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Hardware AMD 4x4 Motherboard Details Unveiled
Anh Tuan Huynh (Blog) - November 20, 2006 3:31 PM
Print E-mail del.icio.us 96 comment(s) - last by Archmaille.. on Dec 14 at 4:24 PM
ASUS L1N64-SLI WS to be the first 4x4 motherboard

DailyTech has obtained a couple of images of an upcoming motherboard for AMD’s 4x4 enthusiast platform. The motherboard is an ASUS  L1N64-SLI WS powered by two NVIDIA nForce 680a MCPs. Two socket-1207 processors are supported with four memory slots—two slots per processor. With two nForce 680a MCPs the ASUS L1N64-SLI WS features 12 SATA 3.0 Gbps ports and one PATA for storage connectivity. There’s also an additional e.SATA port on the back I/O as well.

As far as PCI Exress goes the L1N64-SLI WS features a grand total of four PCI Express x16 slots for plenty of SLI and SLI physics processing power. Due to space limitations the L1N64-SLI WS only has one PCI and PCIe x1 slots.

Networking features of the ASUS L1N64-SLI WS include dual Gigabit Ethernet ports. The onboard Gigabit Ethernet features NVIDIA’s FirstPacket, DualNet, Teaming and TCP/IP offload technologies. Audio is powered by a high definition audio codec with optical and coaxial S/PDIF outputs. It is unknown which codec ASUS has equipped the L1N64-SLI WS with, though it could be Analog Devices or Realtek. The board is not legacy free and still has PS/2 and parallel ports.

Due to the complex design of AMD’s 4x4 platform, the ASUS L1N64-SLI WS uses an eATX form factor which will not fit in smaller cases. Since dual processors require a little extra power, ASUS has equipped the L1N64-SLI WS with an 8-pin EPS12v and Molex power connectors.

U.S. distributors claim the ASUS L1N64-SLI WS will have an MSRP of $480 without bundles, but the street price will probably be much less.

Expect AMD’s 4x4 enthusiast platform to arrive later this month with three Athlon FX processors—FX-70, FX-72 and FX-74. It is unknown if the ASUS L1N64-SLI WS will be compatible upcoming AMD Stars processors.

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waste of money
By albundee on 11/20/06, Rating: 0
RE: waste of money
By bribud on 11/20/2006 4:41:53 PM , Rating: 4
You need to wait until actual performance numbers come out. You can't make a statement like that without any evidence.


RE: waste of money
By psychotix11 on 11/20/2006 4:44:04 PM , Rating: 3
Well odds are that dollar for dollar quadcore will be better then 4x4, and honestly this is getting out of hand.


RE: waste of money
By RMSistight on 11/20/2006 4:48:16 PM , Rating: 2
This is why I haven't jumped to Core 2 Duo yet for my desktop. I'm waiting for both parties to show me what they've got before I even consider purchasing anything. I'm probably going to skip Core 2 Duo and go quad core or 4x4. I'm just waiting for performance numbers.


RE: waste of money
By primer on 11/20/2006 5:21:55 PM , Rating: 5
At launch we should see entry level 4x4 FXs at around $600/pair to $1300/pair on the high end. With the ability to upgrade to quad core and have 8 cores late next year, this is a bargain for the multithreading buck really.


RE: waste of money
By peternelson on 11/20/2006 6:07:36 PM , Rating: 4
Not just in processor/mobo costs, but 8 cores in a single system will be a $ value for software purchases that are licensed per system rather than per core etc.


RE: waste of money
By othercents on 11/20/2006 6:48:10 PM , Rating: 1
However the software has not caught up to the use of multiple cores. Once it does, the 8 cores would be an awesome system.

Did anyone notice the 4 PCI-Express slots?

Other


RE: waste of money
By JackPack on 11/20/2006 8:02:52 PM , Rating: 3
Will four 8800 series cards fit in there?


RE: waste of money
By AggressorPrime on 11/20/2006 8:37:48 PM , Rating: 3
Yeah, if you get water cooled ones.


RE: waste of money
By Thorburn on 11/20/2006 6:58:48 PM , Rating: 3
In some cases its per socket however.
For example you couldn't use this system with XP Home, or Vista Home Premium, as it is 2 sockets.
So add into the cost the extra for Vista Ultimate (or at least Business if you are willing to lose some features).


