USB Compatibility

  • Number of Universal Serial Bus Root Ports: 2

  • USB IRQ Enable/Disable in BIOS: Yes

  • USB Keyboard Support in BIOS: Yes


Recommended SDRAM

Recommended SDRAM: Mushkin SEC -GH PC100 SDRAM; Memory Man SEC -GH PC100 SDRAM
SDRAM Tested: 1 x 64MB Mushkin PC100 SDRAM; 1 x 64MB Memory-Man PC100 SDRAM

Manufacturer: The Memory Man
Purchase Web-Site: http://www.memory-man.com

Manufacturer: Mushkin
Purchase Web-Site: http://www.mushkin.com


The Test

In recent times, choosing a motherboard cannot be completely determined by a Winstone score. Now, many boards come within one Winstone point of each other and therefore the need to benchmark boards against each other falls. Therefore you shouldn't base your decision entirely on the benchmarks you see here, but also on the technical features and advantages of this particular board, seeing as that will probably make the greatest difference in your overall experience.

How I Tested

  • Each benchmark was run a minimum of 2 times and a maximum of 5 times, if the motherboard failed to complete a single test within the 5 allocated test runs the OS/Software was re-installed on a freshly formatted Hard Drive and the BIOS settings were adjusted to prevent the test from failing again.  All such encounters were noted at the exact time of their occurrence.

  • Business Winstone 98 & 3D Winbench 98 was run at each individually tested clock speed, if reliable scores were achieved with the first two test runs of the suite an average of the two was taken and recorded as the final score at that clock speed.  If the test system displayed erratic behavior while the tests were running or the results were incredibly low/high the tests were re-run up to 5 times and an average of all the test runs was taken and recorded at the final score at that clock speed

  • All video tests were conducted using an AGP video accelerator

  • No foreign drivers were present in the test system other than those required for the system to function to the best of its ability

  • All foreign installation files were moved to a separate partition during the test as to prevent them from effecting the test results

  • All tests were conducted at 1024 x 768 x 16-bit color

  • Quake 2 tests were conducted at 800 x 600 x 16-bit color in Software Rendering Mode

Test Configuration

Processor(s): AMD K6-2 350 AFR
Intel Pentium MMX 233
Cyrix M-II 300
RAM: 1 - 64MB Memory Man PC100 SDRAM DIMM
Hard Drive(s): Western Digital Caviar AC35100 - UltraATA
Video Card(s): Matrox Millennium G200 (8MB SGRAM - AGP)
Bus Master Drivers: Microsoft Win98 DMA Drivers
Video Drivers: MGA Millennium G200 Release 1677-411
Operation System(s): Windows 98
Motherboard Revision: TMC TI5VGF Revision A1

 

Windows 98 Performance

  Winstone Quake 2
Business 98 Business 99 Quake 2 demo1.dm2 crusher.dm2
AMD K6-2 300 - 100MHz x 3.0 23.3 16.0 11.7 9.0
Intel Pentium MMX 200 - 100MHz x 2.0 18.1 -- -- --
Cyrix M-II 300 - 66MHz x 3.5 22.3 -- -- --

The Final Decision

The TI5VGF could've been the ideal ATX Super7 motherboard to look for had it not been for its stability and quality issues, hopefully TMC will tweak the board in a later revision to tailor to the needs of overclockers and "system-critical" users, however until then, the TI5VGF can be considered an average board, with a not-so-average 6 PCI slots.


How it Rates

AnandTech Motherboard Rating

  Business
Performance 80%
Price 85%
Ease of Use 80%
Overclocked Stability 45%
General Stability 70%
Quality 73%
Documentation 75%
Reliability 78%
Overall Rating 73%

The New Rating System
Each motherboard is rated in 8 areas, Performance, Price, Ease of Use, Overclocked Stability, Stability, Quality, Documentation, and Reliability.

Do not compare newer scores to older ones, the newer scores are much more aggressive

  • Performance - How well the motherboard compares to others in its class

  • Price - How competitive the price of the motherboard is when compared to others in its class

  • Ease of Use - How easy it is to setup the motherboard, jumper settings, jumperless configuration etc...

  • Overclocked Stability - How stable the motherboard is at overclocked CPU/Bus speeds

  • Stability - How stable the motherboard is at normal CPU/Bus speeds

  • Quality - How much effort went into producing the motherboard

  • Documentation - How helpful is the manual and bundled support manuals

  • Reliability - How long will this motherboard last, will it fail? Deals with quantity/size of capacitors, known bugs, etc...

  • Overall Rating - an average of the eight above areas

Index
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