Hardware and Test Setup

Benchmarking for the nForce 4 for Intel has been split into two distinct sections, one that focuses on the mainboard performance compared to an Intel 925XE board, and a second section that takes a detailed look at the video performance and the benefits seen by SLI.

Hardware

Intel Pentium 4 560 (3.6 Ghz Prescott)
Corsair CM2X512A-5400UL Memory
OCZ PC2-5400 Memory
NVIDIA nForce 4 for Intel Reference Motherboard
ABIT AA8XE 925XE Motherboard
NVIDIA 6600GT Reference Board
NVIDIA 6800GT Reference Board x 2
Western Digital WD1200 SATA HD

Drivers

nForce 7.01 Driver Package
ForceWare 71.84 Drivers
Intel 6.2.1.1001 Chipset Drivers
Intel HD Audio 5.10.0.5034 Drivers

All tests were done on Windows XP SP2.

Memory Timings for CAS, RCD, RP, RAS, RC were set to 3-2-2-7-2 for the Corsair Modules. The command rate was set to 1T on the nForce system and since there was no option available to set this on the ABIT board, it is assumed that it defaulted to 2T. A pair of OCZ PC2-5400 512MB sticks were also used on the nForce board with timings of 4-4-4-8-12 at 2T to get a gauge of what sort of differences are to be expected on the nForce Intel board. Memory speed was set to 667 for the nForce 4 board while it was set to Auto on the ABIT board which also resulted in a 667 timing.

Motherboard tests were done on both the ABIT 925XE board and the NVIDIA nForce 4 Intel board with the 6600GT. The reference board was set to single GPU mode.

The SLI bridge piece

During SLI testing, a pair of 6800GT reference cards were used for testing.

Motherboard Benchmarks