RE: waste of money
By peternelson on 11/20/2006 8:19:29 PM , Rating: 2
Dualboot and/or virtualise Vista Ultimate with Linux was my intention.



RE: waste of money
By dilz on 11/21/2006 10:34:18 AM , Rating: 2
If you're willing to spring for 4x4, are a couple more Benjis for the O/S really going to be a showstopper?


RE: waste of money
By JackPack on 11/20/2006 8:05:27 PM , Rating: 2
They already gave out the prices a few days ago.

$999/1132/1500 -> FX-70/72/74


RE: waste of money
By shabby on 11/20/2006 8:30:10 PM , Rating: 4
*chuckle* Didnt amd say that the whole 4x4 setup(2 cpu's + mobo) was supposed to cost under 1k?


RE: waste of money
By JackPack on 11/20/2006 8:46:59 PM , Rating: 2
I think they said a pack of processors would cost under $1k. Maybe it's just me, but that Asus 4x4 board alone looks like it will cost at least $499.


RE: waste of money
By Gholam on 11/21/2006 3:52:27 AM , Rating: 2
Eh, it's not a server-grade board, and only has 2 RAM slots per CPU... I'd say $350 or so, $500 boards tend to have integrated dual channel SCSI U320, and this one doesn't.


RE: waste of money
By JackPack on 11/21/2006 2:59:52 PM , Rating: 2
I think you underestimate the fact that this product, unlike workstation boards, will be extremely low-volume, uses two MCPs, and is Asustek-exclusive.


RE: waste of money
By KristopherKubicki (blog) on 11/21/2006 3:32:34 PM , Rating: 2
The MSRP is $480.


RE: waste of money
By leidegre on 11/21/2006 6:56:29 AM , Rating: 2
8 cores!? Now i understand what the other guy was saying when he said "this is getting out of hand". What desktop application will utilize 8 cores within the near future?

Quad core solutions is obviusly a good thing, and is a quite resonable platform, but there is a limit to how many times you can divide things into seprate tasks...


RE: waste of money
By Loc13 on 11/21/2006 10:05:17 AM , Rating: 3
Finite element analysis softwares benefit from multi-core... The solve time improves significantly with increasing number of CPU cores, and that saves money...


RE: waste of money
By TheShniz on 11/20/2006 4:47:21 PM , Rating: 2
I think he was just stating this is a less-than-elegant solution in comparison to Intel's latest... w/ which I agree.

I've not owned an Intel anything since the original Pentium (1x Cyrix and a bunch of AMD), but that's about to change for me.


RE: waste of money
By peternelson on 11/20/2006 6:05:06 PM , Rating: 2
Not only that, but 4x4 is forward compatible with future AMD quadcore processors. When this board is used in that 8 core configuration (rather than the current 2 dualcores), it will likely rival Intel's offering very effectively.

Buy board now, upgrade processors later.


RE: waste of money
By JackPack on 11/20/2006 8:07:19 PM , Rating: 1
For a motherboard that costs nearly $600? I'll wait.


RE: waste of money
By defter on 11/21/2006 5:18:20 AM , Rating: 2
There is lot of evidence. Check Core2 Duo benchmarks, two Core2 cores at 2.4GHz (E6600) are faster than two Athlon64 cores at 2.8GHz (FX-62), clockspeed difference is 16%.

In this case, it will be four Core2 cores at 2.67GHz (Kentsfield) against four Athlon64 cores at 3GHz (4x4), clockspeed difference will be 13%. 4x4 will have more bandwidth, which will provide advantage, but Kentsfield will have serious price/performance advantage unless AMD starts selling 3GHz Athlon64-FXs at $400...

Another downside of 4x4 is that adding more memory is impossible, since there is only one DIMM slot per memory channel. If you want to utilize all memory bandwidth, and want to increase memory capacity, you need to replace all four DIMMs.


RE: waste of money
By Heron Kusanagi on 11/21/2006 6:58:30 AM , Rating: 2
It is hard to say as AMD has a upper hand in one area -> 8 cores in the future (2 X Barcelona)

And even though we will migrate to 64 bit one way or the other, with Vista 64 bit NOT exactly the best, I will say that the memory argument is not yet valid for some time, and so, AMD for the winner.


