Thoughts, HEXUS.awards & HEXUS.right2reply
The ECS C19-A SLI is set to be a £66 board including VAT. That pits it directly versus the similarly equipped ABIT NI8-SLI GR and Gigabyte GA-8N-SLI (both C19-powered but with MCP-04, and among other boards from other vendors too) in terms of price and feature set. So it has competition right off the bat.Compared to the NI8-SLI GR for example, the ECS holds one more PCI slot and a better HD Audio CODEC over the ABIT in terms of features, ABIT countering with a better layout. And that's the case uniformly versus all the other cheap Intel SLI boards in the ECS C19-A SLI's class. The board always wins on features, with only little niggles like the layout to detract from the overall picture.
And since it competes well on price, I think it's safe to say that the ECS C19-A SLI is a cheap little winner. Your author personally hates how it looks, but for many that's neither here nor there, and I'm struggling to think what else is realistically wrong with it. C19XE and MCP51 is a potent combination for such a cheap product, and with ECS pairing those ASICs with the ALC883 and a decent BIOS, its worth considering.
Add something like a 6800 GS (or 6600 GT or 7600 GT, depending on budget), Audigy 2/4 and a Pentium-D 820 (or even 805!) and with a bit of overclocking you'd have a decent Intel-based PC with which to game and work on, with the teaser of SLI when you feel flush again. That's how I see this board being used.
Worth a spot on your considerations list, for sure.
HEXUS Awards
ECS Elitegroup C19-A SLI
HEXUS Right2Reply
We invited ECS to respond to our article under the HEXUS Right2Reply initiative. Their reply follows:
Firstly, we would like to thank HEXUS for another thorough review. The C19-A SLI review provides an insight into what we believe will be a strong contender in its intended market and as can be seen from the review this board offers a whole lot for a very competitive price. In reference to the statement on the 4-pin ATX12V and PCI Express graphics slot power connectors placed sub-optimally for clean cable routing, we are grateful for these comments and will take them into consideration for future design revisions.
We are also very pleased with the performance comparison results, and in particular HEXUS’ choice of award as this undoubtedly supports our performance-to-cost ratio to be one of the best in the market.
