MS-6163 Pro ATX BX13 Motherboard Reviewed by CPU-ZILLA (28 Aug 99)
Motherboard Specifications
Processor
- Intel Celeron® Processor 266MHz-500MHz (66Mhz).
- Intel Pentium® II Processor 233MHz-333MHz (66Mhz).
- Intel Pentium® II Processor 350MHz-450MHz (100Mhz).
- Intel Pentium® III Processor 450MHz-600MHz (100Mhz).
- Supports 66/ 75/ 78/ 81/ 83/ 90/ 95/ 100/ 105/ 110/ 112/ 115/ 117/ 120/ 122/ 124/ 126/ 133/ 135/ 138/ 140/ 142/ 144/ 150/ 155 MHz System Clock Speed Setting
- Supports 3.0-8.0 Multiplier Setting
- Core voltage increase by 20%
Chipset
- Intel 440BX chipset
Cache memory
- CPU Built-in 128KB/512KB L2 cache for Celeron/Pentium II/III Processor
System Memory
- 3 x 168-pin 3.3v DIMM sockets support
- Supports 8/16/32/64/128/256 MB DIMM Module
- Supports SDRAM PC66 & 100(Supports ECC, 1-bit Error Code Correct function)
- Supports up to 768MB of memory size
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 (16550 high-speed)
- 1x parallel port (SPP/EPP/ECP)
- PS/2 Keyboard
- PS/2 Mouse
- 2x USB
- 1 IrDA ASKIR header
- 1 Audio port (Line_Out, Line_In and Mic_In) and 1 MIDI/Game Port powered by Creative ES1373 (Optional).
Expansion slot
- 4 x PCI 32-bit slots, PCI 2.2 compliant
- 2 x ISA 16-bit slots
- 1x AGP (1x/ 2x Mode, 66/ 133MHz) slot
Power Management
- Power On by LAN, Modem, Keyboard & Soft-Power Switch
- Power Off by Windows® 95/98 Shut down & Soft-Power Switch
- ACPI (Advanced Configuration and Power Interface) feature
- 3 level ACPI LED
- Suspend To RAM (STR) feature (requires power supply with 5V standby voltage at 1A)
Form Factor
- ATX Form Factor : 30.4cm(L) x 19.2cm(W) x 4 layers PCB
- Fits into regular ATX Case
- ATX Connector on Board
BIOS
- 2 Mbit (256KB) FLASH memory
- Award PCI BIOS with Green, PnP, DMI and Anti-Virus Functions
- LS120, ZIP, ATAPI CD-ROM, IDE #1, #2, #3, #4 bootable
<Introduction><The Good><The Test> <The Bad><Conclusion><Rating>
Introduction
I remember writing BASIC programs on the Apple ][ when I was about 11 years old. I always find it a great challenge to write complex programs although they serve little purpose since the school syllabus did not cover any forms of computing at that time. However, making the program work was not the only task I had in mind, as I remember constantly rewriting the routines and debugging the program to make it as perfect as possible. I suppose being persistent in improving something is a quality that runs in my family blood.
On the other hand, it is great to see the same persistence demonstrated by motherboard manufacturers like Microstar. In the last review of their 5-star award, MS-6163, we were treated to numerous new features that includes voltage tweaking, improved thermal sensors and an array of FSB frequencies to choose from. In my opinion, it was a truly feature packed product that none other managed to surpass. In order to ensure that Microstar stays on top, they have released a new revision to the MS-6163, which is now known as MS-6163 Pro. The pro version is actually the previous MS-6163 board with some new added features and is labeled as Ver. 2 on the motherboard. The BIOS is different, thus you should take note when downloading the BIOS, as you cannot flash the motherboard with the older Ver. 1.x BIOS.
The package comes in the usual colourful box with an MS-6163 Pro sticker on the cover. It comes packed with the same accessories as in the previous revision, such as the user's manual, FDD/HDD cables, CD-ROM containing the drivers and softwares and the motherboard itself.
What's New
More FSB frequencies
This new revision comes with 25 FSB frequencies, and that's a lot of choices to play with if you're a real serious overclocker. If you compare it with the previous revision, there are 10 additional frequencies in this release. However, not all the frequencies are the same between MS-6163 and MS-6163 Pro. In addition, you will also notice some frequencies with two choices of PCI bus speed setting. The table below will describe the differences between the two.
Note : The values are denoted as bus frequency/PCI bus frequency (spectrum spread on/off)
For MSI-6163, the option for spectrum spread was not known for the frequencies listed.
As you can see from the table above, there are over 29 different settings you could choose from. However, I find that enabling or disabling the spectrum spread option did absolutely nothing to the stability and the performance of the board. This should be expected since the option is to enable modulation of the system clock generator pulses in order to reduce the EMI (electrical magnetic interference) generated by the system. On the other hand, it is known that enabling spectrum spread may cause timing problems for some clock sensitive devices.