RE: waste of money
By SexyK on 11/21/2006 9:35:11 AM , Rating: 1
quote:
And even though we will migrate to 64 bit one way or the other, with Vista 64 bit NOT exactly the best, I will say that the memory argument is not yet valid for some time, and so, AMD for the winner.


Huh? How is AMD the winner? If you want 2GB on this board with full bandwidth you need to use 4x512MB, filling all the slots. God forbid you only need 1GB (obviously not likely with a high end board, but still...) then you're stuck with half the bandwidth or 4x256MB. Seems like a loser to me.


If you're going to do this...
By Anonymous Freak on 11/20/2006 5:45:09 PM , Rating: 2
...you might as well go for a dual-socket Xeon board. Probably cost about the same, and you can throw two quad-core Xeon 5300 series processors in there. Significantly less power draw, and at least equal performance.




RE: If you're going to do this...
By Thorburn on 11/20/2006 5:47:38 PM , Rating: 2
The FB-DIMM's wouldn't be cheap though I fear.


RE: If you're going to do this...
By VooDooAddict on 11/20/2006 6:16:39 PM , Rating: 1
The problem with the Xeon route is that afordable motherboards aren't there for gaming. Many can't handle a single PCIe x16 ... let alone 2 (or 4?!)

FB-DIMM does command a premium, too. Though the motherboard premiums for something that can truely support x16 seem to be the killer.

Otherwise I agree ... two quad core Xeons are a very tempting option for a gaming/workstation system. Even at 1.6 or 1.8 Ghz it's still a pretty fast chip in gaming. (Considering you can get two of those chips for the cost of one Core 2 Quad Extreme.)


RE: If you're going to do this...
By Thorburn on 11/20/2006 7:04:26 PM , Rating: 2
If the rumours of an NVIDIA nForce 680i based Xeon chipset are correct then things could certainly get interesting though.
The Xeon really needs something like that as standard DDR2 and 16x PCI-Express would really benefit it in the workstation (and maybe even enthusiast) market.


RE: If you're going to do this...
By Fenixgoon on 11/20/2006 7:33:52 PM , Rating: 4
FB DIMMS are also horridly inefficient. if im not mistaken, some good DDR2 > FB DIMM RAM. FB DIMM has greater theoretical power, but in practice (as per Anandtech's review of the Mac Pro), it's simply not 100% useable.


RE: If you're going to do this...
By JeffDM on 11/21/2006 5:57:16 PM , Rating: 2
The difference is that FB-DIMM scales up better, which is why the workstation chipsets use it. You can put up to 16 of them in a workstation. I think all said, a quad (2x2) Xeon system probably ends up being comparable in cost as a quad (2x2) AMD. I don't understand why this is helping, because it looks like rebranded Opterons + Opteron boards at Opteron pricing, though with less memory capacity and more PCIe slots.


RE: If you're going to do this...
By Nighteye2 on 11/20/2006 7:25:08 PM , Rating: 2
Xeons do not support NUMA, 4x4 does.


RE: If you're going to do this...
By afkrotch on 11/20/2006 7:44:27 PM , Rating: 2
4x4 uses ccNUMA. Which is crap.


RE: If you're going to do this...
By Kiijibari on 11/21/2006 5:56:35 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
4x4 uses ccNUMA. Which is crap.
Sounds like you dont have any clue what you are speaking about ...


RE: If you're going to do this...
By JumpingJack on 11/21/2006 12:06:25 AM , Rating: 3
quote:
Xeons do not support NUMA, 4x4 does.


Interestingly, do you know what NUMA is??? Non-Uniform Memory Access.... in essense, it is forced by virute of AMD's implemenation of HT links and IMC. This does not make NUMA itself superior, as a call from non-local memory must induce at least one hop from one CPU to the other, this is a latency burden step. AMD deservese credit for getting the latency low as possible, but uniform memory access (such as Symmetric Multithreading) does not suffer from latency due to this extra hop.

