opininos on Asrock mobo

[blakerwry]

Anybody have an opinion on Asrock mobos? They seem to be a division of Asus targetting the budget market.

I was looking at their K7S8XE+ mobo based on the SiS 748. It offers comparable features to many of the nicer VIA/Nforce2 boards, but at a price of only $54.

This is a reletively new chipset, but seems to be getting good reviews. The two Asrock motherboards based on this chipset also recieve good reviews, but there aren't very many reviews available for them.

 

[CougTek]

No first-hand experience. Probably sits between ECS and Shuttle in term of quality. The board you're eyeing should be a decent budget board, although I would get a Shuttle at that price.

BTW, at 54$, I wouldn't expect fancy features to work flawlessly. Development must not have been the first thing they had in mind with this board. Buy it for a simple SOHO box, but don't expect to run a mulimedia worskation on it.

 

[e_dawg]

I don't know... I can get Asrock boards for pretty cheap as well, but after my experience with the ECS K7S5A Pro, I don't know if I would risk a whole lot of trouble just to save $30 USD.

 

[blakerwry]

Well, if it doesnt work out for me then I'll just return it for an Nforce2 or kt600 something or rather

 

[CityK]

Did you order this Blake? If so, I would be interested in your impressions once you get it up and running....or attempt too he he.

 

[blakerwry]

THIS MOTHERBOARD IS GREAT!


so far...



I put it together and it booted flawlessly. I ran a repair of winXP and booted right into windows. I then installed the drivers off the CD.

The system feels snappier and boots faster than the previous setup (the dragon+ was a very slow booting board).


I havent gotten to test it much, this is actually my 1st stop.

This makes the second 3rd chipset with native S-ATA support. quite an achievement for a "budget" board company.


The board is solidly built and fit the Antec SLK3700 case perfectly. My whisper Rock III installed well, same with my geforce3 (AGP 4x 1.5v) and FortissimoII sound card.


I will be trying the front/rear USB(8 ports total) here soon.


On a side note, I'm also impressed with the sparkle/Fortron 300 watt power supply.. it is much quieter than the 350 watt antec... but doesnt quite push as much air... I may have to go back to the antec just to keep case temps down.

 

[blakerwry]

Oh, I should mention that my NIC performance is up 10-20% over the onboard VIA NIC of the dragon+. The VIA would get 5-6MB/sec, the SiS on this board gets 7MB/sec.

 

[blakerwry]

oh yeah, what's the site that can tell me all kinds of detailed information about my CPU?

 

[blakerwry]

The I/O performance on this motherboard is fantastic. I can write to a floppy while defragging a HDD while benchmarking another HDD (HDtach showed no noticable speed slowdown) while surfing with minimal to no slowdown and <20% CPU usage.


::drops::

 

[blakerwry]

Couple nitpicks, there are only two 3-pin fan headers on this board... there is a place to solder another (labelled NB fAM). Even though this motherboard does not require a NB fan (the NB heatsink is cool to the touch) I wish they would have included the connector to make it easier to install 3 pin fans.


Nit pick number 2, the power LED connectors on this board are adjacent to each other. Most cases have a PWR LED connector that assumes an empty pin between the + and -. This means modding the connector or doing without a power LED if you have one of these cases.

I chose to mod my PWR LED connector. It took 2 secs with a pair of side dykes.



Hmm.. aparently I got a multiplier locked CPU, because I seem to be locked at 12.5x no matter what I set the jumpers to.... :-( atleast my Xp 2000+ CPU is running well at 2075MHz @ 333MHz bus.

 

[blakerwry]

One neat thing I wasnt expecting is that this board can see what drives are attached to my promise ultra100 PCI card and will allow me to boot to any one of them.

Right now I have my 1200BB on the onboard ATA 133 controller, nothing on the onboard S-ATA, and my OS drive (180GXP) on the promise controller simply because I thought it'd be an easier transition from the old system to the new one without resorting to a format/reinstall..


Another somewhat unexpected bonus is that the board came with decent S-ATA data and power cables.


