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OVERCLOCKING PROWESS:
Unfortunately,
overclocking isn't a strong point for either of
these boards. Pentium 4s, or any other Intel
CPUs for that matter, are multiplier locked.
To overclock an Intel processor, one is forced to
raise the Front Side Bus (FSB) to increase the
overall clockspeed of their processor. Due
to the Pentium 4's "Quad-Pumped" FSB (100MHz
effectively runs at 400MHz), raising the FSB has a
much more dramatic effect on clockspeed. The
keep things stable, while increasing the FSB, we
would usually increase VCore and Vio voltages, but
neither of these boards had that ability. If
we take another look at the Frequency setting
screens in the BIOS...
|
ECS
|
AZZA
|
You'll notice both boards have the
ability to raise the FSB, but that is the extent
of their overclocking options. The ECS board
isn't capable of adjusting the FSB in 1MHz.
increments, instead it has a list of preset
options ranging from 100-145MHz. We're
expecting to get a new BIOS revision from ECS
shortly, if this changes we'll let you know.
Azza on the other hand
does offer the ability to adjust the FSB in 1MHz.
increments between 100 and 132MHz., but it too does
not have any voltage tweaks. With that said,
what we have to report we didn't have much luck
overclocking at all. We were able to take
our 1900MHz. P4 up to 1957MHz. (19x103) with the
ECS board, and up to 1995MHz. (19x105) with the
Azza board. Because these numbers reflect
such a small relative overclock, we won't be
including any overclocked benchamarks in this review.
For now, let's move
onto the numbers...
|
|
|
The Hot Hardware Test Systems |
|
You Just
Have to Love Them! |
|
|
Intel Pentium 4
1900MHz.
ECS P4XAD (VIA P4X266)
256MB Crucial
PC2100 (CAS 2)
GeForce 3
(21.85 Drivers)
3Com 3C905 NIC
On-Board Sound
IBM 7200RPM
30GB HD
Creative Labs
52X CD-Rom
Standard Floppy
Drive
Windows 2000
SP2
DirectX 8.0a
Via 4-in-1s
v.4.35
|
Intel Pentium 4
1900MHz.
Azza P4X2-AV (VIA P4X266)
256MB Crucial
PC2100 (CAS 2)
GeForce 3
(21.85 Drivers)
3Com 3C905 NIC
On-Board Sound
IBM 7200RPM
30GB HD
Creative Labs
52X CD-Rom
Standard Floppy
Drive
Windows 2000
SP2
DirectX 8.0a
Via 4-in-1s
v.4.35
|
|
|
|
Performance Comparisons |
|
Time for
some numbers... |
|
|
The first tests we
ran were using the popular synthetic benchmarks in SiSoft Sandra...
SiSOFT SANDRA:
|
ECS
CPU @ 1900MHz
|
AZZA
CPU @ 1900MHz
| As you
can see, there is no discernable performance
difference between either of these boards in
Sandra's CPU test. Performance was right
where is should be for this board / CPU
combination.
|
ECS
MM @ 1900MHz
|
AZZA
MM @
1900MHz
| Very
similar results here. Sandra's Multi-Media
benchmark shows both boards running neck and neck.
|
ECS
MEM @ 1900MHz
|
AZZA
MEM @
1900MHz
| In
what is probably the most significant test, we see
the Azza board edge slightly ahead of the ECS
board. The difference isn't anything to get
excited about though. As we mentioned
earlier, ECS has promised to supply us with a new
BIOS that should increase performance. If
things change significantly we'll let you know.
|
ECS
Hard Disk
|
AZZA
Hard Disk
| Both
of these boards used the exact same IDE controller
in the 8233 Southbridge, and it shows
looking at the above scores. Let's move on
to some gaming numbers...
QUAKE
3 ARENA:
Running Quake 3 at a
low resolution isolates CPU performance. As
you can see, both the ECS and AZZA boards
performed very well in this test. The 1%
performance lead ECS held is well within the
"margin of error", in essence these scores are
identical.
|
|
Jammin' to
the Stones
| |
|