NUMA is by no means superior, it is a memory access method that is actually burdened by virtue of AMD's architectural decisions. On the single socket desktop, there are not extra CPU nodes between memory and CPU, so 1P is not NUMA --- however, 4x4 being two sockets is NUMA. This is just as crippling as sharing an FSB in a MCM approach, perhaps more so as the physical distance between nodes is much much greater in a 2 socket design.


RE: If you're going to do this...
By drank12quartsstrohsbeer on 11/21/2006 9:46:42 AM , Rating: 1
I don't think you know what you are talking about. Go look at the throughput numbers of existing dual processor opteron boards.

Then come back here and talk about how you actually meant to say something else, or how you last post was misunderstood.


RE: If you're going to do this...
By Nighteye2 on 11/23/2006 10:15:14 PM , Rating: 2
Exactly. A good example of NUMA performance can be seen here: http://www.techreport.com/reviews/2005q2/opteron-x...


By JumpingJack on 11/30/2006 1:27:12 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
Exactly. A good example of NUMA performance can be seen here:


I said nothing about bandwidth, and a sysnthetic BW measurement makes not a representation of realworld performance.

Please link up one showing Woodcrest kicking butt on Opty, and having lower overall 'Sisandra Memory Bandwidth', then explain what you mean.


By JumpingJack on 11/30/2006 1:24:53 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
I don't think you know what you are talking about.


Actually, yes I do. I said nothing about bandwidth, and it works great if you are shuttling large chunks of data combined with a NUMA aware OS. However, you suffer from a fit ignorance and you are mis-interpreting what I said. This is common among people who really know nothing about computing, there is a difference between throughput and latency and how those combine to really produce speed in terms of data rate.

NUMA, non-uniform memory access, by definition means access to any given part of memory will differnt in access time depending on the location of that memory. For example, CPU1 has local connection to MEM1 and CPU2 has local connection to MEM2, if CPU1 cache hit requires data located on MEM2 CPU2 must fetch the data, shuttle to CPU1 via the cHT link --- this will by the fact that it is now across a bus induce extra latency.

IBM measured the affect:
http://www-03.ibm.com/servers/eserver/opteron/pdf/...
See figure 4, where main memory calls split into two discrete values for latency.

Hmmmm, did I not predict that Kentsfield would have better memory metrics:
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,2065497...

Hell -- an FX-62 is showing better memory performance on the small stride cache line traces (where latency has the biggest affect on speed through the system). 4x4 is suffering from this....

Jack


By JumpingJack on 11/30/2006 2:02:41 AM , Rating: 2
Oooops here is one more:

quote:
Secondly, Quad FX platform is often slower than the regular Socket AM2 system with a single CPU because of the higher memory subsystem latency. NUMA technology that proved highly efficient in servers turned out to do more harm than good in the desktop space.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/amd-q...


Still including a parallel port?
By jarman on 11/20/2006 5:00:37 PM , Rating: 2
WTF? Who uses a parallel port on a SLI motherboard?




RE: Still including a parallel port?
By Etern205 on 11/20/2006 5:14:15 PM , Rating: 2
What do you expect them to have?
A serial port for those
external 14.6Kb/s modems?


RE: Still including a parallel port?
By lemonadesoda on 11/20/2006 5:22:27 PM , Rating: 4
Don't knock a COM port. They can run at very high speeds and are very useful for doing all sorts of things and driving all sorts of equipment (like PBAX phone systems, or industrial machinery, or scientific equipment and data aquisition).


By GaryJohnson on 11/20/2006 5:57:44 PM , Rating: 3
The inclusion of a parallel port is definately a bonus. With this system I could run my 200 ton clearing straight side double crank mechanical press and minster 32 ton open back inclinable press WHILE playing Battlefield 2142.


RE: Still including a parallel port?
By lemonadesoda on 11/20/2006 5:19:25 PM , Rating: 3
Have to agree with you there. A COM port would be a much better substitute.


RE: Still including a parallel port?
By Gholam on 11/21/2006 3:55:11 AM , Rating: 2
Top right corner of the first photo, you can see a 9-pin RS-232C pinout.


