CrossFire Xpress 3200: RD580 for AM2
by Wesley Fink on June 1, 2006 12:05 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
It will be several weeks until ATI AM2 retail motherboards are available. As a result ATI AM2 testing is confined to the ATI "Sturgeon" reference board. Somebody at ATI Engineering is apparently a fisherman, since all the recent ATI reference boards have carried fish names during development.
Whatever the reasons for ATI's delay in launching chipsets for retail ATI AM2 boards, ATI is not in a very good market position at AM2 launch. With the RD580 arriving months later than expected, at the end of socket 939 development, we really expected RD580 AM2 to be quickly out the gate. Instead NVIDIA has retail AM2 boards available from a host of manufacturers at AM2 launch and ATI is sampling a reference board.
As discussed in past reviews, reference boards are a breed apart. They are designed for manufacturer qualification, and rarely see the light of day in the retail market. The ATI reference boards are a bit different since Sapphire has marketed reference boards under their own brand name in the past. They are expected to do the same with Sturgeon.
Since the ATI CrossFire Xpress 3200 AM2 was designed for qualification, not much time will be spent on layout. Features, other than integrated chipset features, will not be an overriding concern. Additional features can be selected by manufacturers based on their intended market and price point.
Some notes from using the reference board. Loaded with X1900 CrossFire, there are still 2 usable PCIe x1 slots. However, there is no usable PCI slot if CrossFire is installed. Since users who spend over $1000 for video will likely want to use a standalone audio card, this would be a real issue in a retail board. Similarly, with CrossFire installed, the CMOS jumper is hidden under a video card with X1900 XT cards. ATI did users a great service in making dual-channel memory occupy alternate DIMM slots. This provides for much easier cooling of DDR2 DIMMs, which can become very hot when pushing for fastest memory timings.
Basic Features
Reference boards are used mainly for qualification and development by board partners. As a result you will generally see very extensive BIOS options that may or may not appear on retail motherboards. An option of particular interest is the DQS Signal Training option which replaces a wide range of manual DQS skewing options for both memory channels. This worked well in our testing, and made it much simpler to accomodate different memory on this board than the manual skewing controls seen on some other Enthusiast boards.
ATI has aimed their discrete chipset AMD boards squarely at the computer enthusiast. This clearly continues with the CrossFire Xpress 3200 AM2. The range of options and features is the best so far on any ATI motherboard for AMD. This pays off in the tweaking options and performance of the new ATI RD580 AM2.
Whatever the reasons for ATI's delay in launching chipsets for retail ATI AM2 boards, ATI is not in a very good market position at AM2 launch. With the RD580 arriving months later than expected, at the end of socket 939 development, we really expected RD580 AM2 to be quickly out the gate. Instead NVIDIA has retail AM2 boards available from a host of manufacturers at AM2 launch and ATI is sampling a reference board.
As discussed in past reviews, reference boards are a breed apart. They are designed for manufacturer qualification, and rarely see the light of day in the retail market. The ATI reference boards are a bit different since Sapphire has marketed reference boards under their own brand name in the past. They are expected to do the same with Sturgeon.
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| Click to enlarge |
Since the ATI CrossFire Xpress 3200 AM2 was designed for qualification, not much time will be spent on layout. Features, other than integrated chipset features, will not be an overriding concern. Additional features can be selected by manufacturers based on their intended market and price point.
Some notes from using the reference board. Loaded with X1900 CrossFire, there are still 2 usable PCIe x1 slots. However, there is no usable PCI slot if CrossFire is installed. Since users who spend over $1000 for video will likely want to use a standalone audio card, this would be a real issue in a retail board. Similarly, with CrossFire installed, the CMOS jumper is hidden under a video card with X1900 XT cards. ATI did users a great service in making dual-channel memory occupy alternate DIMM slots. This provides for much easier cooling of DDR2 DIMMs, which can become very hot when pushing for fastest memory timings.
