nForce4 Motherboard Chipset Jesse Printz Bryant Newby CIS 462 2/22/05
Outline ● Socket 939 ● What is a Chipset? ● nForce 4 Chipset ● nForce 4 Features Explination ● Compeditors ● Recommendation
What is Socket 939 ● CPU Specification ● Supports AMD Athlon 64 Processors ● 64-Bit
Why Socket 939? ● 90 nm design ● 64-Bit ● Future Expansion
What is a Chipset? ● Architecture ● Microchips that support the CPU, usually several controllers that govern how information travels between the processor and other components. ● Tom's Hardware Guide: – If the CPU is the brain of the PC, the chipset is the heart ● Standard Given to Motherboard Manufactures
Chipset Example
What is nForce4? ● Chipset Optimized for Graphics and Video ● Standard for Motherboard Manufactures ● nVidia's Fourth Installment of Graphics Chipsets
nForce4 Specifications ● One x16 PCI Express Slot ● Three x1 PCI Express Slots ● 4 Serial ATA Hard Drives ● RAID Across SATA & IDE ● ActiveArmor Firewall ● 10 USB 2.0 Ports
nForce4 Ultra Added Specifications ● nTune for Overclocking ● 3.0 Gb/s SATA Transfers ● 20 PCI Express Lanes
nTune ● On the fly – Clock Speed Changing ● Monitoring – Temperatures – Voltages ● Automated Troubleshooting ● One Place
nTune
nForce4 SLI Added Specifications ● Scalable Link Interface ● 2 PCI Express Video Cards Working Together – Distributed Load Balancing – Automatic Split ● Future Expansion
SLI Diagram
SLI Demonstration
nForce Ultra Modification to SLI
Native Command Queuing
Other 939 Competitors ● Uli ● SiS ● ATI Radeon XPRESS ● VIA K8T800 ● nForce3
Comparison of 939 Motherboards
Reccomendation ● nForce 4 SLI chipset – Advantages ● More Features ● From Anandtech: On Average 3% faster than ATI Radeon XPRESS ● Future Upgrades ● More Control – Disadvantages ● Cost
Sources ● Anandtech - ● nVidia - ● TheTechReport - ● Tom's Hardware Guide - ● ATI - ● PriceWatch -