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Chaintech Zenith ZNF3-150 nForce3 Motherboard Review
Chaintech Zenith ZNF3-150 nForce3 Motherboard Review - PCSTATS
Take it from me, with the "regular" Athlon64 'K8' processor you get about 95% of the Athlon64 FX performance, for about half the price.
 90% Rating:   
Filed under: Motherboards Published:  Author: 
External Mfg. Website: Chaintech Jan 06 2004   C. Sun  
Home > Reviews > Motherboards > Chaintech ZNF3-150

Chaintech Zenith ZNF3-150 nForce3 Motherboard Review

Take it from me, with the "regular" Athlon64 'K8' processor you get about 95% of the Athlon64 FX performance, for about half the price. It's this reason, and the imminent obsolesce of that pesky socket 940 why so many people looking for a high end work station or gaming computer have jumped on board the AMD Athlon64 - even despite the total lack of 64-bit software right now.

The 64-bit Athlon64 3200+ will run just fine under a 32-bit operating system like WindowsXP, while pumping out benchmark results that keep the Intel 3.2GHz Pentium 4 processor playing catch up. Sure there is Intel's P4 Extreme Edition - but who can honestly afford that? In any event, with Windows 64-Bit slated for release sometime this year, it is easy to understand why the Athlon64's popularity continues to grow.

From a chipset standpoint there really are only two good Athlon64 chipsets to choose from at the moment; VIA's K8T800 and nVidia's nForce 3 150. Nvidia have a second revision of the nForce3 chipset set to be released this quarter, called the NF3 250, but we'll have to wait for that to cross PCstats' test bench first.

Yet despite this impending trifecta, there is scarcely much of what we would call the 'intense competition' we saw in the heyday of the K7 chipsets. This is mainly due to the K8's integrated memory controller because it levels the playing field, and consequently makes the differences between each manufacturer's Athlon64 chipset less obvious.

To remain competitive, chipset manufacturers are focusing on other aspects of their core logic, like unique architectures, or pricing that translates into more affordable motherboards. As we examine the Athlon64 Chaintech Zenith ZNF3-150 motherboard in the preceding pages try to keep all that in mind.

Chaintech Zenith ZNF3-150

Includes:

Quick installation Guide, 4in1 Screwdriver, Optical Cable, Four Serial ATA cables, Four Serial ATA Power cables, Two Rounded IDE cables, one rounded Floppy cable, I/O plate, Front Panel I/O Drive Bay, Software CD's.

Built with a nice black-coloured PCB under the top of the line 'Zenith' brand, the Chaintech ZNF3-150 is a force to be reckoned with when it comes to bundled goodies. This board comes with it all; everything from a heatpipe MOSFET cooling system to rounded cables and even a port card.

Based on nVIDIA's nForce3 150 chipset, the ZNF3-150 supports the Socket 754 flavour of AMDs Athlon64 processor series which has a much brighter future than the doomed socket 904 AthlonFX chip.

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Contents of Article: Chaintech ZNF3-150
 Pg 1.  — Chaintech Zenith ZNF3-150 nForce3 Motherboard Review
 Pg 2.  Up close with the ZNF3-150
 Pg 3.  RadEX Cooling System
 Pg 4.  Cbox3 and 7.1 Channel Audio
 Pg 5.  BIOS and Overclocking
 Pg 6.  System Spec's and Benchmarks: Winstone and Sysmark 2002
 Pg 7.  Benchmarks: Winbench 99, SiSoft Sandra 2004
 Pg 8.  Benchmarks: PCMark2002, 3DMark2001
 Pg 9.  Benchmarks: Quake III Arena, UT2003
 Pg 10.  A well rounded motherboard!

 
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