Skyscraper wrote:

Today I did a quick AGP performance comparsion between the Asus A7V333 and the Asus A7V8X, basicly the same motherboard with VIA […]
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Today I did a quick AGP performance comparsion between the Asus A7V333 and the Asus A7V8X, basicly the same motherboard with VIA KT333 and VIA KT400.

The BIOS versions for both motherboards have pretty much exactly the same settings so it's easy to compare apples for apples. The only difference is that the A7V8X wont go lower than "tRAS 6" while I tested the A7V333 using "tRAS 5", this do not affect the performance in any measurable way. I'm using the GF4 Ti 4200 128MB @ stock, AGP subsystem performance differences should still affect the performance even if the system is bottlenecked by the video card.

I had to install the VIA AGP driver to persuade the A7V8X to not run the AGP @ PCI while the A7V333 is using what ever driver XP felt like using as it worked, I never install the VIA driver packages unless I have to.

Asus A7V333, Thoroughbred B 2333 MHz (2900+), Geforce 4 Ti 4200 @ stock: 3dmark 2000

Tbred 2333 (2900+) ti4200 3dmark2000.JPG

Asus A7V333, Thoroughbred B 2333 MHz (2900+), Geforce 4 Ti 4200 @ stock: 3dmark 2001

Tbred 2333 (2900+) ti4200 3dmark2001.JPG

Asus A7V8X, Thoroughbred B 2333 MHz (2900+), Geforce 4 Ti 4200 @ stock: 3dmark 2000

T.Bred 2333 (2900+) ti4200 3dmark2000.JPG

Asus A7V8X, Thoroughbred B 2333 MHz (2900+), Geforce 4 Ti 4200 @ stock: 3dmark 2001

T.Bred 2333 (2900+) ti4200 3dmark2001.JPG

Not much difference at all, the A7V333 KT333 motherboard is faster than the A7V8X KT400 motherboard but the difference is not worth mentioning.

What if you try an faster AGP 8x cappable videocard (like the x1950 PRO), i saw your GPU-Z and CPU-Z results and seems you have the older AGP 4x Geforce 4ti 4200

Carlos S. M. wrote:

What if you try an faster AGP 8x cappable videocard (like the x1950 PRO), i saw your GPU-Z and CPU-Z results and seems you have the older AGP 4x Geforce 4ti 4200

I did try runnng the Radeon X1950 Pro at both AGP 4X and 8X with the ECS Photon AF1 VIA KT600 motherboard, it was a little bit faster when running at 8X.

When it comes to the GF4 Ti 4200 running in the Asus A7V8X it was only 5-6% slower in 3dmark 2001 with the AGP slot runnning at PCI speed. This indicates that there would be hardly any performance difference when running at AGP 2X compared to 4X and no difference at all between 4X and 8X.

I got another AGP card, but idk if is situable for these benches. Is a Radeon X1650 Pro AGP 512 MB DDR2 i got with a bunch of parts i got today

Received my RAM.

What's the current target setup ?
DOS for some VESA Quake, Windows 98 and Windows XP ?

sunaiac wrote:

Received my RAM.

What's the current target setup ?
DOS for some VESA Quake, Windows 98 and Windows XP ?

A mothebroard, some CPUs and a GF4 Ti 4200.

Lets set the video card clocks to the Ti 4400 spec in Windows as almost every GF4 ti 4200 128MB uses "what ever the card maker felt like using" as default clocks. "All" GF4 Ti cards can run at the GF4 Ti 4400 spec 275/275(550). 😀

Memory timings 2-2-2-5 if your memory can handle it, otherwise we will use the timings your memory can handle! 😀

I think what benchmarks we are going to use is still negotiable as I will redo all my benching I have done so far. 😀

Some Windows XP benching is needed for sure both as a substitute for W2K benching and to get reliable numbers. Windows 9x benching is of course just as relevant but the results are often hard to interpret, a reboot later they could be 10% better or worse. 😀

Benchmarks for "slow" K7 machines (Athlon 500 - Thunderbird 1400 MHz)

Under Windows XP

Super PI
7-Zip
PCMark 2002
Quake II
Quake III'
3dmark 2000
3dmark 2001

Under DOS / Windows 98

VESA Quake (DOS)
Quake II
Quake III
3dmark 99
3dmark 2000

Feel free to add things 😀

Skyscraper wrote:

A mothebroard, some CPUs and a GF4 Ti 4200. […]
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sunaiac wrote:

Received my RAM.

What's the current target setup ?
DOS for some VESA Quake, Windows 98 and Windows XP ?

A mothebroard, some CPUs and a GF4 Ti 4200.

