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Intel
was kind enough to send us a complete Pentium 4
system for testing and evaluation. This
system included a Pentium 4 1.5GHz. Processor, 256MB
of RAMBUS DRAM and the Intel D850GB i850
Motherboard, among other things.
Click image for full
view
RAMBUS,
as of late has almost been a four letter word.
However, as it is well known, Intel has all but bet
the farm on the support of this highly controversial
memory subsystem. This time around Intel is
utilizing RAMBUS with 2X the bandwidth found on
their i820 implementation. The i850 chipset
that supports the Pentium 4 also utilizes a Dual
Channel RAMBUS DRAM architecture for 3.2GB/sec. of
bandwidth. That folks, is one fat pipe for
data to the processor.
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| Specifications
Of The Pentium 4 Test Platform |
| A
beefed up memory subsystem and System
Bus along with all the creature
comforts |
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The D850GB Motherboard that came with system has the
following features.
Click
images for full view
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Support
for Intel Pentium 4 Processor
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400MHz.
system data bus
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Two
Direct RDRAM channels with two RIMMs per channel
(four sockets)
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Up
to 2GB of PC600 or PC800 RDRAM system memory
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i850
chipset
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Intel
8250 Memory Controller Hub
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Intel
82801BA I/O Controller Hub
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Intel
82802AB 4Mb Firmware Hub
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SMSC
LPC47M102 LPC Bus I/O Controller
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One
AGP 4X Slot AGP Pro50 (50 W max)
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Five
PCI Slots
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One
CNR slot shared with PCI
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Integrated
AC97 Audio with AD1881 Codec
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Four
USB Ports, 1 serial, 1 parallel, PS2 keyboard
and mouse
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Two
Ultra DMA ATA-33/66/100 IDE Interfaces
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One
Floppy Driver Interface
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Four
three pin sensing fan headers
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12"
X 9.6" ATX Form Factor
Click
images for full view
The
specs on this board are pretty straight
forward. The i850 (the chip on the bottom
left) runs a 400MHz "Quad Pumped" system
bus to the processor. It also generates a fair
amount of heat and, as you can see above, a heat
sink is installed to keep it cool. In
addition, Intel's ICH2 chip (on bottom right)
otherwise known as the I/O Controller Hub, provides
for the drive subsystem interface, PCI and CNR
Slots, as well as the AC97 Audio, USB and every
other peripheral that needs to talk to the system
bus. So, with the exception of the Dual
Channel RAMBUS support, the rest of the features are
standard equipment, as least as far as the untrained
eye can see. Allow us to dig deeper here and
we'll show you a few things you may not see yet.
Heat
and Power
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