Review: Chaintech Zenith ZNF3-250 - Mainboard - HEXUS.net

System setup and notes

Here's a quick rundown of the test system should you wish to compare benchmark results with your own.

Chaintech Zenith ZNF3-250 NVIDIA nForce3 250 chipset-based motherboard (16/1/2004 BIOS)
EPoX 8KDA3+ NVIDIA nForce3 250Gb chipset-based motherboard (07/04/2004 BIOS)
EPoX 8HDA3+ VIAK8T800 chipset-based motherboard (24/03/2004 BIOS)

Other components

AMD Athlon 64 Model 3400+ CPU (2.2GHz)
ASUS Radeon 9800 XT (412/730)
2 x 256MB Corsair XMS3500C2, run at 2-2-2-6
Pioneer 105 DVD-RW
Western Digital 160GB (WD1600) 8MB cache hard drive
Western Digital 36GB Raptor SATA hard drive
Dell P991 19" monitor

Software

Windows XP Professional SP1
DirectX 9.0b
NVIDIA nForce3 Platform Driver
VIA Hyperion 4.51 driver set
ATI CATALYST 4.4 drivers and control panel
Pifast v4.1 to 10m places
Lame v3.92 MP3 encoding with Razor-Lame 1.15 front-end using U2's Pop album (607MB)
HEXUS XviD encoding test
KribiBench 1.1
ScienceMark 2.0
Realstorm Raytracing benchmark 320x180x32
3DMark 2001SE v330
UT2003 Retail (Build 2225)
X2: The Threat - Rolling Demo
Comanche 4 benchmark
Quake 3 v1.30 HQ

Call of Duty - HEXUS Custom Test

Notes

Installation went without a hitch. The board was installed into a regular Lian-Li PC60 case without issue. Under load, though, MOSFETs could often be heard squeaking.

2210.9MHz - AMD Athlon 64 Model 3400+ / EPoX 8KDA3+ (nForce3 250Gb - 2-2-2-6)

2210.9MHz - AMD Athlon 64 Model 3400+ / EPoX 8HDA3+ (K8T800 - 2-2-2-6)

2210.0MHz - AMD Athlon 64 Model 3400 / Chaintech Zenith ZNF3-250 (nForce3 250 - 2-2-2-6)

Overclocking

Given the lack of multiplier adjustment of offer, we reached a maximum driven clock of 226MHz before probable CPU failure. It's just a shame that we could not explore the board's limits. Chaintech also needs to update its site more often with newer BIOSes.

There's a lot goin' on.