Something I'm not familiar with also. This chipset has no problems running my CPU at 166MHZ and ram at 133MHZ. I know I could do that with intel chips on both intel and SiS platforms, but I thought the current VIA and NVidia chipsets for AMD did not allow running RAM slower than CPU. (can someone confirm this behavior?)

While it would make more sense to run syncronously or faster than the CPU, it is nice to know that I dont have to replace my RAM just yet.

 

[blakerwry]

Something else that's nice is the included CD is bootable... it boots to "free" DOS and asks you if you would like to create a driver CD for the SiS S-ATA controller.


This is pretty nice because many other manufacturers require you have a working OS to get the drivers from the CD to a floppy. Some are so bad as to zip the drivers, meaning you'll also need an unzipping program.

 

[blakerwry]

hmm.. memory bandwidth seems pretty poor (not as good as the kt266a it replaced). However, I'll have to wait till I get some proper PC2700 or better before I make any decisions on that.

 

[CityK]

oh yeah, what's the site that can tell me all kinds of detailed information about my CPU?

Well there is this, but its hardly detailed. Do you mean info in regards to the OPN etc. ?

Nit pick number 2, the power LED connectors on this board are adjacent to each other. Most cases have a PWR LED connector that assumes an empty pin between the + and -. This means modding the connector or doing without a power LED if you have one of these cases.

the ECS K7S5A has this annomally/design flaw too.


What are the options in the BIOS like?

 

[blakerwry]

The back of the manual describes the BIOS. It's pretty plain. Has options for the FSB, over voltage(on or off), enabling/disabling the audio, LAN or S-ATA, and all the basic stuff neeeded to cofigure a motherboard.

The navigation of the BIOS is a bit different than I'm used to, but only takes a minute to fogure out if you've used more than just the plain award BIOS most mobos utilize.



Something I like about this board more than others is that all the BIOSes are loaded (including the PCI ultra 100 I have) sequentially. During any part of that loading I can hit either F2 or F10 to view the BIOS or show the boot menu, respectively. This means I dont have to be quick on the keyboard to get into the BIOS.

 

[blakerwry]

oh yeah, what's the site that can tell me all kinds of detailed information about my CPU?

Well there is this, but its hardly detailed. Do you mean info in regards to the OPN etc. ?


No, it was a website I saw here... you put in the serial number and it tells you all kinds of infomation about your AThlonXP (dont think it works with Duron)

 

[e_dawg]

Nit pick number 2, the power LED connectors on this board are adjacent to each other. Most cases have a PWR LED connector that assumes an empty pin between the + and -. This means modding the connector or doing without a power LED if you have one of these cases.

the ECS K7S5A has this annomally/design flaw too.

So does the Gigabyte 7N400-Pro2.

 

[e_dawg]

... but really, do you need an LED to tell you that your computer is on?

 

[blakerwry]

if it's really quiet, yes. ;-)

atleast it helps with troubleshooting.


I'd also like tos ay I was impressed wiht my experience with their technical support. I asked them a quetion of whether the motherboard supported .8, 1.5, or 3.3v and they answered my question in under 24 hours. It supports both .8 and 1.5v

 

[blakerwry]

and their response had less typos than mine....

 

[CityK]

No, it was a website I saw here... you put in the serial number and it tells you all kinds of infomation about your AThlonXP (dont think it works with Duron)

Probably this site that Fushigi outlined in this thread

BTW, that is what I meant by OPN (ordering part number) info etc.

 

[blakerwry]

yeah, that's it. Thanks.


BTW, this chipset will run your RAM +/- one speed step away from your processory BUS.

IE: 233MHz CPU allows 200, 233, and 333MHz RAM. 333CPU allows 233, 333, and 4000MHz RAM. 200 and 400MHz CPUs are limited by the min/max of the board. (200MHz to a selectable speed up to 496MHz)


However, the chipset seems to run best with RAM that is equal or faster than the CPU bus... even at the expense of CPU speed. (when paired with PC2100 RAM running at a constant stock speed, my XP 2000+ CPU scores higher on memory and 3D benchmarks at 1.667GHz than it does at 2.087GHz)

 

[blakerwry]

Ah yes, installing PC2700 RAM gives me kt333 level memory performance according to Sandra. Perfectly acceptable.

