Chaintech CT-6ASA Micro-ATX Motherboard Reviewed by CPU-ZILLA (4 Apr 99)
Motherboard Specifications
Processor
- Intel Celeron® Processor 266MHz-400MHz (66MHz).
- Intel Pentium® II Processor 233MHz-366MHz (66MHz).
- Intel Pentium® II Processor 350MHz-450MHz (100MHz).
- Intel Pentium® III processors (under tests)
Chipset
- VIA Apollo PROplus (VT82c693, VT82c596A) two chip AGPset
Cache memory
- CPU Built-in 128KB/512KB L2 cache for Celeron/Pentium II Processor
System Memory
- 3 x 168-pin 3.3v DIMM sockets support
- Supports 16/32/64/128 MB DIMM Module (256MB compatibility not guaranteed)
- Supports SDRAM PC66 & 100(Supports ECC, 1-bit Error Code Correct function)
- Supports up to 384MB of EDO or SDRAM memory size
- Supports 66/75/83/100/103/112/124/133 MHz System Clock Speed Setting
- Supports 3.0-8.0 Multiplier Setting
PCI IDE
- 2 X PCI Bus Master UDMA/33 IDE ports (up to 4 ATAPI Devices)
- Supports for PIO Mode 0-4, UDMA/33 IDE & ATAPI CD-ROM
I/O Interface
- 1x floppy port (360KB-2.88MB)
- 2x serial ports (16550A compliant)
- 1x parallel port (SPP/EPP/ECP)
- PS/2 Keyboard
- PS/2 Mouse
- 2x USB
- 1 IrDA connector (supports up to 115.2Kbps)
- 1 Audio port with Line-Out, Line-In & Mic-In (ESS Maestro-2 PCI audio chip) and 1 MIDI/Game Port
Expansion slot
- 3 x PCI 32-bit slots, PCI 2.1 compliant
- 1 x ISA 16-bit slots (one PCI/ISA shared slot)
- 1 x AGP (1x & 2x Mode, 66/133MHz) slot
- Supports Creative PCI Sound Card SB-Link™.
Power Management
- Power On by LAN, Modem, Keyboard/Mouse, RTC Alarm & Soft-Power Switch
- Power Off by Windows® 95/98 Shut down & Soft-Power Switch
- ACPI (Advanced Configuration and Power Interface) feature
Form Factor
- Micro-ATX Form Factor : 244mm(L) x 210mm(W) x 4 layers PCB
- Fits into regular ATX Case (six mounting holes)
- ATX Connector on Board
BIOS
- 2 Mbit (256KB) FLASH-able BIOS
- Award PCI BIOS with APM, PnP, DMI and Anti-Virus Functions
- Floppy, LS120, ZIP-ATAPI, ATAPI CD-ROM, HDD (IDE/SCSI) multi-device booting
<Introduction><The Good><The Test> <The Bad><Conclusion><Rating>
Introduction
Shortly after VIA Technologies reached an agreement with Intel that resolves several outstanding intellectual property issues relating to VIA's Apollo Pro chipsets for the Slot-1 architecture, VIA introduced the Apollo Pro Plus on the eve of Christmas last year. This chipset supercedes Apollo Pro which was introduced in early 1998. The two-chip set consists of the VT82C693 North Bridge and the VT82C596A South Bridge. This chipset serves as an alternative to the already famous Intel chipsets (e.g. 440BX) for the Intel Pentium II Slot-1 or the Celeron Socket 370 processors.
A "glamour shot" of the VIA Apollo Pro Plus chipsetThis new Chaintech motherboard utilises the new VIA Apollo Pro Plus chipset by VIA Technologies. It is a Micro-ATX form factor board with built-in on-board audio utilising the ESS Maestro-2 PCI chipset. Tne Maestro-2 boasts support for the Aureal 3D and Direct Sound 3D APIs.
As usual, the package comes with FDD & HDD ribbon cables, plastic stub for standard ATX chassis, a printed copy of the motherboard manual and a CD-ROM containing all the drivers and utilities needed to kick start this baby. However, you may want to download the latest drivers from VIA Technologies, just to make sure you don't run into any unforeseen problems. Anyway, the drivers provided worked fine during the tests but I know most people can sleep better knowing that they have the latest drivers installed.
Let's see if the VIA chipset could live up to its bigger cousin, the Intel 440BX chipset.
The Good
Like the other Chaintech motherboard I reviewed, the power connector was positioned near the IDE connectors, away from the CPU. Most people are concerned by the position of the connector, since a large and chunky connector beside the CPU would definitely obstruct air flow. But I suppose a good casing is important to help purge out the hot air since air flow can be diverted around objects and is not line of sight like light. Hmm... seems like I have deviated from the subject again.
