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Review: EPoX EP-4PLAI

by Ryszard Sommefeldt on 30 December 2003, 00:00

Tags: EPoX

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CPU Tests

CPU bound tests let us check that the motherboard is running the host processor as well as possible. We're looking for as close to performance parity as 865PE as possible. LAME MP3 encoding first, generating 192kbps CBR MP3s from 44.1kHz, 16-bit source .wavs. It's a nice CPU bound test, 848P should do well.

LAME result

A negligible, but measurable, performance difference from the 4PLAI. The memory test results show us the reason for the slightly slower performance.

KribiBench is a CPU test primarily, but doesn't ignore differences in memory subsystem.

Kribi bench

We can clearly see the stepping from 875P/3.2/PAT/DC, down to 848P/3.0/NoPAT/SC, with the two 865PE results in between splitting things up nicely. Adding PAT, another memory channel and then 200MHz CPU speed gives us incremental performance increases on each part of the graph.

Realstorm next, another CPU bound app that likes L2 performance and tight memory timings.

Realstorm result

PAT accounts for the difference, rather than the increase in Trcd and Trp latencies on the memory modules. It shows the 848P can perform well given applications that don't discriminate against its disadvantages.