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Back in April we took a look at the EPoX EP-8K3A, EPoX's flagship Socket A motherboard along with its RAID equipped sibling the 8K3A+. Equipped with VIA's KT333 chipset, it brang DDR333 support to AMD Socket A on a VIA chipset and we had this to say about it: -
So what is the EPoX 8K3A like in practise after all the benchmarks are run and all the talk about KT333 is over? It's one of the most stable boards I've yet seen, something I maybe couldn't say about EPoX in the past. Not a blue screen throughout testing, no instability unless at the very ragged edge and pushing it to the extreme. A notch below the physical limits of the rest of the system and things were outstandingly stable, something EPoX have worked hard on.
So KT333 had hit the market and manufacturers were keen to embrace the chipset with EPoX doing their bit to represent it well. 5 months on (nearly to the day) and here we are again with another EPoX motherboard. The winds of change haven't been blowing especially hard for Socket A as a platform since April an this board is equipped yet again with the KT333 core logic. Yes KT400 is around and about but boards are pretty thin on the ground and from EPoX's perspective, their KT400 board (8K9AI) is still in development.
So 5 months down, why do we have another KT333 based board from EPoX when the 8K3A was so good? 2 reasons. Firstly, some new components such as USB2.0 and Ethernet are commonplace on boards these days so they give EPoX a good excuse for an update of 8K3A+, giving the board some up to date features. Secondly and maybe more importantly, VIA's provider of these services, the southbridge, has recieved an update in the form of the VT8235.
As you know in a modern x86-based PC system, system services are provided by a pair of chips usually deemed the northbridge and southbridge. With the northbridge handling the CPU interface, AGP and the memory controller, the southbridge does everything else. VT8235 brings a few important upgrades to the table over the VT8233 series of bridges used since KT266.
A new PCI implementation is what gets most press time when talking about this new southbridge. VIA recognised, quite rightly, that their previous implementation wasn't the best in the world with the issues (mainly with Creative soundcards) highly publicised. So a new PCI implementation that offers to solve all those problems is present and correct.
You also have a pair of USB2.0 controllers for 6-port support, Ethernet controller and 6-channel AC'97 audio controller on board to bring boards equipped with the new bridge up to scratch with current expected features.
So a glut of new features being expected on boards, a new southbridge to provide them and no new northbridge to play with, EPoX have refreshed their take on KT333 and a performance Socket A board and come up with 8K5A2+ (and indeed 8K5A3+ which has HPT374 for lots and lots of RAID goodness and another DIMM slot over 8K5A2+).
Let's take a closer look!
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