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- Date:
- Tuesday , March 25, 2003
- Author:
- Morry Teitelman
- Editor:
- Kyle Bennett
- Google +1
ABIT BH7
The BH7 is ABIT’s latest masterpiece featuring the Intel i845PE chipset. Read on to find out why ABIT is convinced that this is the board to pair up with your prized P4...
Subsystem Testing
Audio – CPU Utilization
The audio subsystem is among the most utilized and critical of all the motherboard subsystems. A well implemented audio subsystem can be the final touch for a perfect board, while a sub-par subsystem can wreck an otherwise good board. Measuring the CPU utilization while an audio subsystem is in use is one of the easier ways to determine the quality of that subsystem. Ideally, you do not want the audio subsystem inferring with system operation at all, so that your FPS count while gaming does not suffer. In order to best measure the real world CPU utilization of the audio subsystem, we use Ziff Davis’ Audio Winbench.
ABIT did a remarkable job in selecting and implementing the audio subsystem. In all tests, the CPU utilization was < 1%, meaning that the CPU was not being taxed at all by the operation of the subsystem.
Audio – Subjective Listening
While CPU utilization testing can tell you about how the audio subsystem interacts with the system, it cannot tell you how the audio being output actually sounds. Sound quality testing requires a more subjective test that pushes the audio subsystem to it’s extremes of intensity and subtlety. I chose to listen to various tracks off of the Escape from L.A. movie soundtrack.
The sound was adequate coming from all 6 channels, in that there was no hissing, crackling, or skipping detected. However, for applications requiring realistic and clear sound reproduction such as gaming, you will need an additional sound card. The board’s audio solution is just not up to task for that type of use.
USB 2.0
In order to adequately test the capabilities of the on board USB 2.0 connection, we chose to use an ACOMDATA HD060U2FE-72-USB 2.0/FireWire HDD connected to the one of the rear panel USB 2.0 ports and in conjunction with TCD Labs’ HDTach program.
The results from the read/write test are not astounding, but are on-par with USB 2.0 drive performance seen before. The sub 20ms RAT time is expected, with the RBS coming in just over 28 MB/s. The one disappointment encountered was the high CPU utilization incurred while using the USB device, sitting just above 20%.
IDE/ATA Performance
A system’s IDE performance is the most critical determiner of overall system performance. Sub-par IDE performance can cause unnecessary system lag, and overall system slowdowns, while exemplary IDE performance can give an already good system a nice performance boost. In order to test the IDE performance of this board, I used TCD Labs’ HDTach program. My test bench currently uses Maxtor 40Gb ATA 133 model 6E040L0 hard drives installed. RAID is not supported by the implemented southbridge configuration on the BH7. Therefore, tests were conducted with a primary slave configuration and on the SATA connection in both a standalone and shared configuration.
The performance is about what is expected from an ATA100 capable port. The RAT of < 15ms is outstanding, while the RBS of 85.4 MB/s is decent for the connection type in use. What truly astounds in the super low CPU utilization of < 4% while the drive is in use.
The SATA read/write test results are a whole other story, although it seems that having a shared line does not affect SATA performance at all. The RAT times are excellent, coming in just above 14ms. However, the RBS is very low, considering that SATA supports 150 MB/s. The low RBS can be attributed to overhead involved in translating the SATA signal to the IDE controller. The CPU utilization also reflects the added work necessary involved when using a SATA drive.
Network Utilization Tests
Hagel Technologies’ DU Meter software was used in conjunction with Windows Task Manager to measure the performance of the onboard NIC. DU meter was used to measure bandwidth, with Windows TaskMan to monitor the CPU utilization on the test system. For the test itself, a 760Mb archive file containing various sized .WMA audio files for the large file transfer test and a 760Mb worth of various sized .WMA audio files for the small files transfer test were used in conjunction with an Intel Gigabit NIC on the host system, and a crossover cable to connect the host system to the test system. A crossover cable was used to rule out any possible bandwidth losses due to hub or switch passage.
The board performed admirably during both the download and upload tests, with a minimal gap between the top transfer and average transfer speeds. In both cases, the CPU utilization stayed between 20-30% as well.
The large file transfer tests mimic the results of the small files transfer tests. ABIT did a very good job in selecting and implementing the Ethernet solution.
