Intel P965: The Double Mint Twins Gone Wild
by Gary Key on November 9, 2006 8:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
Disk Controller Performance
The AnandTech iPeak test is designed to measure "pure" hard disk controller performance, and in this case, we keep the hard drive as consistent as possible while varying the hard drive controller. The idea is to measure the performance of each hard drive controller with the same hard drive.
We played back our raw files that are recorded I/O operations when running a real world benchmark - the entire Winstone 2004 suite. Intel's iPeak utility was then used to play back the trace file of all I/O operations that took place during a single run of Business Winstone 2004 and MCC Winstone 2004. To try to isolate performance differences to the controllers that we are testing we use the Seagate 7200.10 Barracuda 320GB 7200 RPM drive in both SATA and IDE offerings for our tests. The drive is formatted before each test run and a composite average of three tests on each controller interface is tabulated in order to ensure consistency in the benchmark.
iPeak gives a mean service time in milliseconds; in other words, the average time that each drive took to fulfill each I/O operation. In order to make the data more understandable, we report the scores as an average number of I/O operations per second so that higher scores translate into better performance. This number is meaningless as far as hard disk performance is concerned, as it is just the number of I/O operations completed in a second. However, the scores are useful for comparing "pure" performance of the storage controllers in this case.
The performance patterns hold steady across both Multimedia Content I/O and Business I/O, with the NVIDIA nForce 500 based SATA controllers providing a slight improvement in I/O operations over the Intel, JMicron, and Silicon Image SATA controllers. This has been a historical trend between the manufacturers with the NVIDIA controllers generally having a fractionally higher throughput than the other chipsets. We look forward to seeing how well the ATI SB600 will perform with an Intel processor in the upcoming DFI ICFX-3200 based on the RD600 chipset.
Of note in our SATA tests is the excellent performance generated by the JMicron controller logic that scored higher than the Intel ICH7R or ICH8 based SATA controllers in the Business Winstone test. However, in the read and write heavy Content Creation tests we see the Intel SATA controllers placing ahead of the JMicron offerings. After reviewing the test script results we noticed the write operations of the JMicron JMB363 chipset was about 3% slower than the Intel ICH chipsets while being around 2% faster in read operations.
The VIA VT6410 controller offered the best performance in the IDE tests with the JMicron JMB363 finishing last. During initial testing with the JMicron chipset we noticed several boards having issues with the optical drives being stuck in PIO mode resulting in terrible performance. However, this issue was solved with recent BIOS updates from the motherboard suppliers. We also advise that unless you utilize the JMicron JMB363 for RAID operation then do not load the JMicron driver or allow Windows Update to install the newly released driver. Installing this driver will usually result in sporadic operation of the IDE port or failure to recognize certain optical drives.
The AnandTech iPeak test is designed to measure "pure" hard disk controller performance, and in this case, we keep the hard drive as consistent as possible while varying the hard drive controller. The idea is to measure the performance of each hard drive controller with the same hard drive.
We played back our raw files that are recorded I/O operations when running a real world benchmark - the entire Winstone 2004 suite. Intel's iPeak utility was then used to play back the trace file of all I/O operations that took place during a single run of Business Winstone 2004 and MCC Winstone 2004. To try to isolate performance differences to the controllers that we are testing we use the Seagate 7200.10 Barracuda 320GB 7200 RPM drive in both SATA and IDE offerings for our tests. The drive is formatted before each test run and a composite average of three tests on each controller interface is tabulated in order to ensure consistency in the benchmark.
iPeak gives a mean service time in milliseconds; in other words, the average time that each drive took to fulfill each I/O operation. In order to make the data more understandable, we report the scores as an average number of I/O operations per second so that higher scores translate into better performance. This number is meaningless as far as hard disk performance is concerned, as it is just the number of I/O operations completed in a second. However, the scores are useful for comparing "pure" performance of the storage controllers in this case.
