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ECS 755-A2: Performance and Value for the Athlon 64
ECS 755-A2: Performance and Value for the Athlon 64
Date: January 30th, 2004
Topic: Motherboard
Manufacturer: Elitegroup Computer Systems
Author: Wesley Fink
 
 


It's been almost two months since we took a close look at the SiS 755 chipset for the Athlon 64. After comparing it to other chipsets on the market, we awarded the SiS 755 our Editor's Choice award for the best Athlon 64 chipset. As impressed as we were with the SiS 755 Reference Board, it has taken quite a while for production motherboards to actually make it to market. The first to appear was the ECS 755-A, a value board that is selling in the US for about $80. We were not impressed with our early sample of the 755-A, since it ran our standard DDR400 at DDR333 speed, so we asked ECS if this would be the final board. ECS told us that they would be updating the 755-A very quickly to the 755-A2, a revision tweaked for best performance of the 755 chipset. We, therefore, decided to wait for a review until the 755-A2 was available.

The 755-A2 is a better performer than the earlier 755-A, with performance more on par with the SiS 755 Reference Board, and that is not faint praise. We also found no problems with Revision A2 running DDR400 memory at rated speed. It is still a value board in the Socket 754 Athlon 64 market, and it will likely find itself paired with many of the lower-priced 3000+ and 3200+ A64 processors. However, the SiS 755 Reference Board in our earlier review distinguished itself by being the fastest Socket 754 chipset that we had yet tested. It was also the only chipset with full support for the 800 (1600MT/s) Hypertransport bus combined with a working AGP/PCI lock. With that in mind, we will find out how the ECS 755-A2 compares to the best Athlon 64 boards that we have tested.

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14 Comments - Last by Glenngalata, 2074 days ago
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No Subject by NFS4, 2202 days ago
After getting burned with "DDR333 only" support on my 755-A (even after ECS plastered stickers on the box and specs on the website claiming DDR400 support), I won't be going with them any time soon.

Good thing NewEgg took back my board even though it was past NewEgg's 30 day warranty period. Shows you what a good company NewEgg is and how they look out for their customers. ECS, are you listening?

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No Subject by microAmp, 2202 days ago
What board did you get in replacement NFS4?

I returned my ECS board back to NewEgg too and settled for the ASUS K8V.

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No Subject by gglawits, 2202 days ago
When one clicks the "Buy it from ioCombo for $84.95" link, what comes up is the 755-A, not the 755-A2.

Some people might not notice the difference and order the old 755-A anyway. Major goof-up.

Either remove that link altogether or make it point to a 755-A2.

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No Subject by KillaKilla, 2202 days ago
NFS4- I agree, newegg support/ruturning is quite excelent.

When is the Asus version coming out? They're generally better than ECS.

Why did they use the 9800Pro-128? Why not the XT? I would think that to test the MB/CPU combo you would want to eliminate as much of other bottlenecks as posible.

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No Subject by KristopherKubicki, 2202 days ago
Unfortunately since we have labs all over the country we try to standardize as much as possible. Even though Wesley used a 9800 Pro, he used the same testbed that Anand, Derek and Evan use - we eliminate as many variables as possible.

Kristopher

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No Subject by TrogdorJW, 2201 days ago
This board is a perfect example of why 64-bit is really meaningless for the most part. Two DIMM slots? Not that it really matters, since pretty much all of the other A64 motherboards have issues with populating all three DIMM slots anyway.

The reason to buy Athlon 64 is that it's faster (and cheaper, relative to the 3.0 and 3.2 GHz P4 chips) in 32-bit software. (Just purchased parts for a 3000+ for a friend - I'll be building it this weekend.) 64-bit software will come during the life of the PC, sure, but you definitely won't need to switch to 64-bit anytime soon. Unless youre running into memory limitations, in which case you better be prepared to pony-up for the Opteron or Athlon FX!

As for ECS, I've only used two of their motherboards in my PC building life, and neither one impressed me. They may work okay, but I question the long-term choice of their boards over MSI, Asus, A-bit, etc. The 755-A was a prime example of why I no longer consider ECS boards an option. On the bright side, they're usually hella cheap. (And you get what you pay for....)

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No Subject by NFS4, 2201 days ago
KillaKilla, I got a Biostar NF3 board from ZipZoomFly

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No Subject by Wesley Fink, 2201 days ago
AMDMB and others have flashed the A2 BIOS to Rev A boards and found that DDR400 then works fine. The mod in the ECS Forum there has his basic Samsung memory now running at DDR432 after the flash. He also reports the memory timings from the 12/25 A2 are now on his Rev A and they work fine.

In addition a BIOS modder has uncovered hidden vCore adjustments and additional options in the 12/25 A2 BIOS. You can find tne 12/25 BIOS at the AMDMB Forums ECS Forum at http://forums.amdmb.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=293252. I am told the modded BIOS will also post there soon.

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No Subject by justly, 2201 days ago
I don't see the reason to bash the 755-A2 just because of the troubles that people had with the 755-A. The 755-A was the very fist production board that used the SIS chipset.

Since when did first production run of anything not have quirks or room for improvement. Granted, the 755-A may have had more quirks than most. The thing is you can argue this from both sides. My take on the 755-A is that any enthusiast that expects top of the line, trouble free performance with the least expensive motherboard available (and the first production run of that board to boot) is betting on a long shot, and is bound to loose in most cases. Sorry if I offended anyone.

As for the 755-A2 it looks like a decent option IMO, although it maybe never be the perfered choice for the hardcore enthusiast.



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No Subject by NFS4, 2200 days ago
Justly, the point is not that board was just "buggy", it simply doesn't have what they EXPLICITY stated was a supported feature of the board.

(1) They said that the 755-A supported DDR400 memory on their website.
(2) Vendors and other venues stated that the board supported DDR400
(3) The BIOS had setting for DDR400 memory speeds.
(4) The motherboard box says RIGHT THERE IN PLAIN ENGLISH that it supports DDR400.

Then when you try to test the board, it's only running at DDR333 speeds despite if you're using DDR400 or higher memory. And the only thing that ECS does is drop the specs down to DDR333 on their website instead of issuing a statement saying that their board doesn't work as advertised.

It'd be all the same if Chevy announced that their C6 Corvette has 400 HP at the wheels. The dealers list that spec as well. Customers go and buy a C6 and notice that performance is down a bit. They put their car on a dyno and it's making 350HP at the wheels instead. This result is then repeated by countless others that have purchased C6's.



And I SHOULDN'T have to use a hacked BIOS to get it to work either.

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