Better voltage tweaking (including chipset 3.3-3.6V)
Voltage tweaking is improved in this new revision. You are now allowed to increase the voltage up to 20% of the recommended voltage set by your CPU. Overclocking could have never been simpler and you are now given the choice to push your CPU to its limits. In addition to tweaking the CPU core voltage, there's also an option to increase the northbridge chipset voltage. The default value of the chipset voltage was 3.3V and you could increase it to 3.6V in steps of 0.1V. Perhaps this feature is useful if you are pushing your system above 133MHz FSB. However, I didn't use this feature as I was able to move up to 144MHz FSB without much problems. Anyway, I don't recommend increasing the chipset voltage as the chipset is already very hot, and without a fan, it could very well turn into a frying pan. However, if you have one of those heatsink/fan combos that directs air to the top and bottom, it could help cool the chipset, but that would be another topic for discussion.
D-LED™
"Silent night... holy night..."D-LED stands for Diagnostic LED (light emitting diode). It is actually a set of four dual colour LEDs that tells you what is wrong with your system or motherboard, should it refuses to boot up for any reason. As the motherboard is powered up, these LEDs will light up with different combinations of green and red, and each combination tells you at what stage the system initializes. If the system hangs, you could refer these colour codes to the reference table provided in the manual for a detailed description of the problem. This is a good diagnostic tool, especially for those new to the DIY world as it helps diagnose any problem instantly. On the other hand, this may help Microstar reduce the number of "false faulty " product returns due to improper installation. On the left is an example of how the D-LED works, but at a much reduced speed.
Suspend-to-RAM functionAlmost every new motherboard released nowadays contain this new feature. Suspend-to-RAM literally switches off all the system devices and peripherals including the CPU when the system goes into standby mode. During this operation, all the system status is dumped into memory, and only the memory is kept powered. In order for this feature to function properly, you will need to ensure the power supply's 5V Standby Voltage (5VSB) can supply up to 1A of current. Thus, make sure you check this on the power supply before you buy the casing. The power supply specifications are normally pasted on the supply box itself.
New softwares
Microstar, as usual, have included their brand of softwares for hardware monitoring, soft cooling and even their own version of overclocking tool for your favourite graphic card. The new softwares include :-
PC Alert III
Although it looked exactly like PC Alert II, there are a few new interesting features like a Y2K diagnostic tool and a modem tweaking utility to optimise your modem.Doctor Y2K
This utility is actually one of the functions available in PC Alert III. It basically tests your system for all the critical dates. As you can see here, the 6163 Pro passed all tests, as expected.Mospeed
This is another utility in PC Alert III. It basically allows you to tweak your dial up networking registries to give it a little boost in performance. You can choose to do it manually or have the utility to optimise the system for you.Soft Cooler II
Like CPUIdle or Waterfall Pro, this utility sets your CPU in idle mode when it is not in use. This helps reduce the CPU temperature, and may help to prolong the life of your CPU. Good utility to have for free. However, you do not need this if you have PC Alert III installed since the same function is built into PC Alert III. But for some reason if you decide not to use PC Alert III, you can always install this standalone utility. Smart thinking by MSI.3D! Turbo II (overclocking your graphic card)
As shown here, this utility allows you to overclock your favourite graphic card. Here, I'm using a Vanta chipset which has a default value of 110MHz for core and 125 MHz for memory. However, I didn't quite like the utility as it cannot remember the clock settings. Thus, after every reboot, you need to set the core/memory clock all over again. I guess this is a safety feature.3D! Turbo II (desktop switching)
This option allows you to place active programs into 8 different desks. For example, if you have opened 8 different applications, you can re-arrange these windows into each different desks. This would help make your task bar look cleaner and neater. Switching between these desks can be done from the 3D! Turbo II tray icon. I don't find this utility useful, since I need a few extra clicks before I can reach the application I want. Maybe others would find it useful.
Coloured connectors
As part of the PC99 specifications, all the connectors should be colour coded and that's what you will notice in this board. Although the connectors are nicely coloured, you will only see them when you look behind your PC. Although it does add some colour to the dull looking board but it is extra cost. :(
The Test
In all the tests, I used the Intel Pentium II-350 processor which is well known to be very overclockable. The fact that the processor is a Deschutes (0.25µm) core with its multiplier locked at 3.5x allows me the freedom to overclock the processor up to speeds of about 500MHz (which is about the maximum you could normally go with a Pentium II). Therefore, FSB speeds above 133MHz is not just a dream anymore. In addition, I used the latest Micron PC133 SDRAMs for all the tests, although I did try using my normal Mitsubishi PC100 SDRAM which yields similar results. The benchmark results were compared to the ECS P6BXT-A+ Rev. 1.3b using the same test configuration.