The performance patterns hold steady across both Multimedia Content I/O and Business I/O, with the NVIDIA nForce 500 based SATA controllers providing a slight improvement in I/O operations over the Intel, JMicron, and Silicon Image SATA controllers. This has been a historical trend between the manufacturers with the NVIDIA controllers generally having a fractionally higher throughput than the other chipsets. We look forward to seeing how well the ATI SB600 will perform with an Intel processor in the upcoming DFI ICFX-3200 based on the RD600 chipset.
Of note in our SATA tests is the excellent performance generated by the JMicron controller logic that scored higher than the Intel ICH7R or ICH8 based SATA controllers in the Business Winstone test. However, in the read and write heavy Content Creation tests we see the Intel SATA controllers placing ahead of the JMicron offerings. After reviewing the test script results we noticed the write operations of the JMicron JMB363 chipset was about 3% slower than the Intel ICH chipsets while being around 2% faster in read operations.
The VIA VT6410 controller offered the best performance in the IDE tests with the JMicron JMB363 finishing last. During initial testing with the JMicron chipset we noticed several boards having issues with the optical drives being stuck in PIO mode resulting in terrible performance. However, this issue was solved with recent BIOS updates from the motherboard suppliers. We also advise that unless you utilize the JMicron JMB363 for RAID operation then do not load the JMicron driver or allow Windows Update to install the newly released driver. Installing this driver will usually result in sporadic operation of the IDE port or failure to recognize certain optical drives.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
23 Comments
View All Comments
Zak - Tuesday, November 14, 2006 - link
Yeah, WTF with the software design? Did they hire someone fired from FisherPrice or what? It's ugly and dysfunctional, even Asus AI Booster isn't THIS ugly.<Z>
mindless1 - Monday, November 13, 2006 - link
Regarding the article comment about the floppy connector,"We would just as well have this connector disappear at this time."
you might want to clarify who "we" is, since there are plenty of people who want a floppy connector even if they don't have a constant use for a floppy drive.
Remember that one person's use of a system does not equal entire world. Many legacy apps and even some emergency bios recovery routines require a floppy drive. If this were a reduced form factor board, it stands to reason that more features requiring connectors need to be left out, but to give up functionality on a whim is hardly useful, it's not as though you would have to grand replacement feature on that bottom edge, cubic inch of space otherwise.
Larso - Friday, November 10, 2006 - link
Oh my, do those motherboard monitoring/tuning applications look ugly... Ugly as in grotesque swollen blobs rather than functional design.A shame, I really liked the biostar board until the accompanying software utility appeared before for my eyes, aww... The gigabyte software is not pretty either... Can you switch the GUI to something less graphical and more standard windows widgets -like?
Do all software accompanying motherboards look like this??
Avalon - Saturday, November 11, 2006 - link
You mean you actually use software to overclock? Do it the manly way and use the BIOS.Larso - Saturday, November 11, 2006 - link
Its not about overclocking, the problem is if the motherboard software has some specific monitoring/adjusting features not available in freeware monitoring applications. Then you would have to use that monstrous software if you want the feature.Another problem is quality impression of the product as a whole. That software's user interface simply turns me off. Why don't they make the interface look like PRO tools, instead of plastic hell!
bullfrawg - Friday, November 10, 2006 - link
I think it's great that, as mentioned in the first article, you are checking out the manufacturer's tech support by pretending to be regular joes rather than review sites. So I want to express interest in seeing more detail about how tech support treats you. ASUS seems to have gotten a bad reputation lately for tech support -- is this justified in your experience? I see that you say Gigabyte has been good so far. Thanks!Staples - Friday, November 10, 2006 - link
The 965 performs very well no matter what board it is on. I will be waiting till you get a 650i Ultra board to review. I am holding out on a Core Duo and my next purchase will be between these two chipsets.Kensei - Friday, November 10, 2006 - link
Nice old school reference back to the double-mint twins. You definitely dated yourself with that one Gary.Kensei
Hikari - Friday, November 10, 2006 - link
Not really, I saw a double mint advertisement on TV with twins the other day...Kensei - Friday, November 10, 2006 - link
Really! I didn't know they had done a remake of that commercial.Ken