LAN PARTY KT400A - LAN PARTY KT400A

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DFI LAN PARTY KT400A

 

 

ASSEMBLY AND STARTUP (continued)

 

This is the first screen that greets you from the motherboard BIOS. This can be disabled once you access the BIOS.

 

This is a picture of the preproduction BIOS that came with the motherboard sample.

 

This is the BIOS screen after updating to the latest code. This is the normal screen you get during POST once the LAN Party logo has been disabled.

 

 

      

    

Here are the obligatory pictures of the Award BIOS.

 

   

and the "Genie" sub-BIOS for tweaking and overclocking.

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BENCHMARKS

After slogging through the usual Windows loading procedure, It was time to load up some software and take a look at this motherboard and it's capabilities. My software bundle for today is:

• Sisoft Sandra (OCA™ edition)

• PCMark2002

• 3dMark2001 SE v330

• 3dMark2003 v320

• CodeCreatures Demo

• Comanche 4 Demo

• AquaMark Demo

• WinCPUID

• CPU-Z

I had Motherboard Monitor also but I decided to load the Winbond Hardware Monitor that comes with the LAN Party package.

 

    

 

As you can see the Hardware Monitor program provides sufficient information about the health of the motherboard through a friendly Windows GUI.

 

I will be comparing this motherboard to my own MSI K7N2-L and the Abit NF7-S V2.0.

System 1:

• ABIT NF7-S V2.0(14 Beta Bios, nVidia 2.03 drivers)
• AMD XP 2500+ (333 MHz FSB Barton)
• 512MB TwinMos PC3700 (2x256 Dual Channel, TwinMos chips)
• ATI 9700Pro (Catalyst 3.4, default settings)
• Seagate 120GB SATA HDD
• Pelt Loop: MCW462-UHT, MCW50-T, Hydor L30, BIX2 Pro, Meanwell s-320
• H2O Loop: Danger Den z-Chip, Hydor L20m, BIX pro
• Antec True Control 550W PSU
• Windows XP Pro (SP1, DX 9.0a)

 

System 2:

• MSI K7N2-L (BIOS 6570v33, nVidia 2.03 drivers)

• AMD XP 2500+ (333 MHz FSB Barton)

• 1 GB Kingston PC2700 (2x512 Dual Channel)

• ATI 9700Pro (Catalyst 3.4, default settings)

• Maxtor DiamondMax 80GB ATA133 HDD 8MB

• Thermaltake Volcano 9

• Dynapower 350W PSU

• Windows XP PRO (SP1, DX9.0a)

 

System 3:

• DFI LAN Party KT400A (BIOS 42302e31 dated05/06/03, Hyperion 4in1 v4.47 drivers)

• AMD XP 2500+ (333 MHz FSB Barton)

• 1 GB Kingston PC2700 (2x512 Single Channel - FastStream64)

• ATI 9700Pro (Catalyst 3.4, default settings)

• Maxtor DiamondMax 80GB ATA133 HDD 8MB

• Thermaltake Volcano 9

• Dynapower 350W PSU

• Windows XP PRO (SP1, DX9.0a)

I am pitting the DFI's KT400A chipset implementation against a top-notch Abit board and a middle of the road MSI board. Let's see if the VIA FastStream64 memory controller technology can stand up against nForce dual memory channel architecture.

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