Lets set the video card clocks to the Ti 4400 spec in Windows as almost every GF4 ti 4200 128MB uses what ever the card maker felt like as default clocks. "All" GF4 Ti cards can run at the GF4 Ti 4400 spec 275/275(550). 😀

Memory timings 2-2-2-5 if your memory can handle it, otherwise we will use the timings your memory can handle! 😀

I think what benchmarks we are going to use is still negotiable as I will redo all my benching I have done so far. 😀

Some Windows XP benching is needed for sure both as a substitute for W2K benching and to get reliable numbers. Windows 9x benching is of course just as relevant but the results are often hard to interpret, a reboot later they could be 10% better or worse. 😀

Benchmarks for "slow" K7 machines (Athlon 500 - Thunderbird 1400 MHz)

Under Windows XP

Super PI
7-Zip
PCMark 2002
Quake II
Quake III

Under DOS / Windows 98

VESA Quake (DOS)
Quake II
Quake III

Feel free to add things 😀

Rip, i don't have any CL2 rated DDR 400, only CL2.5 and CL3. Also, i would need to OC my Ti 4200 or underclock my Ti 4600, i know the Ti 4800 SE is basically a TI 4400 in AGP 8x and the Ti 4800 is the same as the Ti 4600, but with AGP 8x as well. Windows XP SP3 is my OS choice for Athlon and other K7 based CPUs usually

Carlos S. M. wrote:

Rip, i don't have any CL2 rated DDR 400, only CL2.5 and CL3. Also, i would need to OC my Ti 4200 or underclock my Ti 4600, i know the Ti 4800 SE is basically a TI 4400 in AGP 8x and the Ti 4800 is the same as the Ti 4600, but with AGP 8x as well. Windows XP SP3 is my OS choice for Athlon and other K7 based CPUs usually

The slow CPUs use SDRAM at 100/133 MHz (depending on chipset) or DDR266. DDR400 CL2.5 memory can normally run at DDR266/333 CL2-2-2-5.

We will all need to change video card clocks, there is no such thing as a standard GF4 Ti 4200 128MB. I have at least never seen one clocked at 250/222(444) which is the official spec. My card I have used for some benchmarks lately comes close but it's not exact and if we are changing clocks we might aswell bump the clocks to the Ti 4400 spec. At the official spec 250/222(444) the Geforce4 Ti 4200 128MB is slower than a GF3 in many benchmarks! 😀

Rivatuner is a good tool for changing the clockspeed on Nvidia cards.

I got another Socket A mobo, this time from some old Fujitsu PC. Is a Gigabyte GA-7ZMMC which is exactly the same board as the retail model, but with a Fujitsu BIOS.

Is based on the VIA KM133 + 686B, AGP 4x, 3x PCI, CNR, VIA VT611A onboard audio, S3 ProSavage SDR. It came with another Duron 1000 attached, the same DHD1000AMT1B as the last Duron i got

I'm thinking about crossflashing the board with the Gigabyte BIOS, but i'm not really sure. Acording to CPU support, this board supports all FSB 200 Thunderbird/Spitfire and Morgan/Palomino CPUs.

Pics will come later

I picked up a Socket-A Asus A7N8X-E with an AXP 2000+ (not checked what kind yet) off Craigslist for $15. Unfortunately, I don't have an era AGP video card (has a GeForce 3 Ti200).

So is there anything particularly wrong with Slot-A (seems some folks are avoiding this)? After picking up a Slot-1 440BX, the CPU cooling solution seems the most annoying (relatively hard to find replacements).

So what could make my fix az11e so unstable it crashes on me and won't even load the win2k installer. No bad caps and memory and cache pass memtest

Skyscraper wrote:

"All" GF4 Ti cards can run at the GF4 Ti 4400 spec 275/275(550). 😀

But can run a GF4 Ti4400 run at 4600 clocks? I think it depends mainly on the RAM, right? The +25Mhz for the core should be not the real problem...

candle_86 wrote:

So what could make my fix az11e so unstable it crashes on me and won't even load the win2k installer. No bad caps and memory and cache pass memtest

What's an az11e? 😁

melbar wrote:

Skyscraper wrote:

"All" GF4 Ti cards can run at the GF4 Ti 4400 spec 275/275(550). 😀

But can run a GF4 Ti4400 run at 4600 clocks? I think it depends mainly on the RAM, right? The +25Mhz for the core should be not the real problem...

I do not think running the Ti 4400 @ Ti 4600 is something one can take for granted, and you are right it's the memory that is the issue.

I know for sure that many GF4 Ti 4200 128MB stops below 600 MHz on the memory which is far from the 650 MHz needed to run as a Ti 4600, the core will almost always handle 300 MHz though, even on the Ti 4200.

Running at the Ti 4400 spec is "always" a safe bet for a Ti 4200 128MB as 275/275(550) usually leaves a fair bit of margin both when it comes to the GPU and the memory.

dexvx wrote:

I picked up a Socket-A Asus A7N8X-E with an AXP 2000+ (not checked what kind yet) off Craigslist for $15. Unfortunately, I don't have an era AGP video card (has a GeForce 3 Ti200).

