Albatron KM51PV - Loaded with new features! - Mainboard - Press Release

Albatron KM51PV - Loaded with new features!

The Albatron's KM51PV mainboard with NVIDIA's® nForce™ 430 Southbridge and GeForce 6150™ Northbridge (codenamed C51) is one hot mainboard. This technical document will take you through a quick tour of the KM51PV's exciting list of new features.

Integrated full featured, powerful GeForce 6 Series GPU

The integrated GPU contained on the Northbridge of the KM51PV is not your ordinary, run-of-the-mill, on-board token GPU. It is based on a serious GeForce 6 Series GPU with a 475 MHz core, DX9 and SM3.0 support and an advanced video processor dubbed, PureVideo, An integrated GPU means, of course, that there are graphics facilities on the mainboard, so your customer does not have to buy a video card (saves money). But there are lots of mainboards with integrated GPUs. What makes the KM51PV different? Most integrated mainboards are equipped with nothing more than a GPU you can scrape by with, not particularly capable of tackling serious gaming software. However, NVIDIA is now competing seriously in the integrated GPU market these days with its GeForce 6150 chipset. The integrated GPU is endowed with a powerful 475 MHz core (yes, quite fast for an integrated GPU - at the time of this article only a few of the top end Albatron VGA cards were faster at 500 MHz).It also comes with DX9 (DirectX 9.0) with SM 3.0 (Shader Model 3.0) support. If your customer plays PC games, their system needs to support these important graphics programming standards which allow gaming programmers to use the latest tools, interfaces and programming techniques to display the most realistic 3D imagery. This includes highly sophisticated rendering techniques for the most difficult situations including water reflection, lighting, shading, fire, smoke, hair, surface textures etc.What does this mean for your customers?Of course they save money on the video card but they also get a serious integrated GPU. As well, they can be assured that they will be able to run all the latest and most sophisticated games supporting the latest industry standards and thus achieving the highest image quality.

NVIDIA's PureVideo video decoder with HDTV support

PureVideo is NVIDIA's first integrated Video Decoder which decodes, encodes a variety of video formats for display on various output mediums producing high-quality (that is exceptionally high-quality) video imagery.

PureVideo is integrated. This means that it is burned into the Northbridge GeForce 6150 chipset. This means "hardware-based" which allows the chipsets to do all the work of processing video, leaving the CPU to do other things.What does it mean to customers? It means the customer can watch videos in one window and work in other windows without waiting around for a sluggish CPU processing video display.
PureVideo also supports HDTV (High Definition Television). Digital TV is becoming the trend these days as the market moves away from the traditional analog TV to improve picture quality. As you know, resolution on an image display is measured in the horizontal lines of display. Conventional analog TV typically only contains about 525 lines (525 interlaced or 525i in the US). HDTV is a type of digital TV that is capable of rendering up to 1080 lines (1080 interlaced or 1080i). What does it mean for customers? They have the hardware ready to install an HDTV and get more than double the resolution of conventional analog TV. They also get wider screens (yeah, like the movies) which our human eyes are naturally more accustomed to.
PureVideo supports WMV9 and MPEG2 decompression. Of course producing better resolution means massive amounts of high quality video information that must be compressed for efficiency. Much of today's video information uses the popular compression formats WMV9 and MPEG2. PureVideo provides the facilities to decode either formats. And again, WMV9 and MPEG2 decoding is all done on a hardware level (hardware acceleration) which means it's non-CPU intensive. What does this mean to customers? Massive amounts of video information can be decompressed with little impact on CPU utilization using the latest decoding standards.
PureVideo includes sophisticated picture enhancement technologies. Video processing and display is a complex, time consuming laborious process that involves compressing, decompressing, translating video information from many different formats to be displayed on TVs, Monitors, LCDs of all different sizes and types. PureVideo uses the most sophisticated video processing techniques to ensure the highest quality imaging no matter the source, no matter the destination. High Quality Video Scaling allows incoming video data, no matter the format, to be specifically adapted to several standard output display sizes such as 640x480, 800x600, and as high as 1280x1024, all at a variety of refresh rates What does it mean for customers? This ensures the highest quality imaging no matter the output size that their display equipment is capable of.Inverse Telecine with 3:2, 2:2 pulldown is another video translation technique, until now only limited to high-end DVD players and other image display electronics equipment. Inverse Telecine converts motion picture display from one speed to another (e.g. film at 24 frames per second might be converted to video at 30 frames per second) to suit your output display. However, this process can result in subtle imperfections in image quality. This is where PureVideo's sophisticated Inverse Telecine protocols smooths out all of the wrinkles and imperfections. So what does it mean for customers? It means outstanding video resolution that approaches high-end, home-electronics image display quality.Spatial Temporal Deinterlacing - Deinterlacing is a technique used to take video in interlaced format (such as that used by analog TVs) and convert it to non-interlaced video (used by progressive scan displays like computer monitors). However, this process of transforming interlaced frames to non-interlaced does not always produce an accurate non-interlaced picture. Additional lines, colors or pixels must be added to a frame to enhance the image quality. NVIDIA's Spatial Temporal Deinterlacing is NVIDIA's own deinterlacing protocol which uses advanced pixel manipulation and calculation from several surrounding interlaced frames (not just the current frames) to produce the highest quality deinterlaced image quality. So what is PureVideo again? It is NVIDIA's integrated Video Decoder capable of sophisticated encoding, decoding, translation, picture enhancement, and display processing of any number of video formats and adapting it to almost any kind of output display, including the latest HDTV technology, while maintaining the highest quality.What does it all mean for customers? It's almost like taking a high-quality DVD player and putting it right into your PC.

AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 Dual Core CPU support

The latest trend in CPUs is Dual Core. You've seen it with Intel's Pentium D and now AMD has come out with their AMD Athlon 64 Dual Core CPUs. The KM51PV contains a 939 socket which supports all of the current AMD Athlon 64 Dual Core CPUs which are built on 90 nanometer process technology. 1. The 90 nanometer process technology means that the circuitry on the CPU is condensed into a very small area. Highly condensed circuitry means that the data on the CPU travels shorter distances which means faster transmission of data. Condensed circuitry also means that you don't need as much power to move the data from point to point which means power conservation. Less power also means that the heat per square unit of area on the die is considerably less. Less heat means a more stable CPU. The condensed circuitry also means that the there is more room for other components, such as, lets say, another core. So what does it mean for the consumer? Their system runs faster with less heat and more stability. 2. Dual Core - AMD Athlon 64 Dual Core is basically having 2 CPUs in one and is especially useful for customers whose systems often or even sometimes multitask. So what does it mean for your customer? Fast, fast, fast, especially when running several applications at a time, which we all do from time to time.As for the future, the expectation is that more and more applications will be written to take advantage of Dual Core technology. With the KM51PV, your customer's system will be Dual Core application READY.

ActiveArmor Firewall

Today's PC security concerns are not so different from that of a highly secured corporate network. PCs are also subject to the same devastating attacks that can lead to loss of important data and significant downtime. However, for many consumers, the thought of implementing a "Firewall" can be quite an intimidating task of selecting and configuring complicated equipment or software. However, users are always aware of the potentially lethal virus and worms that lurk in the internet and how easy it is to contract one. Well, the KM51PV actually comes with an integrated Firewall.An "Integrated" Firewall, of course means that it is Hardware Based and less susceptible to virus and hacker manipulation than a software based Firewall. Basically, its very, very secure.Secondly, the process of examining every network packet can be very CPU intensive (software firewalls can sometimes take up 70-80% of the CPU overhead). However, the ActiveArmor Firewall is hardware based, which means that the chipsets take care of all of the network packet inspection and leaves the CPU alone. In other words, the ActiveArmor Firewall is non-CPU intensive. 1. ActiveArmor also supports both Stateless Firewalls (traditional packet filtering of every packet) and Stateful Firewalls (packet filtering based on connection - more efficient). 2. ActiveArmor also includes Anti-Hacking technologies (anti-IP-spoofing, anti-sniffing, anti-ARP cache poisoning, anti-DHCP server). This serves to protect against devastating hacker invasions such as DDoS (Distributed Denial-of-Service) type attacks. 3. NVIDIA has augmented ActiveArmor with IAM (Intelligent Application Manager). This is an application-based filtering program that protects at a higher application level, protecting your system from rogue applications that change existing application code, infect other PCs or send out unauthorized network packets. It also limits the ability of Trojans and Spyware to setup on your PC as a server. 4. All ActiveArmor user interfaces are intuitive and user friendly. 5. ActiveArmor also provides Instant-On protection. This means that the moment that the PC is switched on, the incoming network line is immediately scrutinized for unauthorized packets, leaving not even the slightest margin for a hacker and virus to enter the system. So what does all Firewall technology mean for customers? They don't have to spend time researching, searching, and installing a Firewall because there is one right on the mainboard. They can rest assured knowing that a very secure hardware based protection wall is guarding against even the most lethal of attacks. Furthermore, the Firewall is almost completely hardware based and non-CPU intensive so they won't even notice that it's there.

