System setup and notes
Hardware
| System | EVGA nForce 680i LT SLI | EVGA nForce 680i SLI | Foxconn 975X7AB System | MSI K9A Platinum AM2 System |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Processor | Intel Core 2 Extreme X6800 (2.93GHz, 4MiB L2 cache, LGA775) | AMD Athlon 64 FX-62 (2.8GHz, 2 x 1MiB L2 cache, Socket AM2) | ||
| Motherboard | EVGA nForce 680i LT SLI | EVGA nForce 680i SLI | Foxconn 975X7AB - Intel i975X | MSI K9A Platinum AM2 - ATI RD580/SB600 |
| Memory | 2GiB (2 x 1024) Corsair EPP | |||
| Memory timings and speed | 4-4-4-12 2T @ 800MHz (PC6400) | |||
| Graphics card(s) | 2x ASUS GeForce 7900 GTX | HIS X1900 CrossFire Edition + Sapphire X1900 XTX | ||
| Disk drive(s) | Seagate 160GB SATAII (ST3160812AS) | |||
| BIOS revision | 721N0P01 (02/22/2007) | 691N0P19 (10/31/2006) | 635F1D08 (09/08/2006) | 1.2B1 (07/17/06) |
| Mainboard software | NVIDIA 9.53 | Intel Inf Update 8.0.1.1002 | Catalyst 6.8 Southbridge package | |
| Graphics driver | NVIDIA ForceWare 91.47 | ATI CATALYST 6.8 | ||
| Operating System | Windows XP Professional, w/ SP2, 32-bit | |||
| PSU | FSP Epsilon 600W | |||
| Monitor | Dell 2405FPW | |||
Software
We ran the mainboards through our usual array of benchmarks.| 2D Benchmarks |
ScienceMark Memory Bandwidth ScienceMark Memory Latency HEXUS Pifast calculation to 10M places HEXUS WAV encoding HEXUS DivX encoding CINEBENCH 2003 v9.5 HDTach RW v3.0.1.0 |
|---|
| 3D Benchmarks |
Far Cry v1.33 Quake 4 v1.04 Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory v1.05 |
|---|
Observational notes
We're comparing the EVGA nForce 680i LT SLI motherboard its nForce 680i SLI stablemate. We've also included an Intel i975X chipset-based motherboard from Foxconn, the 975X7AB, and, completing this high-end quartet, MSI's RD580-based board for AMD's AM2 form factor.We feel that your choice of graphics cards dictates the choice of motherboard. High-end users will want to run with multi-GPU setups, or at least have the option to, so both nForce 680i SLI boards have been tested with NVIDIA's GeForce 7900 GTX 512 cards, running them in SLI. The Foxconn and MSI K9A Platinum AM2 boards both support ATI's CrossFire, so that's why we've chosen the largely equivalent X1900 XTX and CrossFire cards. Taking this into account, 2D results will be directly comparable between platforms but 3D results can only be directly compared against the platform offering the same multi-GPU support. All clear? If not, please head on over to the forums.
The actual running speed of the boards is often the differentiating factor between motherboards based on the identical core logics. Here's how our quartet panned out, with respect to CPU speed
2933.1MHz - 266.6MHz FSB - Intel Core 2 Extreme X6800 - EVGA nForce 680i LT SLI
2933.1MHz - 266.6MHz FSB - Intel Core 2 Extreme X6800 - EVGA nForce 680i SLI
2928.4MHz - 266.2MHz FSB - Intel Core 2 Extreme X6800 - Foxconn 975X7AB - i975X
2810.7MHz - 200.8MHz FSB - AMD Athlon 64 FX-62 - MSI K9A Platinum AM2 - ATI RD580/SB600
The playing field is pretty level as far as the Intel boards are concerned. On to the benchmarks!