RE: Still including a parallel port?
By EBH on 11/21/2006 11:57:48 AM , Rating: 2
if i wated to use a debugger machine or a UPS i would need a parallel port, so yeh don't knock it scrub



RE: Still including a parallel port?
By EBH on 11/21/2006 11:59:18 AM , Rating: 2
nevermind i meant COM port lol


Time for bigger cases?
By Zurtex on 11/20/2006 5:19:57 PM , Rating: 2
Given size of graphics card, heatsincs, 2 physical CPUs and the like. Think it's time to come up with a new even larger standard for mobos and cases?




RE: Time for bigger cases?
By lemonadesoda on 11/20/2006 5:23:17 PM , Rating: 4
... how about SMALLER CPUs and SMALLER GPUs?


RE: Time for bigger cases?
By Archmaille on 11/20/2006 5:54:25 PM , Rating: 2
haha, this would be just perfect for my case. Finally be able to fill out my Lian-Li PC-70 but this board has the capability for 12 sata drives... so I might need another case this one will only hold 9 hard drives w/o buying another drive holder for the 5 1/2 bays.


By drank12quartsstrohsbeer on 11/21/2006 9:44:07 AM , Rating: 2
I believe it is called extended ATX or eatx for short.


WTF is this pile of crap?
By afkrotch on 11/20/2006 7:39:50 PM , Rating: 2
Seriously, WTF. This is meant for a home user? This thing is going to require more power, generate more heat, have more useless slots, and simply take up more space.

Only a moron would buy two lower performing Athlon X2s over a single higher performing Intel Core 2 Quad.

Sure in the future AMD will actually put out a quad core. Course in the future Intel will put out an octuple core, probably on 45nm and it'll use less power than a Core 2 Duo or some crap like that.

Cheaper than buying an actual workstation? Sure. So's the Intel version.

Also, why does anyone need four 16x PCIe slots? Three, I can see, for using a physics card. Shoot, I personally get pissed just having two 16x PCIe slots on my mobo.

A parallel port for me, is pretty worthless. They should have put a serial port instead. Would have made configuring switches/routers a lot easier.

Asus makes bad mobos. I don't see it. My old P4T533 was good. My P4P800-E Deluxe is good. My current P5W DH Deluxe is good.




RE: WTF is this pile of crap?
By vanka on 11/21/2006 12:54:48 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
This is meant for a home user?

Nope, this is meant for those fanatic know as hardcore gamers. The kind of people who would sell both their grandmothers (if they haven't already) and their manhood to get a 5% FPS increase. But I completely agree with the rest of your post.


RE: WTF is this pile of crap?
By JumpingJack on 11/21/2006 1:08:55 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
Nope, this is meant for those fanatic know as hardcore gamers. The kind of people who would sell both their grandmothers (if they haven't already) and their manhood to get a 5% FPS increase. But I completely agree with the rest of your post.


:) :) --- well the fanatic hardcore gamer then would be pretty dumb to buy into this at this point (or an Intel Kentsfield for that matter) as no game currently on the market can utilize 4 cores, only a few do 2 cores --- gaming performance on the 4x4 will not be any better than an equivently clocked AM2 dual core.


RE: WTF is this pile of crap?
By vanka on 11/21/2006 1:32:49 PM , Rating: 2
quote:
gaming performance on the 4x4 will not be any better than an equivently clocked AM2 dual core.

You know that and I know that; but do the fanatics know, or care?


RE: WTF is this pile of crap?
By Runiteshark on 11/30/2006 8:45:08 AM , Rating: 2
If you configure switches and routers then you should atleast have a clue what this is useful for:


Deck this badboy out with SATA drives, 12 on the board, and with 4 16x slots you can put another 64 HDDs on just this one board alone. With that many drives in RAID, it would be pretty nice to have something like this, now wouldn't? Pretty sure this board kicks any other server board's ass when it comes to PCI-E slots too. I dare you to go find one Xeon or Socket F Opteron board that has more then 1 PCI-E slot, and that is full 16x a piece. Oh thats right you can't.

With this board decked you could have a a grand total of 76 hard drives, and I can't even tell you how useful that would be for a large NAS. The only downside is that it dosen't come with 2 more GigE ports on it so you can quad trunk it.

Think about that huh, 57TB of raw storage or 40TB of RAID 5 storage with a couple hot spares. I want to see some other enterprise storage server beat that.

So in my eyes, this does have a use. I can think of a couple more uses too.


