ScienceMark 2.0 and Pifast
Motherboard testing begins with a look at the memory subsystem.
Both chipsets use dual-channel memory controllers. AMD/VIA's offer DDR400 support and Intel's i925X chipset has provision from DDR2 support at 533MHz. That's a potential ~8.5GB/s on tap. ScienceMark 2.0 reckons that barely half of that is utilised. VIA's K8T800 PRO chipset manages 5.6GB/s from a potential 6.4GB/s.
Overall latency is also far superior on the AMD/VIA setup. An integrated memory controller and lack of a latency-adding northbridge help to keep Intel's i925X firmly in second place here.
Taking latency, bandwidth and overall clock speed into account translates to around a 6-second deficit for the DFI LANPARTY 925X-T2/P4 560 combination. High DDR2 RAM latencies doesn't help the DFI's cause.
