DFI LANParty UT RDX200: ATI’s Crossfire AMD for the Bleeding Edge
by Wesley Fink on October 18, 2005 11:03 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
Overclocking: DFI LANParty UT RDX200
The DFI matched the highest stock speed overclock that we have achieved with this Clawhammer 130nm processor. There is little to complain about with this kind of stock overclocking with this CPU.
When we discussed results with the DFI Design Engineer, we were told that our results were typical of what could be expected on this. The highest clock does not reach to 315 to 318 as a few other boards have because of the compromises made to achieve reliable operation with 4 double-sided DIMMs at 1T. However, most boards should be able to reach a 300 to 310 Clock frequency in overclocking with appropriate ratios.
| DFI LANParty UT RDX200 Overclocking Testbed |
|
| Processor(s): | Athlon 64 4000+ (2.4GHz, 1MB Cache) |
| CPU Voltage: | 1.425V (default 1.40V) |
| Cooling: | Thermaltake Silent Boost K8 Heatsink/Fan |
| Power Supply: | OCZ Power Stream 520W |
| Memory: | OCZ PC3200 Platinum Rev. 2 (Samsung TCCD Memory Chips) |
| Hard Drive: | Seagate 120GB 7200RPM SATA 8MB Cache |
| Maximum OC: (Standard Ratio) |
245x12 (4x HT, 2.5-3-3-10) 2940MHz (+22.5%) |
| Maximum FSB: (Lower Ratio) |
305 x 9 (3x HT, 1T) (2718MHz, 2 DIMMs in DC mode) (+53% Bus Overclock) |
The DFI matched the highest stock speed overclock that we have achieved with this Clawhammer 130nm processor. There is little to complain about with this kind of stock overclocking with this CPU.
Lowering the multiplier to reach the highest CPU clock was a bit more difficult. While it was easy to reach a stable 270 with the default (mostly AUTO) memory timings in BIOS, getting to the eventual 305 proved more of a challenge. The design team tells us that the RDX200 was optimized for Crucial Ballistix 1GB DIMMs and not our standard OCZ TCCD DIMMs. We finally reached a stable 305 setting with the following settings:
- Tref (Refresh Period) - 2592
- DRAM Drive Strength - 7
- DRAM Data Drive Strength - 2
- Max Asynch Latency - 9
- Read Preamble Time - 6.5
When we discussed results with the DFI Design Engineer, we were told that our results were typical of what could be expected on this. The highest clock does not reach to 315 to 318 as a few other boards have because of the compromises made to achieve reliable operation with 4 double-sided DIMMs at 1T. However, most boards should be able to reach a 300 to 310 Clock frequency in overclocking with appropriate ratios.
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JarredWalton - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
SATA2 actually only increases the bandwidth from 1.5Gbps to 3.0Gbps. Since sustained transfer rates are still maxing out at around 100MBps (0.8Gbps), and that's only with RAID-0 and two drives... well, SATA2 isn't a huge deal. I don't recall seeing whether the ATI chipset supports NCQ, which is of course in a similar boat.USB2.0 performance is only really important if you use an external HDD. Most flash cards and other USB2.0 devices don't come anywhere near 60MBps, as Anand's USB Flash Drive article showed. USB2.0 video devices might also have trouble, though - not sure what the throughput on those is. 150Mbps should be enough, really. Isn't 1080i only a 20Mbps stream? (Or is it 20MBps?)
haelduksf - Wednesday, October 19, 2005 - link
Err...that's what I meant, 3 Gbps, not 300Mbps. in either case, it's quite useless, and will be for the forseeable future.erinlegault - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
I would have been nice if DFI would have used the ULI southbridge. Maybe DFI will include the ULI M1575 for the DFI LANParty UT RDX200 Expert motherboard (that's if they do the same as they've done with the NF4 board).DigitalFreak - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
Anyone else think this board is a bit lacking feature wise for the $230 asking price? If you REALLY want Crossfire, then you'll need this board. Otherwise, the Nforce4 seems to be the better choice. I just can't believe that DFI is asking so much $$$ for this!mongoosesRawesome - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
price will likely come down pretty quickly. remember how much the nforce 4 sli boards were when they came out?I've also heard rumors that DFI is going to release a new board with an updated southbridge in a few weeks.
bob661 - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
Only if people buy these things otherwise there would be no reason to lower prices.coomar - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
226-2-2-2-7-2T is going to be faster than 206-2-2-2-7-1Tvdimm and vcore voltage choices were very impressive
how good is azalia compared to good soundcards/ decoders?
muffin - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
DFI was not the first! EQS have had a board on sale at overclock.co.uk for a couple of weeks now. Its the same as the (as yet unreleased) Sapphire board, made by the same people.Linky: http://www.overclock.co.uk/customer/product.php?pr...">http://www.overclock.co.uk/customer/product.php?pr...
Its been on sale for a while guys, pay attention. Theres an Inquirer story about it too :/
erinlegault - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
There is data for x850XT missing in the Half-Life 2, Wolfenstein, Aquamark and UT2004Wesley Fink - Tuesday, October 18, 2005 - link
Due to time constraints we did not run a full set of Crossfire benchmarks. We were mainly trying to confirm Crossfire worked as it should on the DFI. We therefore ran those benches where more powerful video makes a difference and left out those where the video power makes little difference. You can find a full suite of Crossfire, 7800GTX, and other graphics benchches in our Crossfire Graphics launch reviews under the Video tab at the top of the page.We did intend to run Half Life 2 but our benchmarks no longer work with the new build Steam forces on you. We are in the process of updating the HL2 benchmark unless some of you tech wizards know of an HL2 benchmark that will definitely work with the new HL2 version.