Test Configuration
Processor(s): Pentium II - 350 Retail, batch=SL37F, 2.0V, Philippines RAM: 1 x 128MB Micron PC133 SDRAM DIMM
(48LC8M8A2 -75B)Hard Drive(s): IBM Deskstar 22GXP DJNA-371350 Video Card(s): Microstar NVidia Vanta 16MB Bus Master Drivers: Windows 98 Bus Mastering Drivers Video Drivers: NVidia Reference Detonator Drivers 2.08 Operation System(s): Windows 98 Second Edition (Build 4.10.2222A) Ziff-Davis Business Winstone 99 Results
Processor speed (FSB x multiplier) MSI6163Pro ECS P6BXT-A+
Rev 1.3b350 MHz (100x3.5) 20.3 20.5 467 MHz (133x3.5) 23.7 - 497 MHz (142x3.5) 24.4 - 504 MHz (144x3.5) 25.0 -
Ziff-Davis CPUMark 99 Results
Processor speed (FSB x multiplier) MSI6163Pro ECS P6BXT-A+
Rev 1.3b350 MHz (100x3.5) 27.4 27.6 467 MHz (133x3.5) 36.8 36.5 497 MHz (142x3.5) 39.0 - 504 MHz (144x3.5) 39.7 -
Ziff-Davis FPU Winmark Results
Processor speed (FSB x multiplier) MSI6163Pro ECS P6BXT-A+
Rev 1.3b350 MHz (100x3.5) 1800 1800 467 MHz (133x3.5) 2400 2400 497 MHz (142x3.5) 2550 - 504 MHz (144x3.5) 2600 - Due to time constraints, the Winstone 99 benchmark was not performed on the ECS P6BXT-A+ at 133MHz FSB. However, judging from the results, the benchmarks showed very similar scores. This is evident in almost every BX motherboard you can find in the market, although some do believe that the previous MS-6163 is a little slower than most other boards. Well, this is a common trade-off for any motherboard manufacturer to sacrifice a little speed with stability and overclockability. It is the law of nature, you win some, you lose some. However, I was able to hit 144MHz without much problems and still managed to run Winstone. I was also able to boot into Windows at 150MHz, but the system got unstable. At 150MHz FSB, it is difficult to tell which is failing, as it could be the RAM, BX chipset or even the CPU. Anyway, this is for interest sake and I doubt anyone is crazy enough to overclock this much.
In a separate test, I found the MS-6163Pro to be a very stable and overclockable board as well. I had this Pentium-II 333 SL2WY which has never been stable when overclocked to 500MHz (even at 2.3V). However, with the MS-6163Pro, I was able to make the bugger run without a single hitch at 2.3V. This shows how much more stable the motherboard is as compared to the others.
As what I've indicated in the last review, there seems to be very limited space between the Slot-1 and the SDRAM DIMM slots. This prevents serious overclockers from using large heatsinks and fans like those from GlobalWin and Alpha. This is a really sad design flaw as the motherboard is really great for overclocking purposes. Anyway, I believe large fan/heatsinks are not necessary for successful overclocking. If your casing air flow is bad, no matter what kind of cooling you place on your CPU, overclocking will not be successful. Thus, a combination of good casing air flow, and a decent CPU fan/heatsink is sufficient for successful overclocking.
One good feature found in the BIOS is its protection feature against accidental BIOS re-programming. This option is supposed to help protect the motherboard against the vicious CIH virus which has claimed numerous victims in the past few months. However, I was surprised this feature failed to work even when the BIOS lock option was enabled. In my normal testing routines, I often check for new BIOS releases and there was actually a newer BIOS version in Microstar's web site. I then proceeded to download the latest version and flashed the BIOS without any knowledge that the BIOS lock feature was turned on. When I finally realised that the feature was turned on, the flashing process completed. After rebooting, I was surprised to see that the newer BIOS was properly programmed. I was puzzled and so I reconfirmed the problem by flashing back to the older version. The result was expected, the BIOS lock option was not functioning. Perhaps Microstar might want to look at this problem?
Another problem that bothered me during the tests was the jamming of my keyboard. I really do not understand why but the keyboard randomly jams during system reboots and sometimes during restarts. The only way to revive the keyboard was to unplug and plug it back into the socket. This forces the keyboard to re-initialize. I am not sure if this problem is only isolated to my cheap keyboard, but if the keyboard works in other systems, I don't see why it should not work on the MS-6163Pro.
Conclusion
Apart from the minor grievances, I am very impressed with the vast array of features and options offered by this motherboard. It is almost an "All-in-one" motherboard that has all the features which suits not only normal users, but overclockers as well. With the support of 133MHz FSB, I sincerely doubt this board would ever lose popularity although Intel's decision to lower the production of the ever popular BX chipset may make this board obsolete faster than you know it. In addition, the latest BIOS release has already added support for the new Intel Coppermine processors. This is a great board and I think Microstar has done a great job in improving the standard of their motherboard. For a bundled price of less than SGD200, this board is a pretty good buy. All in all, it still retain its 5 star award, but it has also earned our prestigious Most Overclockable Product award for its overclockability as well as stability in overclocking.
Overall Rating (Out of a maximum of 5 Star) |
|
| Installation | **** |
| Performance | ***** |
| Price | ****½ |
| Overclockability | ***** |
| Material Quality | ***** |
| Stability | ***** |
| Overall Rating | ***** |
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