 

[e_dawg]

Just a question: what is an "opinino"? A mini opinion?

 

[CityK]

Stop making fun of Blake's Italian heritage e_dawg.

 

[blakerwry]

it's often cold in my apartment... and that makes my typos increase.

atleast it's not as bad as some of the stuff on SR lately

 

[CougTek]

At least it's not as bad as some of the stuff on SR lately.

Eric (EBB) has already explained here why he no longer spell-checks his posts. I don't agree with his attitude, because I think one should make a reasonable effort to post messages in a correct grammar on public forums, but I don't condemn him either. And I'm more tolerant versus the mistakes of people who's mother tongue isn't English (raise hand... although I think I'm not too bad on this regard).

 

[blakerwry]

I'm really happy with this motherboard. I'd buy another one if I had the need for a new motherboard.

If someone asked me for a gamers board I'd probably recomend an Nforce2 because the slight memory bandwidth increase and overclocking ability would probably interest them. But for anything else this board is great.

Tons of practical features, excellent real world performance, fuss free setup, good build quality, and an excellent price. Seems like something even Tannin would like.



btw- at 166MHz bus my AthlonXP 2000+ wasn't stable(failed after 7+ hours of prime95, memtest86 ran fine overnight). I am thinking at 160MHz bus(2.0GHz) my CPU will be fine.

 

[e_dawg]

Gasp! Thou shalt not invoke our resident curmudgeon's name to endorse just any product! Shame on you. 8)

 

[e_dawg]

Stop making fun of Blake's Italian heritage e_dawg.

What, you mean you've seen him in Woodbridge driving a lowered Honda Civic? :mrgrn:

 

[blakerwry]

vrooom!

 

[e_dawg]

Ah, yes, the sound of a coffee can muffler on a tiny four-banger...

 

[Tannin]

Gahh!

I give up.

First I have the wrong decade, now I have the wrong thread.

Shall I cross-post it over to the correct discussion? Might as well, I guess.

While I'm at it, I might as well deliver my thoughts on the KM-400.

In a word, it seems like a classic VIA integrated chipset of the classic kind: i.e., more-or-less functional but basicly crappy. We have been pretty much forced to switch to them since the ASUS Nforce 1 boards gave out. We are using ... er ... some brand I never heard of before and can't remember at the moment. We have had one or two fail, no thorny compatibility problems to speak of. They hate any sort of RAM they don't like, Lord only knows why.

I don't like them, but there doesn't seem to be anything else.

This is a shame as for some reason I don't understand, we are still paying quite a lot for entry-level video cards (Gforce 4 MX things which are probably SEs and sluggish but at least totally fuss-free and as utterly reliable as all other Nvidia video products.)

(Are you listening Mercutio?)

So for our mainstream I'd far rather be selling more of the reasonably-priced and excellently stable Albatron KT-600 board or its Gigabyte equivalent, coupled with a cheap and solid little video card: an old TNT M-64 would nearly do it - anything just a smidge faster than that would be perfect. But the reality is that it costs the same to buy a KT-600 or a KM-400, and with the KT-600 you have to spend an extra $100 (just under) to buy a video card. That translates to a >10% price premium for the system, and for entry-level buyers, that's hard to justify

Result: we are selling more KM-400s than I like to. I don't mind carrying them, but I don't like to see them taking away customers who should be buying real computers.

 

[Tannin]

Well, it turns out that those no-name KM-400s I mentioned are in fact ASRock boards. Here is a mini-review.

Price: Good. As cheap, more-or-less, as anything else on the market. 8/10.

Availability: Good. The key is to have a product that is available reliably, not here today and gone tommorow. No problems with these. 10/10.