Basic Features
| ATI CrossFire Xpress 3200 AM2 | |
| CPU Interface | Socket AM2 |
| Chipset | ATI RD580 Northbridge - ATI SB600 Southbridge |
| Bus Speeds | 200 to 400 in 1MHz Increments |
| Memory Speeds | DDR2 at 400, 533, 667, 800 |
| PCIe Speeds | 100 to 200 in 1MHz Increments |
| PCI/AGP | Fixed at 33/66 |
| Core Voltage | Auto, 0.8V to 1.45V in 0.025V increments |
| CPU PWM Level | 1 to 25 in 1 increments |
| VTT PWM Level | 0.807v to 1.149v in .007v to .014v increments |
| CPU Clock Multiplier | 4x-25x in 1X increments |
| DRAM Voltage | 1.541V to 2.804V in .05v increments |
| HyperTransport Frequency | 1000MHz (1GHz) (Stable in overclocking to 1500+ HT) |
| HyperTransport Multiplier | Auto, 1X to 5X |
| RD580 HT Drive Strength | Auto, Optimal |
| HT Receiver Comp. Ctrl | Auto, Optimal |
| RD580 HT PLL Speed | Auto, High Speed, Low Speed |
| Radeon Xpress (NB) Voltage | 1.143v, 1.201v, 1.260v, 1.299v, 1.348v, 1.406v, 1.455v, 1.504v |
| HT Link Voltage | 1.143v, 1.201v, 1.260v, 1.299v, 1.348v, 1.406v, 1.455v, 1.504v |
| PCIe 1.2 Voltage | 1.143v, 1.201v, 1.260v, 1.299v, 1.348v, 1.406v, 1.455v, 1.504v |
| SB Voltage | 1.143v, 1.201v, 1.260v, 1.299v, 1.348v, 1.406v, 1.455v, 1.504v |
| GFX1/2 (PCIe) Link Width | X16, X8, X4, X2, X1 |
| GFX and/or SB Payload | 64, 32, or 16 Bytes |
| GFX PCIe Link ASPM | Disabled, L0, L1, L0 & L1 |
| GPP PCIe Link ASPM | Disabled, L0, L1, L0 & L1 |
| GFX 0 and/or 1 Slot Power Limit | 0 to 255 watts in 1 watt increments |
| GPP Slot Power Limit | 0 to 255 watts in 1 watt increments |
| AHCP 2.0 (AMD Cool'n'Quiet) | Enabled, Disabled |
| DDR Drive Strength (N) and/or (P) | 0 to 8 in 1 increments |
| DQS Signal Training | Enabled, Disabled |
| Memory Slots | Four 184-pin DDR2 DIMM Slots Dual-Channel Configuration Regular Unbuffered Memory to 4GB Total |
| Expansion Slots | 2 PCIe X16 2 PCIe X1 1 PCI |
| Onboard SATA/RAID | 4 SATA2 Drives by SB600 (RAID 0, 1, 1+0, 10, JBOD) PLUS 4 SATA Drives by 2 Silicon Image 3132 (RAID 0, 1, 0+1, JBOD) |
| Onboard IDE/IDE RAID | One Standard ATA133/100/66 (2 drives) |
| Onboard USB 2.0/IEEE-1394 | 10 USB 2.0 ports supported by SB600 2 Firewire by VIA VT6307 |
| Onboard LAN | PCIe Gigabit by Marvel Yukon 88E8052 PHY |
| Onboard Audio | Azalia HD Audio by Realtek ALC880 codec |
| BIOS Revision | AMI Build 15 - May 30, 2006 |
Reference boards are used mainly for qualification and development by board partners. As a result you will generally see very extensive BIOS options that may or may not appear on retail motherboards. An option of particular interest is the DQS Signal Training option which replaces a wide range of manual DQS skewing options for both memory channels. This worked well in our testing, and made it much simpler to accomodate different memory on this board than the manual skewing controls seen on some other Enthusiast boards.
ATI has aimed their discrete chipset AMD boards squarely at the computer enthusiast. This clearly continues with the CrossFire Xpress 3200 AM2. The range of options and features is the best so far on any ATI motherboard for AMD. This pays off in the tweaking options and performance of the new ATI RD580 AM2.
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lopri - Thursday, June 1, 2006 - link
Most of responses below my post didn't read my points. I'll be paitently waiting for AT staff's responses. In the meantime, you guys can check:http://www.anandtech.com/memory/showdoc.aspx?i=267...">http://www.anandtech.com/memory/showdoc.aspx?i=267...
http://www.anandtech.com/memory/showdoc.aspx?i=239...">http://www.anandtech.com/memory/showdoc.aspx?i=239...
And the sub-reviews. If DDR400(2-2-2) are DDR600(2.5-3-3), I guess all those memory reviews on AT were wasting of time?
Ahe here is the DIMM sticks this review used for AM2 platform.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82...">http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82...
Oh that's not it. While searching, I found that decent DDR2-800 would cost >$250, and higher speed/same timing or same speed/timing sticks will (if you were to buy) dig a big hole in your packet. (think $500) Is that mainstream? What about the 1T issue??
