MSI K9N SLI Platinum

Although it isn't the all bells and whistles Dolby Master Studio version, it still has useful audio tools like Dolby Live

I don't think this mobo has dolby digital live does it?

Whilst I wouldn't use Gigabit Ethernet personally, and there are still few home routers able to buy with it on, more LAN parties are using Gigabit networking now so you can't sniff at having a couple of them to boot.

I thought the exact same way until I recently started to use a laptop and have found using gigabit ethernet via a crossover cable between the desktop & laptop to be extremely useful for transferring files. I used to get average transfer rates of 5MBs/s when transferring files via a 10/100 router (some overhead obviously involved when using a router versus connecting directly) whereas using a crossover cable I get 25-30MBs/s average. Just something for people to keep in mind when evaluating the networking features of a mobo :)

Also I was under the impression that the current AM2 memory controller didn't support ddr2 800 at 1T command rate. Have mobo makers gotten around this or have I read it wrong? Wouldn't be the first time :)

Originally Posted by Renoir
Also I was under the impression that the current AM2 memory controller didn't support ddr2 800 at 1T command rate. Have mobo makers gotten around this or have I read it wrong? Wouldn't be the first time :)

We've had the ASUS M2N32-SLI Deluxe, Foxconn C51XEM2AA and the MSI K9N SLI Platinum @ DDR2-800 1T. The only other board tested was the ECS KA3 MVP Extreme, which lacked command rate adjustments. :)

As far as Im aware all the ALC88x's have Dolby Live and Virtual Surround, the "M" versions have extra stuff because they are Master studio version like the 882M. But the 880, 882 and I can only guess the 888 has it. I cant remember now, it has been a while since I installed the software and tested the board, but I was certain it was a standard software feature however the Realtek site states that the 883D has Dolby Live support and 883DTS is DTS. It seems strange to go BACKWARDS with support seeing as the 880 and 882 did it as standard: you had Live, Virtual Surround IIx, Dolby Headphone etc. Ill have to check this one.

EDIT: Even the 888 now has Dolby Live as an extra. The whole point of HD was that it had Dolby support for a home theatre, not just high def media decoding into multichannel. It seems Realtek have pulled support as standard and made it an extra that people pay for, which sucks. I love Dolby Live and Virtual Surround IIx :(

As for Xover cable: sure, and having two ethernet ports are great for that but most home routers are still 10-100 Fast Ethernet so as long as you have one Gigabit port that should be fine. If you have a Gigabit router then Id assume youd just plug in your laptop into that so as it can share with everyone in your house and have net access.
For sharing data though, Gigabit is a must. Ive got a 4 user NAS box with 10-100 support connected to a 10-100 router and it struggles sometimes.

Page 5

and having trebble checked our latency scores

is that even a word?

ok back to reading...
Interesting article.
I liked the 2 summaries at the end. Gave me some useful info.
Oh and the board layout shot was really nice too.

Keep it up.

Apparently it is a word, just not the one I was looking to use.

We've had the ASUS M2N32-SLI Deluxe, Foxconn C51XEM2AA and the MSI K9N SLI Platinum @ DDR2-800 1T. The only other board tested was the ECS KA3 MVP Extreme, which lacked command rate adjustments.

That's good to know. I'll have to try and find where I read that the memory controller didn't support 1T at ddr2 800

As for Xover cable: sure, and having two ethernet ports are great for that but most home routers are still 10-100 Fast Ethernet so as long as you have one Gigabit port that should be fine. If you have a Gigabit router then Id assume youd just plug in your laptop into that so as it can share with everyone in your house and have net access.
For sharing data though, Gigabit is a must. Ive got a 4 user NAS box with 10-100 support connected to a 10-100 router and it struggles sometimes.

My router is only 10/100 and we only have the 1 pc and 1 laptop in the house. I obviously agree that gigabit is great for file transfers and if you only have a 10/100 router then 1 gigabit and 1 fast ethernet port would be sufficient but it seems like the choice with mobos tends to be between 1 and 2 gigabit ports rather than between 1 gigabit and 1 gigabit + 1 fast ethernet. Like you say though if you have a gigabit router then you may as well just plug the laptop (or whatever computer) into the router therefore forgoing the need for a second ethernet port at all if that makes any sense :)

As for DDLive support that was my understanding (some versions of the codec support it some don't)

The ECS KA3 MVP we reviewed recently has 1 Gigabit, 1 fast ethernet. The 10/100 chips are still cheaper and are PCI based.

For me as long as there's 1 gigabit that's the main thing. I guess the gigabit chips will get cheaper to a point where there's not much point to going for 10/100 over gigabit. Plus with performance chipsets from nvidia you're pretty much gauranteed gigabit given that the gigabit mac is included in the chipset.

We checked out the ALC883 and it appears the Dolby options have been removed :(:(

We changed the article to reflect this accordingly.

Was just wandering is the dolby digital live functionality built into some realtek codecs software or hardware based? My guess is software to minimise costs.

Bindibadgi,

I know it's a bit cheeky but noone seems to have any info for me for the following thread

Onboard SATA & eSATA compatibility

I assume it's info most people here haven't come across so was wandering if you or anyone from bit-tech had any insight?

Originally Posted by Renoir
Was just wandering is the dolby digital live functionality built into some realtek codecs software or hardware based? My guess is software to minimise costs.

It was software based when they were released. I tested the CMI8..something and the ALC880 in 2003. The overhead is virtually nil though. Couldnt say for the latest ones if it wasnt a combination of both: hardware required but software driven.

I guess as long as the overhead is small enough it doesn't matter either way.

That's good to know. I'll have to try and find where I read that the memory controller didn't support 1T at ddr2 800

I have now found a reference for this although it's not the one I saw initially not that it matters

Current AM2 IMC doesn't officially support ddr2 800 at 1T command rate

It seems that some mobo manufacturers have gotten round this problem although not yet for when all four dimm slots are populated with ddr2 800. According to the article above the command rate doesn't have much real world performance impact with the current memory controller but thought I'd mention it.