Feature set: Pretty standard. All the usal stuff applies: on-board video, AGP slot, 3 x PCI, 2 RAM slots, single serial and parallel, 6 USB (1 each of 1.1, 2.0 and front-of-case 2.0), sound, and etc. 7/10.

Layout: Again, perfectly practical on the whole. My only beef is the absurdly difficult, non-standard and badly labelled connector for the LEDs and switches. Yuk! FSB speed is selected by a simple three-position jumper, which is as good a way as any and better than most. 6/10 (points off for the bad pinout).

Other: The AMI BIOS is dreadful. It pisses me off every time I have to use it. Believe it or not, you have to press F2 to get into setup! Huh? WTF are these guys smoking? Function keys for setup went out when the 386 came in. Then you discover that the avaiable options are limited and badly laid out, with all the most-used features buried well down in the menu structure. Worst of all, a bizzare WAD fault that I simply cannot believe: if you plug in a stand-alone slave device, such as a CD-ROM drive, it crashes irrecoverably on boot with a "system halted" message. Yes, it deliberately halts the system when you plug a CD drive or burner in! Minus 10 points for the worst BIOS I've seen since those appalling AMI Windows BIOSes that late-model 486 boards were afflicted with for a few months before Award showed them how to do it right.

Relibility & compatibility: Seem to be OK overall, but they are very fussy about RAM. You have to match them to particular exact brands, which is a pain in the arse. This is not something you expect to find in an entry-level board. Outside of that, no problems to speak of. We had one fail out of 30 or 40. Thought we had two more, but that turned out to be their RAM problem. 7/10.

Summary: The sort of board you buy when you can't get anything better.

 

[Tannin]

But I've been buying the things because we didnt have anything else available in that arket segment. I've been ringing around trying to find something that Kristi and I like to work with but didn't find anything until today, when we got hold of an Epox KM-400 product at about the same price. Haven't plugged one in yet, but first impressions suggest that they will be much better. Like the ASRock boards they need a non-standard back plate, but that's what you expect these days with an AIO board.

BTW, I forgot to mention that the ASRocks have the serial port on a stand-alone mini-card, which is a bad idea, as it's easy to forget to screw it in.

Also, I forgot to mention that they have PC-Cillian 2002 bundled with them, which is the best bundled anti-virus product. So, as a matter of detail, does the Epox.

 

[CougTek]

Are you able to get Shuttle boards easily where you are? Their KM400 seems better to me than what you described for the Asrock. Probably less picky about RAM AND both 3 phase VRM and the 4 pins 12V ATX power connector

Take a look at it : picture of Shuttle MK40VN.

One bad thing about it is that it uses the same shitty AMI Bios as your Asrock.

 

[blakerwry]

hmm, I have no problems with the BIOS in the k7s8xe+. It's a little different than the BIOSes I'm used to from my former VIA/SiS boards, but it's perfectly usable and I have had no problems with it.


The K7S8Xe+ has a whopping 6 USB ports on the backplate, pushing the game port to a PCI slot. That's a non-issue for me since I dont use the onboard sound (tested it once to make sure it works), and even if I did, would not have a need for the joystick port.

 

[Fushigi]

Tannin, what you describes sounds like an OEM board for Dell or some other 'top tier' brand. F2 for setup, yep. Very limited options in goofy menus, yep. Fussy about RAM, yep. Stupid crsahes for no logical reason, heck yeah.

Limited expandabilit and USB 1.1 & 2 instead of all 2? Really, and I'm being serious here, this sounds like a board Asus sells to OEMs like Dell to put in their bargain systems.

 

[Tannin]

I had exactly that same thought myself, Fushigi. Anyway, I'll have a good look at the Epox over the next few days and report back. Getting shot of that poxy BIOS alone should make it worth the switch.

Shuttle: no good supplier at present, Blake.

BTW, maybe it's USB 2.0 all the way - I didn't check, just assumed.

 

[Tannin]

Also BTW, what is the point of those useless bloody extra PSU connectors? Is there any point?