The top of the line Socket 939 vs Socket AM2 comparison could be something like this:
2 x 512MB: DDR600 with 2.5-3-3-7 (less thanl $150) vs DDR2-800 with 3-3-3 ($500) or,
2 x 1GB: DDR500 with 2.5-3-2-7 (less than $200) vs DDR200-800 with 4-4-4 ($250)
Think about how mwny mobo/memory reviews we've seen here on AT? Why don't we use the knowledge we learned from those founding to compare Socket 939 and Socket AM2?
Spoelie - Thursday, June 1, 2006 - link
You need a reality check. Lots of reviews have pointed out that the higher cost of TCCD memory and such is not worth the little extra performance, except if you're a serious overclocker that just really wants to run his mem on 1:1 and need the frequency headroom.The common setup out there is not 270-2.5/3/2 or whatever, it is 200-2.5/3/3/8 or even CL3. Especially with the higher density memories like 1GB sticks. THAT is what most persons are running. If anything, the 2/2/2 200 are a bit too high end for the majority of people. And they're also reading AT.
lopri - Thursday, June 1, 2006 - link
What you're saying is not totally out of my context. My main meat was towards the reviewers. Does anyone here own a DDR2-800/3-3-3? (Forget about TCCD 270MHz) DO you know how much they are? Indeed, such memory is not even officially out yet. But AT is using those sticks for AM2 system but at the same time for Socket 939 system they use more "pedestrian" DDR400/2-2-2. These days you can by 2 x 1GB DDR400/2-3-2 for under $200.Wesley Fink - Thursday, June 1, 2006 - link
The Corsair 8500 we used for testing is NOT rated at DDR2-800 3-3-3 - it is actually rated at DDR2-1066 5-5-5-15. The fact is it will run at DDR2-800 3-3-3 with voltage in the 2.1 to 2.2v range. So will most other recent dimms based on Micron memory chips. At stock voltage of 1.8v it runs about 4-4-4-13.Where TCCD was capable of DDR400 2-2-2 and DDR500 2.5-2-3 or 2.5-3-3, Micron chips are currently the top-performing chips for DDR2. Infineon also has DDR2 chips that perform at lower latency and they are generally priced more reasonably.
Our memory articles ALWAYS compare performance at different memory speeds, but the fact is DDR400 was the fastest memory standard for DDR. Anything higher was overclocking. For DDR2, we have DDR2-800 as the current highest standard speed, though there will likely be a DDR2-1066 speed in the near future.
When we point out that the massive bandwidth increases in DDR2 on AM2 have almost no impact on performance, surely it is obvious that AM2 is not memory bandwidth starved. We found on DDR that the on-chip memory controller for AMD was very sensitive to latency improvements. In fact hte mad shrimp article unintentionally shows just that - gaming responded more to latency improvement than bandwidth improvement. That will also likely be the case in DDR2 EXCEPT with such a massive increase in bandwidth over DDR, latency may not matter nearly so much. We will take a closer look at htis in a future memory article.
peternelson - Thursday, June 1, 2006 - link
Price of fast, low latency DDR2 will come down once AMD users start buying it in volume. That will come, so it is not unrealistic to benchmark now using fast expensive highend memory, because it won't be as expensive or uncommon in a month or two or three when boards are in most stores and consumers are buying them in bulk eg for "back to school/college" or "Christmas holidays season" which are when sales peak. Conroe should also improve the market availability for high performance DDR2 memory.
On the other hand there are reports of far east short-term wholesale prices of ddr2 generally having a rise because of more demand.
Spoelie - Thursday, June 1, 2006 - link
http://www.madshrimps.be/?action=getarticle&ar...">http://www.madshrimps.be/?action=getarticle&ar...peternelson - Thursday, June 1, 2006 - link
AMD are moving to AM2 with or without you.
Get over it.
You will not be able to get AMD's top performing new models if you stay with 939. Ditto the 65nm processors will also be on AM2.
939 WILL be phased out sooner or later, and with it goes DDR support.
Therefore it is somewhat irrelevant question to complain about the speed of the DDR. There won't BE any DDR support going forwards. Make the transition.
lopri - Thursday, June 1, 2006 - link
Did you even read my post? What was I saying?It has nothing to do with AM2 transition and I have nothing against AM2.
peternelson - Thursday, June 1, 2006 - link
Yes, the ddr comments relate to your Q1 section, not the DDR2 discussion.
Sorry if my response seemed overly critical.
lopri - Thursday, June 1, 2006 - link
On page 3, in the tablePCIe Speeds | 100 to 2000 in 1MHz Increments