BIOS
Shuttle's recent XPC BIOSes have been on a par with its full-size motherboards'. It's no longer a case of locking out all the fine tuning, Shuttle positively encourages enthusiasts to have a go.
DRAM configurations are still locked out on this nForce3 150. One cannot manually define the 2-6-2-2 timings that we regularly use to benchmark systems. The only available options are with respect to the system's memory speed. The Athlon 64 3200+ uses memory divisors to keep the memory controller and DRAM controller in check. The options limit the speed of the RAM at a given CPU speed. So for 2000MHz a /10 divisor is used to ensure that DDR400 (200MHz) memory speeds are obtained. For the DDR333 setting a divisor of 13 is in place. It all makes implicit sense once you toggle with the BIOS. You'd really want to run DDR400 memory for performance's sake.
The Athlon 64 Clawhammer runs off a native 200MHz internal clock. Shuttle gives the options of up to 250MHz. At the present time, multipliers applied to be locked on Socket-754 CPUs, such that the only method of overclocking is in raising the internal clock speed, a la Pentium 4. There's little inference here that the nForce3 150 specifies bus speed locking. Most BIOSes inform the user if and when certain key buses are likely to go out of specification with on-the-fly reporting. AGP speeds are adjustable from 66MHz (default) to 100MHz.
VIA reckons its HyperTransport implementation, the link between the CPU and chipset, is by far the most desirable. NVIDIA has reduced its HT link from a previously quoted 6.4GB/s to 3.6GB/s (2.4GB/s from the CPU and 1.2GB/s to the CPU). Considering that the single-chip nForce3 150 communicates directly with the CPU 3.6GB/s is enough for the time being.
Voltages are pretty decent on the SN85G4. There's a broad range for each and every variable. The board doesn't tend to under-volt as much as some desktop models, suggesting that the stout 240w PSU is up to the job. The Athlon 64 3200+ doesn't seem to appreciate high, high voltages, so limited overclocking is definitely possible within the confines of the SN85G4. A number of features can be toggled from within BIOS. It's just a shame that SATA isn't an on-chip option. Also note that there's no integrated video. This is a power cube aimed at the enthusiast market.
The I.C.E cooling is elegant and flexible. The fans can be set to pre-defined levels of ultra-low, low, mid, full and Smart Fan. The Smart Fan feature raises the speeds once the CPU hits a preset temperature, which in this case is 52c. During strenuous testing we found that the mid selection was more than adequate at keeping the Athlon 64 3200+ cool enough under full load. It's perplexing as to why there's no automatic shutdown feature here. A number of full-size boards carry it. We'd certainly have expected it to be present here. The voltages, though, are excellent on every line.
