Review: EPoX EP-4G4A

Performance is strong on the 4G4A+ and EPoX can rest easy since that conclusion is in the bag. So whether it gets your nod is down to features. It's not the bare EPoX performance boards that we might have seen in the past. EPoX now seems content to offer features built into its boards that it might not have done in the past and given 6 PCI slots on this board, we have to applaud EPoX for this.

They are adding significant value to their boards in terms of the features they are offering and still giving customers good expansion if they don't want to use the onboard Ethernet, audio (which isn't particularly strong) or graphics (which is downright poor).

You get the best of both worlds with this board. Highpoint as the choice for IDE RAID duties is a great choice and it's my favourite IDE RAID chipset despite being an ardent SCSI fan.

Bundle and presentation is a step above the usual EPoX fare, presentation wise especially. Jet black attractive PCB and the packaging were a move up the ladder for EPoX so thumbs up to that. This board is definitely not OEM fare, its targetted at you the consumer and it's to be applauded that EPoX realise that bland presentation doesn't help sell boards these days.

While I don't feature overclocking performance in my reviews, it did push the 1.8A to 2.6Ghz without issue prvided the CPU was kept cool and with a Swiftech in my system, an 800MHz overclock is among the best I've seen for that CPU without serious voltage being needed.

It was very stable, even when overclocked, something we've all become accustomed to recently with Pentium 4 boards. Being able to lock PCI and AGP bus speeds is a godsend in terms of overclocking performance and the 4G4A+ has this feature so be sure to use it.

So did I like this board and should it be an option for your shortlist? Yes and yes. Go ahead and forget the integrated graphics even exist on this board since I don't think you can find 4BEA anywhere and besides, the voltage adjustment and system tweaks available in this BIOS make it a performance users board and no mistake.

It's 2nd or 3rd in my list of boards available for the Pentium 4 platform and with the massive multitude of boards available, that's even better in my eyes.

EPoX can be proud of this board.

Pro's

Performance in spades
Good onboard features (HPT372 especially)
Excellent presentation
Excellent manual
Excellent BIOS adjustment
Good expansion from 6 PCI Good value (~£125)
Con's

Dismal onboard graphics performance (but who's going to use it on this board?)

9/10