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- Date:
- Monday , July 25, 2005
- Author:
- Morry Teitelman
- Editor:
- Kyle Bennett
- Google +1
ECS KN1 Extreme
The KN1 Extreme is ECS' first entry in to the nForce4 and Athlon64 world. In fact, it might be said that it is ECS' first true entry into the enthusiast motherboard market ever. We put it through our normal evalutions and come away surprised.
BIOS
ECS chose to mate the KN1 Extreme with the Phoenix AwardBIOS template. Version 1.1a of the BIOS was used in testing.
The Advanced BIOS Features menu contains various system boot up related options, including those concerning startup detection of boot devices. With a USB 2.0 hard drive properly connected and detected by the system a startup, the drive shows as a configurable boot device within the Hard Disk Boot Priority submenu. The priority of specific items in this menu can be changed using either the + and – keys or the PageUp and PageDown keys.
The Advanced Chipset Features menu is the centralized location in the BIOS for all chipset, bus speed, and voltage related settings. The CPU Frequency option controls the base speed of the CPU bus, with configurable settings from 200MHz to 400MHz. While the amount of latitude allowed here is good, the fact that you are unable to change the CPU’s multiplier settings inhibits the ability to use excessively high frequency settings.
UPDATE Note that the above statement is, in fact, incorrect. The internal CPU multiplier can be modified through the Hammer Fid Control option located in the Power Management Setup menu. This option allows for setting of the CPU multiplier from 4x all the way to 25x with a multiplier unlocked CPU installed.
The HyperTransport link speed is set through the HT Frequency option using multipliers. The multipliers, when multiplied by the CPU frequency setting, give you the actual HT link running speed. The HT Width option controls the bandwidth of the HyperTransport link, with the recommended setting of 16 up and down.
The base CPU voltage is set through the CPU Voltage Control option, with the settings available adding to the default CPU voltage detected by the BIOS. The maximum CPU voltage allowable is +375mV over the current CPU’s default voltage. The DIMM Voltage Control option controls the amount of voltage supplied to the currently populated DDR modules. The maximum value of 3.11V should be plenty to cook your modules with, just keep in mind that you’ll need active cooling on them should you decided to go that high.
The DRAM Configuration submenu contains all memory related options, including those controlling the DDR operating speed. With both the Timing Mode the User Config mode options set to Manual, all memory related settings become user configurable. The Memclock index value (Mhz) option controls the memory speed using ratios. The settings available map to the following speed ratios (DDR FSB:CPU FSB): 100Mhz is 1:2; 133Mhz is 2:3; 166Mhz is 5:6; and 200Mhz is 1:1.
The following memory timing options are configurable through the DRAM Configuration submenu: CAS latency; active to precharge delay (shown as Min RAS# active time(Tras)); RAS to CAS delay; RAS precharge delay (shown as Row precharge Time (Trp)); command rate (shown as 1T/2T Memory Timing); read preamble; and asynchronous latency. Note that on the memory timings listed, the numerically lower setting forces more aggressive memory operation.
The Integrated Peripherals menu contains a series of submenus used for controlling all integrated system devices. The IDE Function Setup submenu contains settings for the nForce4 chipset controlled IDE and SATA II ports only. The RAID Config submenu contains options for configuring the nForce4-based RAID controller only. Notice that all IDE and SATA ports, including the IDE master and slave channels within a single IDE port, can be individually configured for RAID operation. If a port is configured for RAID operation, it will not be detected on system initialization, but it will show as available through the NVIDIA RAID BIOS. The Onboard Device submenu contains options for configuring the USB 2.0 and IEEE 1394 ports, the onboard audio, and both the NVIDIA GigE and Realtek 10/100 NIC controllers. Note that the onboard SIS-based RAID chipset is not user configurable through the system BIOS.
The PnP/PCI Configurations menu contains various IRQ and PnP related setup options. While there is no direct way to control the IRQ numbers assigned to the various devices, you can control the IRQ pool settings through the IRQ Resources submenu. The submenu becomes user when the Resource Controlled By option is set to Manual.
The PC Health Status menu contains real time statistics on all BIOS monitored temperatures, voltages, and speeds of fans connected to monitored headers. The Shutdown Temperature option defines the monitored CPU operating temperature threshold; temperatures above this threshold trigger a BIOS initiated system shutdown. Unless running stock with good cooling, it is probably best to leave this option disabled since the upper temperature limit allowed is only 70C.