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How to Choose A MotherBoard
Continued from page: 2
Friday, February 01, 2008
Rs 4-8k Boards
The Winners
XFX 630i–7150
While testing this board, somehow intuitively we knew it was going to
win. Promising robust performance and features to kill for and yet being easy on
your pocket is what the 630i–7150 is all about. It supports Intel's Core 2
Extreme (both quad and dual core) and Core 2 Duo processors. It is compatible
with nVIDIA MCP73U/PV/V/D chipset. In features, it supports 4 USB ports, 6 Audio
channels, 1 PCI-Express slot and 2 PCI slots, 2 slots each for DIMM and LAN and
3 slots for SATA. Video outlets are provided on board with HDMI, VGA and DVI. An
added advantage of having an HDMI port is that you can transfer both audio and
video signals to a desired device, and the XFX 630i – 7150 empowers you to do
just that.
In PCMark05, it scores 5624, which was second best in this range, with MSI
P6N SLI giving the best score of 6248. It scored 8304 3DMarks in 3DMark06
benchmark, which was the highest in this category. This goes to prove that XFX
boards have been excellent with graphics capabilities. In fact the only close
competitor to this board was MSI P965 Neo which scored 8288 3DMarks. In the
other tests, XFX 630i-7150 fared well and overall its performance score was in
close proximity to the MSI P6N SLI board.
MSI P965 Neo
The MSI P965 Neo supports Intel Dual Core and Pentium 4 processors,
whereas Intel ICH8 and Intel P965 chipsets are compatible on it. It features 4
DIMM slots, 1 PCI-Express and 3 PCI slots, 4 USB ports, 6 audio support channels
and 4 SATA and 2 LAN ports.
It scored 5088 in PCMark, which is slightly lower then XFX, but a good score
nevertheless. In 3DMark06, it was second highest with a score of 8288 3DMarks.
It performed better than the XFX board in the POV Ray benchmark, wherein its CPU
response time was around 4 as compared to XFX's 5. Apart from that both were
almost equal. It lost majorly due to a lack of features. Had it come with any
one of the video options, either DVI or HDMI or even VGA, it would have given a
tough fight for the top spot. Its pricing however is better than the XFX board,
but you'll have to shell out extra for a video card to use this board.
Other Contenders
Budget ranges includes the users who are ready to pay a bit extra,
but not very much and still want to enjoy almost all the features and blazing
performance from their motherboard. While in the entry level the first warrior
from the XFX family, the 630i – 7100 just missed the top slot by a whisker, its
sibling, the XFX 630i – 7150 manages to grab the honour of the overall best
performer in all categories in the budget range of motherboards.
If features are of prime importance to you, you may consider the MSI G33M
which offers 4 slots each for DIMM and SATA, 6 slots each for USB and Audio, 2
each for PCI and LAN, 1 PCI express slot and 1 VGA port for video output. Well,
you couldn't have asked for more, at least in the budget range and is the only
board which comes with 45nm processor support, which means its one of the most
future ready board. You won't need to upgrade your motherboard if you want to
migrate to 45nm processor.
There may still be some, who are unable to stretch their budget and demand
the best possible features and performance in the least possible amount. For
them, Simmtronics SIMM NV – 7050 would be the ideal choice as it costs a little
over Rs. 4000/- and offers 4 slots each for DIMM and USB, 2 each for PCI, LAN
and SATA, 3 video ports (HDMI, VGA and DVI), 6 audio channels and 1 PCI express
slot.
The budget range starts from Rs. 4000 onwards. Hence people investing such
amount of money would obviously expect performance and features a notch higher
than the entry level range. However, we were quite disappointed to see some
features synonymous with the sub 4K range like one or no PCI/video ports, 3
audio channels even in a budget range. All the three entrants from Gigabyte did
manage to perform well in our score but where lacking in features in that price
bracket. We have seen other boards offering more features at that price range.
Asus M2A-VM DVI was a strong contender in the competition. As it was priced
brilliantly but again due to lack of features it was hit badly, but it should
not be counted out simple coz of it's pricing. You get almost all features and
decent performance at an attractive price, making it a board worth a look. Even
the other Asus board M2R32-MVP scored very high in performance but eventually
lack of features and higher price led to its downfall.
Ankush Sharma and Saurangshu Kanunjna with help from Vijay Chauhan
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