as the memory and CPU. This motherboard uses the AMIBIOS version 8.00.11. The main part of the bios shows a system overview of the computer. It displays the specific type of processor as well as the exact speed. In this case, my 3.2 Ghz computer runs at 3215 Mhz. Lastly, the main screen shows the amount of memory in the system as well as the typical system time and date.
The advanced menu in the bios contains most of the important functions. This is where you can observe the information everything from your PC health to the detected drives in your computer. Each of the items listed in this menu expand into further menus. I will not go through each of the menu items, but I will explain just the more important ones.
The PC health bios menu is appropriate where it shows a variety of different temperatures in the computer system. It shows the CPU temperature, north bridge temperature, as well as the overall system temperature. The fan speeds plugged into the motherboard complement the temperatures. For those overclockers out there, the voltages are displayed.
In the voltage control menu you will be able to control the voltages to a certain extent for the CPU, memory, and the AGP slot. For instance, you change the voltage on the CPU from 1.075V all the way to 1.1625. Being able to control voltages is extremely important for the overclocker as mentioned before. Changing the voltage allows the overclocker to achieve better stability when overclocking parts of their system.
Also important to the overclocker is the memory options in the bios. In this bios, you can change important items such as the CAS latency as well as the timing. Overall, the options provided are more than enough.
Lastly, you have the ability to disable or enable certain features of the motherboard if you so desire. I'm not sure why though you might want to disable USB 2.0. The temperature control, I have to admit, is a bit sparse of options. All you can do is set the maximum temperature limit before the computer shuts down. I'd like to see a more comprehensive set of options which allow you to specify a range in temperatures as well as warnings when it reaches a specific temperature.
Test Setup/Benchmarks
Here are the specs of the computer used to test the computer. The motherboard was tested with both application and gaming benchmarks. I mainly compared the PowerColor A350A-VF motherboard with an Intel D865GLC motherboard. Both motherboards are extremely similar in terms of features with the exception that the PowerColor motherboard has a better integrated graphics solution considering that it fully supports DirectX8.1 and has pixel shading support. In addition, the PowerColor motherboards has Firewire ports built into the motherboard. The Intel D865GLC motherboard, as the model name suggestions, is based on Intel's 865G chipset.
-Pentium 4 3.2 Ghz Processor (Prescott) running at 800Mhz FSB
-400GB Hitachi 7K400 hard drive (Serial ATA)
-1GB IBM PC2700 DDR memory
-PowerColor X800XT Platinum Edition
-Windows XP w/SP2
-Catalyst 4.08 drivers from ATI
-DirectX 9.0c
Disclaimer: The following benchmark numbers are the values that I obtained when I ran the tests on my machine. If you have any questions or comments about how they were obtained, please contact me. I’d be glad to re-run and retest any benchmarks that you think may be a bit inaccurate. The benchmarks were run in order to provide a general idea of the performance of the card. The results you obtain may be slightly different than mine.
Benchmarks
-PCMark2004
-Sisoft Sandra 2004 Pro
-SuperPi
-3DMark2001
-Aquamark
-UT2004
-Doom 3
-CounterStrike Source Video Stress Test
PCMark2004
The performance of a computer is mainly determined by four major components: the hard drive, graphics, memory, and CPU. PCMark performs common tasks such as file compression, video encoding, accessing data in memory, and even testing video performance. The benchmark has been broken down into the four different categories. We can see that both the PowerColor A350A-VF and the Intel D865GLC both had nearly the same performance in all categories.
Sisoft Sandra 2004
Sisoft Sandra is a commonly used synthetic benchmark whose results have consistently been close to the real world tests. The PowerColor motherboard performed slightly better than the Intel for memory bandwidth. For both the CPU Arithmetic and CPU mult-media tests, both motherboards performed neck and neck with each other.
SuperPi
SuperPi is a program that calculates the time needed to calculate a certain number of digits of 'pi'. In this benchmark, I calculated pi to 1 million digits. This is mainly a CPU intensive task. The PowerColor motherboard fell behind Intel's by 4 seconds which isn't too bad.
3DMark2001
I only decided to use 3DMark2001 rather than 3DMark03 because I think benchmarking today's games will be a more accurate representation. 3DMark2001 tests performance under DirectX8.1. This benchmark has always provided an accurate general idea of the performance in games and also represents how well your older DirectX8.1 games will perform. The PowerColor motherboard fell slightly behind under 1000 points.
Aquamark 3
Aquamark 3 is a benchmark based on a game engine written from scratch. This game engine has been used in games such as Aquanox 2: The Revelation. I did an official benchmark test where the official scores are being reported. The Intel motherboard's score was a bit over 1000 points higher. Nevertheless, both motherboard are extremely close because the Intel motherboard had an average framerate of 51.55fps, whereas the PowerColor motherboard had an average frame rate of 49.77fps. That is less than 2 frames of a difference.
UT2004
Unreal Tournament 2004 is as always an appropriate game to use as a benchmark. It is still a common game played today and provides real world performance. I performed the benchmark in a 3-bot botmatch timedemo on 3 different maps. The scores were then averaged. Again, both motherboards are still neck and neck with only a 2 frame difference.
Doom 3
With Doom 3 having been released already, I found it appropriate to test the motherboards on this latest game. With Doom 3's intense graphics, both motherboards performed the same overall.
CS Source Video Stress Test
As Half-Life 2's release is quickly approaching, I wanted to test the motherboards on the latest Source engine. This will provide a general idea of how well these motherboards will perform on the upcoming Half-Life 2. Again, just like the other game benchmarks, there was less than a 2 frame difference which shows how similar Intel's 865g chipset performed with ATI's 9100 Pro IGP.
A Quick Look At the Integrated Graphics Chip
The integrated graphics chip on the Powercolor motherboard is a very powerful graphics chip for an integrated solution. It supports DirectX 8.1 games as well as pixel shading 1.4 for those extra details. I quickly tested the chip's capabilities by performing the CS Source Video Stress test. The chip performed at a lousy 12.66fps. In addition, I even benchmarked the integrated chip in 3DMark2001. It got a low score of 3090. What does this all mean? Although the integrated graphics chip on this board is definitely more advanced than Intel's integrated graphics chip called the Intel Graphics Extreme 2, you're still going to find it unable or difficult to play today's games. This obviously means that a dedicated graphics solution is still the way to go if you plan to use this motherboard for gaming. The extra capabilities and performance of this integrated graphics chip seems to be meant to provide an overall better visual experience for budget computers. For instance, there will probably be better video playback as well as increased performance when dealing with more intense applications on the web.
Conclusion
With PowerColor still being a new name to the motherboard market, I was impressed at how similar the motherboard performed with the similar Intel 865g chipset. In most of the game benchmarks, the PowerColor motherboard was able to keep up with Intel's with only a maximum of 2 frames of a difference. This motherboard has a list of features and performance that will surely attract those looking for a value motherboard. I would like to see PowerColor add some of their own features to make their motherboard much more unique and to help differentiate it from other motherboard companies.
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