VIA Apollo Pro 133A Motherboard Roundup - July 2000

Gainward 6VBA-133A

Gainward 6VBA-133A Specifications
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CPU Interface	Slot-1
Chipset	VIA Apollo 133A VIA 694X North Bridge VIA 686A South Bridge
L2 Cache	N/A (on-chip)
Form Factor	ATX
Bus Speeds	100 / 103 / 112 / 124 / 133 / 138 / 140 150
Voltages Supported	XXXXXX
Memory Slots	3 168-pin DIMM Slots
Expansion Slots	1 AMR Slot 1 AGP Slot 5 PCI Slots (4 Full Length) 1 ISA Slot (1 Shared / 1 Full Length)
Onboard Audio	Analog Devices AD1881 AC'97 CODEC
BIOS	AWARD BIOS 6.00PG

While Gainward isn't exactly a household name, even in the hardware community, we have reviewed a few of their video cards and motherboards. The video cards all seemed to operate just fine, but we've not had such good luck with their motherboards. Unfortunately, the 6VBA-133A continues this tradition as our board was not stable at all and could not complete any gaming tests. It's possible that we simply had a bad board, but there's no way for us to know.

Ignoring these problems for a moment, the 6VBA-133A does have a good layout, following all ATX specifications, with a 5/1/1/1 (PCI/ISA/AMR/AGP) expansion slot configuration. Also worth noting is the fact that there are no FSB speeds below 100 MHz on this board.

Otherwise, it's a pretty average board, that does little to stand out from the pack.