The BIOS settings are a little different when it comes to configuring the DRAM settings. The DRAM timing setting is very simple with only different options (e.g. 8ns, 10ns, Normal, Medium, Fast or Turbo), instead of all the confusing settings like RAS to CAS Delay and RAS Precharge Time. In addition, the DRAM timing setting can be set individually for each SDRAM bank. This may be a good feature for those who may want to mix their DIMMs. However, I have not tried it, so I really do not know how it well it would work.
Besides setting the DRAM timing, you can also set the DRAM clock speed to run at either 66Mhz or at the host clock speed. This is also another good feature for those who want to use their PC66 SDRAMs at 100MHz bus speed, although they may sacrifice some performance due to the reduced RAM speed. Also, if you have an AGP card capable of 2x speed, you can also easily enable it in the BIOS. And for overclockers, they would be glad to know there's a jumper to disable automatic FSB detection.
I always liked a simple and neat setup for any computer systems. One way is to integrate as many features into the motherboard as far as it can take. As with the previous Chaintech motherboard I reviewed, this baby also comes with a built-in audio chipset. The audio utilises the ESS Maestro-2 chipset. Although it is not the most desirable audio chipset around, I suppose it is sufficient for most entry level users.
I know most of you are dying to know how this board performs, and as Fox Mulder would say in this situation, "The Truth is In Here"!
The Test
In the tests, I used my Pentium II 300 SL2YK, which most of you would know that it is one of the most overclockable chip around. Heh, come to think of it, the next generation of Intel chips would be called Sextium, and my oh my, does it sound erotic! Anyway, overclocking this CPU was simple with the jumper to override auto detection of the FSB. However, overclockers may feel a little squeezed since changing the voltage is not possible through the BIOS.
And as usual, I will compare the test results with my own Elitegroup P6BX-A+ motherboard.
Test Configuration |
|
| Processor(s): |
Pentium II - 300 Retail, batch=SL2YK, 2.0V, Malay |
| RAM: | 1 x 128MB Samsung PC100 (GH) SDRAM DIMM |
| Hard Drive(s): | Quantum 840AT - 800MB |
| Video Card(s): | ECS Riva 128 AGP |
| Bus Master Drivers: | Windows 98 Bus Mastering Drivers |
| Video Drivers: | NVidia Ref. Drivers Release 2.77 |
| Operation System(s): | Windows 98 (build 4.10.1998) |
| CPU | (1) Intel Pentium II with MMX@300 MHz |
| Video Board | ECS Riva 128 AGP |
| Video Mode | 1024x768@16bits/pixel |
| RAM | 128 MB |
| OS | Windows 98 4.10.1998 |
| Area Tested | Value (P6BX-A+) |
Value (CT-6ASA)
|
|---|---|---|
| CPU Integer | 870.9869 MIPS | 872.4655 MIPS |
| CPU Floating Point | 349.1219 MFLOPS | 347.8073 MFLOPS |
| Video(2D) | 38.46286 MPixels/s | 33.11886 MPixels/s |
| Direct3D | 89.92081 MPixels/s | 90.90893 MPixels/s |
| OpenGL | 64.56181 MPixels/s | 63.53908 MPixels/s |
| Memory | 522.9412 MB/s | 499.1566 MB/s |
| Cached Disk | 64.89151 MB/s | 55.33963 MB/s |
| Uncached Disk | 2.780753 MB/s | 1.362628 MB/s |
| CPU | (1) Intel Pentium II with MMX@450 MHz |
| Video Board | ECS Riva 128 AGP |
| Video Mode | 1024x768@16bits/pixel |
| RAM | 128 MB |
| OS | Windows 98 4.10.1998 |
| Area Tested | Value (P6BX-A+) |
Value (CT-6ASA)
|
|---|---|---|
| CPU Integer | 1303.563 MIPS | 1309.993 MIPS |
| CPU Floating Point | 523.1732 MFLOPS | 522.1724 MFLOPS |
| Video(2D) | 55.11017 MPixels/s | 46.38165 MPixels/s |
| Direct3D | 94.27676 MPixels/s | 94.37476 MPixels/s |
| OpenGL | 66.97032 MPixels/s | 65.82224 MPixels/s |
| Memory | 774.7418 MB/s | 767.3304 MB/s |
| Cached Disk | 93.57198 MB/s | 87.665 MB/s |
| Uncached Disk | 2.83783 MB/s | 1.389292 MB/s |
| CPU Mark 99 (Winbench 99 v.1.1) | P6BX-A+ | CT-6ASA |
| 300MHz (66 x 4.5) | 23.1 | 22.6 |
| 450MHz (100 x 4.5) | 34.5 | 33.6 |
| FPU Winmark (Winbench 99 v.1.1) | P6BX-A+ | CT-6ASA |
| 300MHz (66 x 4.5) | 1540 | 1540 |
| 450MHz (100 x 4.5) | 2300 | 2320 |
| Business Winstone 99 | P6BX-A+ | CT-6ASA |
| 300MHz (66 x 4.5) | 15.9 | 15.3 |
| 450MHz (100 x 4.5) | 20.0 | 19.6 |
The Wintune scores revealed very little differences between my P6BX-A+ and the CT-6ASA motherboard. The only difference I can find in the results was the poorer performance of the 2D Video and Memory. Somehow I do not believe in the scores given by Wintune as I always doubt its accuracy. Anyway, do not compare the hard disk performance, since I used an IBM Deskstar 8 for my P6BX-A+ test and an old Quantum 800MB hard disk for this test. It is not a fair comparison, therefore I do not want to comment further.