Price
By electriple9 on 11/20/2006 10:54:12 PM , Rating: 2
Are these prices for the pair
$999/1132/1500 -> FX-70/72/74
Also will this board work with regular ddr2 ram, or will it require fb-dimms
Thanks




RE: Price
By Archmaille on 11/20/2006 11:15:49 PM , Rating: 2
As far as I know those prices will be for pairs. At a LAN Party here in Kansas City we had a rep from AMD come and said they would be selling the 4 x 4 chips as pairs and not individually. Regular DDR2 from what I know... but of course I'm not an expert or anything.


RE: Price
By vanka on 11/21/2006 12:49:35 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
Also will this board work with regular ddr2 ram, or will it require fb-dimms

FB-DIMMS are an Intel invention, I really don't see AMD using them.


RE: Price
By JumpingJack on 11/21/2006 1:06:50 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
Are these prices for the pair
$999/1132/1500 -> FX-70/72/74
Also will this board work with regular ddr2 ram, or will it require fb-dimms
Thanks


Yes, indeed they are for the pair. AMD will sell them in 'kits' to go with the 4x4. I have not heard nor read if AMD plans to package the CPU's individually.... since the FX-7X series will become the enthusiast flagship, the FX-6X series will likely be retired or live a long side.

It is not clear if AMD plans to discontinue any more speed bumps to keep an FX CPU for AM2 or if they will let the AM2 FX brand die. I doubt they would as this would really over focus their ultra-enthusiast market to an exclusive solution. AMD is all about choice, I doubt they would want to project anything different.

The 4x4 is reworked to accept non-registered, non-ECC DDR2, i.e. regular old DRAM. What this means is they are going to get a little more performance and sacrifice some stability. That is not to say it will not be stable, it will... but unlike a workstation or server you may have a few BSOD due to memory errors that would have otherwise been corrected.


Features
By gramboh on 11/20/2006 5:43:23 PM , Rating: 2
Features look good, like the massive number of SATA ports.

I can't see this being priced under $300US, probably closer to $400US.

Not cost effective compared to Q2Q options.




RE: Features
By JackPack on 11/20/2006 8:10:16 PM , Rating: 3
$400? Um, this 680i motherboard from Asus already costs $400....
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82...


RE: Features
By gramboh on 11/21/2006 12:28:52 PM , Rating: 2
Yes because of all the extra 'features' for those who demand the best. Asus has a 680i coming out in the $250-300US range soon.

My point is ALL 4x4 boards will be a huge rip-off. Not a cost effective platform and not a threat to C2D or C2Q.


Does this support the GeForce 7950 GX2?
By SigmundEXactos on 11/20/2006 6:18:30 PM , Rating: 2
I think this is about the platform....If it supports 4 GeForce 7950 GX2s....yum! and when AMD QuadCore comes out....then 8 CPU cores and 8 GPU cores baby!!! Of course you'll need a small generator to supply all that power (~1KW avg, 2KW max?).




By Thorburn on 11/20/2006 6:54:32 PM , Rating: 2
The final two PEG slots are too close together to allow that, and with only 1 SLI bridge per pair of cards only two can be linked together.


12 SATA nice!
By cochy on 11/20/2006 7:30:31 PM , Rating: 2
12 Sata ports is very nice! Hopefully the cost of ownership of 4x4 won't be unreasonable. Lastly, it's going to be damn noisy to cool this system lol Doesn't look like there is room for 120mm fans on those cpus.




RE: 12 SATA nice!
By Anonymous Freak on 11/21/2006 1:26:58 PM , Rating: 2
Now, come on. I don't even know any WORKSTATION users that would use 12 SATA ports. (Unless it supports RAID across all 12 ports, including RAID 5.)


$$$$?
By swtethan on 11/21/2006 12:31:51 AM , Rating: 2
I saw a dual opteron board at frys for $1400, how much will this cost???




RE: $$$$?
By drank12quartsstrohsbeer on 11/21/2006 9:50:27 AM , Rating: 2
$1400? Was it plated in gold? Tyan and Supermicro dual opteron boards cost about 400 online, and they are generally regarded as being the best.


It has 4 GbE connectors, not 2
By Kiijibari on 11/21/2006 5:58:59 AM , Rating: 2
At least that is what is stated on an official nVidia slide:

http://www.technoa.co.kr/content/View.asp?pPageID=...