MediaShield Advanced Disk Management System

MediaShield is one of the most advanced disk management systems on the market and is integrated onto the chipsets of the KM51PV. MediaShield gives users access to the most advanced performance hardware and disk access techniques available. In addition, MediaShield has incorporated new features that streamline user configuration and administration of disk arrays. This system also contains safeguards, redundancy and fault tolerance that can almost eliminate any downtime during disk failure and disk repair.*RAID 0,1, 0+1,5*SATA 3 Gb/s *Dual Controllers *Disk Alert System *Morphing *Cross Controller RAID*On-the-fly rebuilds of mirrored drives *Hot plug for SATA drives 1. MediaShield supports RAID 5. MediaShield provides RAID functionality including the commonly seen RAID 0 (striping), RAID 1 (mirroring), RAID 0+1 (mirroring and striping). This RAID system also includes the increasingly popular RAID 5, which incorporates striping for performance but also contains a parity checking mechanism to provide data security. The great thing about this configuration is that it offers the speed of striping and the data security of mirroring but with only a minimum requirement of 3 disks.What does RAID 5 mean to customers? They get performance (striping) and data security (parity mechanism) like RAID 0+1 but without having to purchase a lot of disks. Sure, you can do RAID 0+1 with only 1 additional disk (4 disks) but that extra disk can still be an annoying extra consideration when you're trying to pare down the expenses. 2. MediaShield supports SATA 3 Gb/s. The KM51PV supports the latest 3 Gb/s SATA drives that have been recently coming into the market. These drives almost double the speed of predecessor SATA 1.5 Gb/s drives. 3. MediaShield uses a Dual Controller. This architecture uses the power of two channels to move information between hard drives and system memory (see images below). What does Dual Controller mean to customers? Disk activity is one of the most time consuming processes for PC systems. The KM51PV adds Dual Controllers to go with SATA 3 Gb/s drives and RAID performance facilities (striping) making disk access significantly faster than any predecessor configurations. 4. MediaShield includes Disk Alert System. This system conveniently locates and identifies a failing drive to the user with a clear image of the slot layout on the mainboard (see slot highlighted with red in image below). So how does an accurate picture get of the KM51PV get displayed with its slot connectors? Albatron engineers had to take digital pictures of the mainboard and adapt it to the Disk Alert System so that it could be used with the KM51PV.What does this mean to the customer? If you've ever had a failed disk drive and then tried to physically identify that drive on a multi-drive system (HD serial numbers, slots, connectors), you know how frustrating and time consuming that can be. With Disk Alert System, you can accurately zero in and locate the errant drive almost immediately. 5. Media Shield includes Morphing. This is also another feature used by MediaShield which easily allows you to change from one RAID type to another (i.e. RAID 0 to RAID 1) with only a minimal amount of administration. Usually, changing your RAID disk array, means that you have to back up your data, delete the array, reboot the system, recreate your array and reload your data. With Morphing, you can change your RAID array from type 0 to 0+1 in one simple step.What does this mean to the customer? When initially configuring a RAID array, the customer does not need to be so committed to the initial RAID type. At some later point, the customer may easily "Morph" to another RAID configuration depending on changing circumstances or needs. 6. MediaShield has Cross Controller RAID. This feature allows you to use both SATA and PATA drives in same RAID array, something traditional RAID systems were not able to do. Traditional RAID systems required identical drives and identical connectivity formats in the same RAID array.What does this mean to the customer? Customers can now make use of their old PATA drives with their new SATA drives in the same RAID array. They will also have more options when adding or changing out a drive a few years down the road. 7. MediaShield supports Spare Disk Allocation - MediaShield's RAID system can also provide a spare disk to automatically replace a failed disk in an array. This spare disk can protect multiple arrays of drives (shared spare) or protect a single array (dedicated spare).What does this mean to the customer? In case of disk failure, a spare disk can automatically kick in, eliminating downtime and giving the customer, support teams or technicians time to respond and repair the problem. 8. MediaShield supports On-the-fly rebuilds - MediaShield allows mirrored disks that have failed to be rebuilt on the fly, eliminating any downtime during repair of failed mirrored drives. 9. MediaShield supports Hot plug - SATA drives can be hot plugged without powering down the system.

FarStone Restorit™ Recovery Utility Bundle

With the KM51PV, Albatron is bundling a popular disk and file recovery utility from FarStone called Restorit™. With this utility, the user is able to "roll back" the system to a point in time just before a system disaster, such as a disk failure or a virus intrusion. You can also recover deleted files and folders with this utility. An image of your data is first saved to a hidden-protected partition of a hard disk or CD-ROM. After that, data is incrementally saved.

Dynamic Overclocking Technology

This exciting new technology automatically overclocks the system when the CPU begins to experience heavy loads.