Epox 4PEA+ (845PE): A well rounded 845PE

Epox 4PEA+: Stress Testing

We ran quite a few stress tests on the Epox 4PEA+. We tested this board in several different areas and configurations, including:

1. Chipset and motherboard stress testing was conducted by running the FSB at 160MHz.

2. Memory stress testing was conducted by running RAM at 333MHz with as many banks filled as possible. We also ran memory at 400MHz with as many banks filled as possible. We attempted to use the most aggressive timings available in both scenarios.

During our strictly-FSB runs, the Epox 4PEA+ was able to sustain our standard round of stress tests operating at 160MHz FSB (1:1 ratio). At this overclocked speed, the 4PEA+ was perfectly reliable running Prime95 torture tests for hours at a time. We also reran our entire benchmark suite at this FSB speed several times over just in case Prime95 hadn't caught everything. We still were unable to find any issues operating at 160MHz FSB and a 1:1 divider.

We're happy to report that the Epox 4PEA+ is a good memory performer as well. Using a double-sided Corsair XMS CAS2 DDR400 module running at 333MHz with all banks filled, we were able to achieve the following timings:

These are just about the most aggressive timings you can set in the Advanced Chipset Features section of your BIOS. For a board that claims to be able to support DDR333 memory, we're glad the Epox 4PEA+ was able to withstand the most strenuous DDR333 settings possible (or very close at least). We're happy that we can truly proclaim the 4PEA+ as a great DDR333 motherboard.

We ran memory at 333MHz using the timings listed in the above table in conjunction with the 4:5 divider available in the BIOS. To make sure everything ran stable, we stressed our system with 24 hours of Prime95 torture tests. This proved successful, as we didn't encounter a single failure. We also ran one run of Super Pi at 32M, and yet again didn't encounter any issues.

We were also pleased to see that the Epox 4PEA+ was easily able to run two sticks of memory operating at 400MHz. Epox nor Intel guarantee DDR400 operation whatsoever, so this is obviously quite impressive. Here were the best DRAM settings we could achieve at this frequency:

These are respectable timings for DDR400 memory. However, what's most impressive about this type of performance is the fact that it's able to run with two DIMMs installed, in addition to the good timings.

As you know, to run at DDR400 we had to raise the FSB to 160MHz, which just happened to be the overclocking limit for our particular setup anyway. We ran exactly 24 hours of Prime95 torture tests to ensure everything was running smoothly; not surprisingly, everything went very well. Several runs of Super Pi stress tests also proved successful, as we encountered no issues whatsoever.