Looking at the Winbench results, we can really see the distinct difference between the Intel BX and VIA chipsets. At both 66MHz and 100MHz FSB settings, we can see that the VIA chipset does not perform on par with the Intel BX chipset. However, the FPU Winmark scores did very well. As for the Winstone scores, you can also see that there's little difference. Also, you can see that Winbench does provide more accurate scores than Wintune (I mean for CPU benchmark). In future, I may choose to remove the Wintune tests, unless by popular demand. Any comments, anyone?
Again, I pushed this board up to the 133MHz limit and I was surprised it failed to even POST (Power On Self Test). I scratched my head for a while and wondered why. I suspected that it was the RAM and so I changed the SDRAM from the infamous SAMSUNG GH to my HYUNDAI PC100 RAM. I restarted the machine, and to my surprise it purred like a healthy kitty. It booted right up to Windows and ran tests on it without any hitch. I then replaced the RAM with the SAMSUNG GH again and changed the RAM clock to 66MHz in the BIOS. This time it worked, but alas, at a lower RAM speed. I really do not understand why the board failed to work with the SAMSUNG SDRAM, but this lesson tells us never to underestimate other branded RAMs.
One of the surprises that I had while setting up the system was the lack of fan connectors on the motherboard. I know that this shouldn't deserve the first mention, but I really find it inconvenient to have only one fan connector beside the CPU. As most of my CPUs have two fans attached (ok,ok, I'm KIASU, so what?), I find it difficult to install the CPU. Luckily, there was another fan connector (actually the casing fan) located near the IDE connectors. As it is actually quite far away, you would really need a rather lengthy wire to connect your second fan.
Another disappointment was the built-in audio chip. Somehow, I find that they really didn't do a very good job with it as the sound output was rather noisy. I'm an audiophile so I tend to be quite fussy at audio quality. There was this constant hiss produced on my speakers even at considerably low volume settings, which I find rather annoying. In addition, if you have a CD-ROM connected to the Audio CD-in connector, you would get even more noise. Everytime you access a CD-ROM, you can actually hear the drive seeking noises through your speaker like as if the CD-ROM is not noisy enough. Listening to Audio CDs is really a nightmare. Beethoven would have been offended to hear his famous Choral Symphony played with this constant CD-ROM seeking noise in the background. If you don't intend to use the Audio CD, you can always mute the Line In in the control panel. On the other hand, if you don't want to use audio device at all, you can also disable it in the BIOS. Also, I find the lack of bass and treble adjustment a little disappointing although I rarely use it.
As mentioned in the previous section, the VIA chipset is actually not on par with the Intel BX chipset as shown by the Winbench results. Anyway, the difference is not much and is hardly noticeable at all. Also, this board is definitely not for overclockers since you cannot change the CPU core voltage, although the board runs stable at most overclocked speeds. Also, it seems to have a little problem with the Samsung GH RAMs at 133MHz FSB setting.
Conclusion
This latest motherboard utilising the latest VIA Apollo Pro+ chipset is certainly a good alternative to the Intel BX chipset. Even at overclocked speeds, the board runs stable. This is really a "No Frills" board targeted at entry level users who wants a compact and highly integrated system.
Overall Rating (Out of a maximum of 5 Star) |
|
| Installation | *** |
| Performance | ***½ |
| Price | **** |
| Overclockability | *** |
| Material Quality | *** |
| Stability | **** |
| Overall Rating | ***½ |
Copyright © 1999 by Singapore Hardware Zone. All rights reserved.
None of the above
shall be reproduced, copied and/or
modified without the permission of the WebMaster.
