Tyan BX Socket-370 Tomahawk BX

The Bad

AnandTech encountered very few problems with the S1856, however the problems we did run into with the motherboard were ones that simply can't be ignored.

The lack of a heatsink on the 440BX North-Bridge (more specifically, the 443BX chip) does cross the line for cutting costs on the motherboard.  A better decision by Tyan would have been to cut down on the surface area of the motherboard, which could easily have been done, and dilute the cost of the board by saving money in the PCB.  Unfortunately Tyan didn't pursue that avenue, something they have done in the past, and something that has never done them any good.

The biggest problem AnandTech ran into with the motherboard was the poor stability, Tyan did not exhibit the same dominating presence in the stability category as it has done in the past with their high-end workstation motherboards.  In fact, the S1856 was one of the most unreliable Socket-370 motherboards AnandTech has tested.  Although it must be noted that the other motherboards AnandTech has taken a look at have been, generally speaking, excellent in stability.

Tyan gets the unfortunate no-go recommendation here for the S1856, it looks like they should've stuck to the high-end market.

USB Compatibility

• Number of Front Universal Serial Bus Root Ports: 0

• Number of Rear 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; 1 x 256MB Corsair PC100 SDRAM DIMM (for compatibility testing only)

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

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