(see the 5th picture)

cheers

Kiijibari




By KristopherKubicki (blog) on 11/21/2006 3:33:25 PM , Rating: 2
The one we have only has 2. I'm not sure why there is a discrepancy


Memory?
By GoatMonkey on 11/21/2006 8:35:03 AM , Rating: 2
Did anyone see a mention of whether this board requires ECC memory like opterons?




RE: Memory?
By Archmaille on 12/14/2006 4:24:47 PM , Rating: 2
It doesn't say on here, but from what I know it does not. That is one of the major differences between this board and the dual opteron setups.


well
By yacoub on 11/21/2006 10:44:18 AM , Rating: 2
it seems sorta hacked together, partly because of its lack of regular ATX formfactor, and the price is also ridiculous. unless they can get the pricing down (and they know this), it will never take off as an acceptable alternative.




RE: well
By Runiteshark on 11/30/2006 8:49:37 AM , Rating: 2
Go look at some other dual socket boards and lets see you say that.




confusion?
By AKAK on 11/20/2006 7:16:51 PM , Rating: 1
Just because it is not Intel doesnt mean it sucks. Performance numbers are what matters not the fact it does not contains the new poster child chip.

Yes this system is likely going to be overkill for a desktop or gaming rig but what is so wrong with that? Dont forget that Intel isnt the winner on multi core servers(over dual core) so simply replacing with Xenons is not automatically going to improve performance they need a chipset and analog to hypertransport to use them effecently. When Intel can improve performance with more than 2 cores that that kind of argument might work. The 4 core processor of Intel is simply 2 dual cores shoved together with no effective communication or optimization between the two like this MB has perhaps that is where the confusion is.




RE: confusion?
By nofumble62 on 11/25/2006 10:17:28 AM , Rating: 2
said "The 4 core processor of Intel is simply 2 dual cores shoved together with no effective communication or optimization between the two like this MB has perhaps that is where the confusion is."

Well. If the 2 core don't communicate, then how Intel could do that with same number of socket pins that AMD couldn't do.

Having two CPUs communicate through the motherboard and over long distance in AMD approach, I wonder how much latency and transmission loss that would be. In any case, the 4x4 performance is better wow people to justify the expensive design and box space. When will it suppose to come out? There are only 4 working days left of this month.


Hmmm.....
By WarpNine on 11/20/2006 9:57:16 PM , Rating: 3
RE: Hmmm.....
By Pitbulll0669 on 11/20/06, Rating: 0
Holy sockets batman!
By shamgar03 on 11/20/2006 4:50:01 PM , Rating: 2
Yeah...title says it all.




Too little too late
By exdeath on 11/20/2006 4:53:47 PM , Rating: 2
Where was this 3 years ago when we wanted dual CPU before without sacrificing performance? (ie: limited selection of server boards with ECC memory and onboard video) Nothing but a 'me too' effort, only too little too late for AMD. Just a last ditch effort to sell off their second place Athlon64 chips.

All my PCs have been AMD since the original SlotA Athlon and my last AMD system will be a FX @ 3 GHz.

Core 2 Quad next please.




New Box
By Fnoob on 11/20/2006 5:21:55 PM , Rating: 2
Benchmarks please!

This is likely to be an excellent, "well sorted" board, given the long development period. The dual AthlonMP served me very well for 5 solid years. This may make the build list for the new box.




w00t.
By Xenoterranos on 11/20/2006 5:32:12 PM , Rating: 2
I hope this mobo makes good on the performance, because as soon as I can get a quad core AMD, it's all about 8 cores and 4 GPU's for me. (Even if they're bottom of the line quad-core procs and used 7800's !)




ATX connector placement
By Thorburn on 11/20/2006 5:40:56 PM , Rating: 2
Oh dear, they couldn't of put that in a much worse place. Have fun threading it between a pair of heatsinks (which having to dissipate 125w each won't be small) if your PSU is at the top of the case, or round the graphics card(s) if its at the bottom.

Might be time to buy some shares in a power supply company too, 250w of CPU's, a pair of graphics cards at 150w+ each (I can't really imagine they'd fit 4 GPU's, so I'd say 2 + physics) and the high end PSU manufacturers are going to be drooling.