Test Systems
The following system configurations were used for the Sandra memory benchmark graph, as well as all graphs listed under the Application and Gaming Benchmark sections:
NOTE: For all benchmark tests done on the BH7 motherboard, the optimized default BIOS settings were loaded for the benchmark tests. The following BIOS settings were also engaged during the tests: CAS Latency Time = 2; Row-active Delay = 2; RAS-to-CAS delay = 2; Row-precharge delay = 2.
ABIT BH7 (i845PE) - Intel Pentium 4 2.53 GHz CPU (clocked at 19x133 for 2.53 GHz speed) - 2 x 256Mb Corsair XMS3200 - ATI Radeon 9700 Pro w/ ATI Catalyst 2.3 drivers - 40 GB Maxtor ATA133 HDD - Allied 400w PSU - WindowsXP w/SP1
ABIT BE7-RAID (i845PE) - Intel Pentium 4 2.53 GHz CPU (clocked at 19x133 for 2.53 GHz speed) - 2 x 256Mb Corsair XMS3200 - ATI Radeon 9700 Pro w/ ATI Catalyst 2.3 drivers - 40 GB Maxtor ATA133 HDD - Allied 400w PSU - WindowsXP w/SP1
MSI 845PE Max2 (i845PE): Intel Pentium 4 2.53GHz CPU(clocked at 19x133MHz for 2.53GHz clock speed); 512MB Corsair XMS3200; ATI Radeon 9700 Pro w/ ATI Catalyst 2.3 drivers; 40 GB Maxtor ATA133 HDD; Zalman 300w PSU; WindowsXP w/SP1
ASUS P4G8X (Granite Bay): Intel Pentium 4 2.53GHz CPU (clocked at 19x133MHz for 2.53GHz clock speed and at 14.5x180MHz for 2.61GHz clock speed); 2 x 256Mb Corsair XMS3200; ATI Radeon 9700 Pro w/ ATI Catalyst 2.3 drivers; 40 GB Maxtor ATA133 HDD; Zalman 300w PSU; WindowsXP w/SP1
ASUS A7N8X (nForce2): AMD AthlonXP 2400+ CPU (clocked at 12x166 for 2.0 GHz CPU speed); 2 x 256MB Corsair XMS3200; ATI Radeon 9700 Pro, onboard nForce2 10/100 NIC; 40 GB Maxtor ATA133 HDD, Zalman 300w PSU. WindowsXP w/SP1, ATi Catalyst 2.3.
Note: The following test systems were used only for comparison in the ZD Business 2002 Winstone and ZD Content Creation 2003 Winstone.
MSI 655 Max (SiS 655): Intel Pentium 4 2.53 GHz CPU (clocked at 19x133 for 2.53 GHz); 2 x 256Mb Corsair XMS3500; ATI Radeon 9700 Pro w/ ATI Catalyst 2.3 drivers; 40 GB Maxtor ATA133 HDD; Vantec 520w PSU; WindowsXP w/SP1
MSI K7N2G-ILSR (nForce2): AMD Athlon 2400+ CPU (clocked at 12x166MHz for 2GHz clock speed); 2 x 256MB Corsair TwinX XMS3200; ATI Radeon 9700 Pro; 40 GB Maxtor ATA133 HDD; Vantec Stealth 520w PSU. Windows XP w/SP1; ATI Catalyst 3.0; NVIDIA nForce 2.03 Driver Package; DirectX 9; BIOS v1.2
GIGABYTE GA-7VAXP (KT400): AMD Athlon 2400+ CPU (clocked at 12x166 for 2.0 GHz CPU speed); 2 x 256Mb Corsair XMS3200; ATI Radeon 9700 Pro w/ ATI Catalyst 2.3 drivers; 40 GB Maxtor ATA133 HDD; Allied 400w PSU; WindowsXP w/SP1
Graphs are labeled as follows: Motherboard Model & Version @ FSB MHz/Memory MHz
SiSoft Sandra Memory Bandwidth Benchmark
The BH7 is able to match performance with its older sibling, the BE7-RAID. This is a good thing and means that ABIT did not necessary go back to the drawing board with the design of the board, but chose to improve upon an already good design. The Granite Bay board pulls a hefty lead due to its dual channel memory architecture.