So is there anything particularly wrong with Slot-A (seems some folks are avoiding this)? After picking up a Slot-1 440BX, the CPU cooling solution seems the most annoying (relatively hard to find replacements).

Cooling is a problem on Slot CPUs, I had a few of them(including a SlotA Athlon 600Mhz) and the the size and air flow were problems never solved on stock coolers, some Intel weren´t too "hot" but it wasn´t ideal. Socket370 and SocketA are very better on various aspects.

Skyscraper wrote:

candle_86 wrote:

So what could make my fix az11e so unstable it crashes on me and won't even load the win2k installer. No bad caps and memory and cache pass memtest

What's an az11e? 😁

Its an FIC AZ11E KT133 motherboard

candle_86 wrote:

Skyscraper wrote:

candle_86 wrote:

So what could make my fix az11e so unstable it crashes on me and won't even load the win2k installer. No bad caps and memory and cache pass memtest

What's an az11e? 😁

Its an FIC AZ11E KT133 motherboard

If it had been an Asus motherboard with a Mosel flash chip I would have said reflash the BIOS as this often solves stability issues even if it's the same BIOS version you flash...

I would run some program to load the CPU 100% for an extended period of time without overdoing it like Prime95 would, I use the 7-Zip benchmark but if you can not install Windows 2K then use something you can run from DOS. Even if the caps isn't visually bad they could have become lazy from not beeing used, stressing the system a bit with an even load can sometimes persuade the caps to wake up. I have found this to be the case with the "yellow jacket" caps Asus used, they often come to life and work perfectly even if they look somewhat dodgy.

If could also be a memory issues, have you tried some other memory?

My ti 4200 returned to the sender cause the postman didn't find my name at my address.
Seriously... I receive more than a package a week... And they don't find me suddenly!?

Transporters...

sunaiac wrote:

My ti 4200 returned to the sender cause the postman didn't find my name at my address.
Seriously... I receive more than a package a week... And they don't find me suddenly!?

Transporters...

That sucks!

I did some testing with my Asus A7V880 VIA KT880 motherboard.

Asus A7V880, Thoroughbred B 2333 MHz (2900+), single channel memory: Super PI 1M: 49s

Asus A7V880, Thoroughbred B 2333 MHz (2900+), single channel memory : 7 Zip 32M

Asus A7V880, Thoroughbred B 2333 MHz (2900+), single channel memory: PCMark 2002

Asus A7V880, Thoroughbred B 2333 MHz (2900+), Geforce 4 Ti 4200 @ stock, single channel memory: 3dmark 2000

Asus A7V880, Thoroughbred B 2333 MHz (2900+), Geforce 4 Ti 4200 @ stock, single channel memory: 3dmark 2001

The conclusion is that the performnce with the KT880 chipset running single channel memory is the same as with the KT600 chipset. It's also only ~1 percent faster than the KT266A, KT333 and KT400 and that could be because I actually bothered to tighten up memory sub timings with the A7V880 motherboard.

As the performance with all VIA DDR chipsets for Socket A with the exception of the somewhat flaky original KT266 is more or less the same I can use this Asus A7V880 motherboard with full multiplier control to test all Socket A CPUs for the scaling tests. This will save alot of time as I only have to use one Spitfire Duron, one Thunderbird Athlon and so on.

Ti4200-8x and 768MB RAM received and tested (under DOS/BIOS for now)
For XP, are we targeting a specific SP ?
I think I have a SP1 home and a pro SP3.
should updates be applied ?

sunaiac wrote:

Ti4200-8x and 768MB RAM received and tested (under DOS/BIOS for now) For XP, are we targeting a specific SP ? I think I have a S […]
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Ti4200-8x and 768MB RAM received and tested (under DOS/BIOS for now)
For XP, are we targeting a specific SP ?
I think I have a SP1 home and a pro SP3.
should updates be applied ?

I'm usng an updated Wndows XP SP3 install image from about 2013 (from the Internet). I do not think it matters much when it comes to performance but I would disable Microsoft Security Bloat to free up memory.

Skyscraper wrote:

sunaiac wrote:

Ti4200-8x and 768MB RAM received and tested (under DOS/BIOS for now) For XP, are we targeting a specific SP ? I think I have a S […]
Show full quote

Ti4200-8x and 768MB RAM received and tested (under DOS/BIOS for now)
For XP, are we targeting a specific SP ?
I think I have a SP1 home and a pro SP3.
should updates be applied ?

I'm usng an updated Wndows XP SP3 install image from about 2013 (from the Internet). I do not think it matters much when it comes to performance but I would disable Microsoft Security Bloat to free up memory.

I once benched XP RTM vs SP1 vs SP2 vs SP3, practically 0% difference in my end