See also L1N64-SLI DELUXE
By peternelson on 11/20/2006 8:50:37 PM , Rating: 2
http://www.xfastest.com/redirect.php?tid=370&goto=...

See picture of L1N64-SLI DELUXE at the link above

Seems very similar two sockets, four x16, lotsa SATA, four memory slots ....

Can anyone spot the difference(s)?

Apart from the name "Deluxe" vs "WS" marked on the board, and maybe the price?




LOOK ON THE BRIGHT SIDE!
By yacoub on 11/21/2006 10:48:14 AM , Rating: 2
If you can fit a board that big in your case, you should be able to fix 8800GTXs no problem! :D

And you can probably afford a pair of them too =-p




4x4
By AppaYipYip on 11/20/06, Rating: -1
RE: 4x4
By JackPack on 11/20/2006 8:47:57 PM , Rating: 3
At 125W per dual-core processor, it had better do some regulation


RE: 4x4
By JumpingJack on 11/21/2006 12:02:10 AM , Rating: 3
quote:
AMD has the superior platform. AMD's 4x4 can regulate individual voltages and speeds per core. Must more efficient and stable.


You are bit confused on what is what. 4X4 will house plain old vanilla K8 CPUs, it is nothing more than a reworked Socket F 1206 LGA Pin CPU sporting two sockest to take 2 dual cores to get a core count of 4 and cannot gate or clock each core individually as a power saving mechanism.

AMD does not have a quad core part yet (true, native, glued or otherwise), what you are confusing is the individual core throttling to save power in individual sleep states which is suppose to be introduced in K8L, not until Aug-Sept of next year.
http://dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=2388

Quote:
quote:
K8L has a few other highlights, including dynamic powering of sections of the processor -- a page taken straight out of Intel's Yonah playbook.


Interesting you state superior when Intel has already implemented a much superior power consumption mechanism in Core 2 Duo with gated power transistor, where parts of the CPU can sleep when not utilized, even when other parts or execution units are under load.

AMD makes good CPUs, but on this call you are completely, humorously, naively, incredibly wrong.


By Kim Leo on 11/20/2006 5:33:25 PM , Rating: 1
that's my next board :D damn it looks nice and fu..damn big!.. I like Tyan too but i don't think they want this market, I think theyre hands are full on the server market, and i have never experienced real disturbing trouble with Asus, all of theyre boards seem ok to me..

damn, i'm gonna dream wet tonight(ok, i know nasty!) :P, this baby and 4X1gb sticks, think i'm gonna go with some Kingston Value actually, i've been messing with some of them, the 533MHz@CL4 those little bastards can run 800+ still at CL4 at 2V.. uhh.. i was gonna buy a Dual Core because this crap Celeron was pissing me off, but then i got hold of an XP2400+ and NF2 board, not the best but 10 times better than that Celeron crap!

anyway this is cool, 4X4 still offers some great upgradeability and som nice features(numa!) this board and AMD's plan to stick with 1207 in the future, you'll have a nice piece of machinery for a long time..


By MAIA on 11/21/2006 1:45:50 PM , Rating: 2
After reading some ridiculous posts, it does really smell like people working for AMD are here and making us all laugh ...

Beware, i've always bought AMD, but i do have to admit this last Q2D and Q2Q are impressive and way better than any stuff AMD has to offer.


By Kim Leo on 11/21/2006 6:00:41 PM , Rating: 2
LOL i don't work for AMD, but you should know that AMD is pretty good when it comes to upgrading an older platform, i've seen LGA775 boards not supporting any 64Bit P4's and Celerons, even with Intel Chipsets, i have never seen a K8 Socket Mobo not supporting any of it's socket compatible CPU's at least not after some Bios update(Socket 939, and Dual cores ;)). C2D is impressive, there's no doubt, but so is the Opteron tech(Numa! ;D) :), and you can't call A64 crap because intel comes with something greater afterwards, it seems wrong to me, like calling P3 crap, it got it's ass kicked by K7, but it's still a decent CPU.

i just like the way AMD do things.

this socket will Support Quad Core(and probably beyond), and K8L, so how do you figure it will be obsolete after 6months?


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