Sapphire A4-A985 (Ati A4) Motherboard Review

Sapphire A4-A985
Chipset	Ati A4
Processor	Pentium 4 FSB 400/533 MHz Celeron FSB 400 MHz
Memory	PC1600/2100
HDD	UltraDMA/100
Additional	Audio AC'92 6 USB integrated video
Price:	~73$ (Price.ru)

Until recently, little has been know that ATI produces chipsets for desktop systems. Only a narrow circle of computer reviewers were able testing motherboards based on the Ati A3 and A4 chipsets. But then things starting changing to the better and such boards began appearing in the open retail. In fact, the list of manufacturers cooperating with ATI is not that long: Fic, PC Partner and Sapphire.

Regretfully, there is still too little online information on ATI's chipsets; it lacks even on the company's official website (but for the brief specifications). So we'll break up that traditions and dwell on the new chipset. Note that the chipset ATI A4 features the North Bridge Radeon IGP 340 or Radeon IGP 330. The former supports Intel processors having 100 MHz and 133 MHz buses, with the latter only 100 MHz bus (i.e. either Celeron or Willamette).

As for the South Bridge, ATI has had to cope with various problems. As a result, first boards (like our Sapphire A4-A985 in question) were released with the combination Radeon IGP + VIA VT82C686B. Certainly, the bandwidth between the bridges (the PCI bus) is not high as per today's measures.

Only recently ATI has announced availability of its own South Bridges IXP200 è IXP250 in which the support for USB2.0 and Ethernet LAN was implemented.

The integrated graphics core merits a separate consideration. This is the core RV100 or Radeon 7000, which features the following characteristics:

• The core is 128-bit and supports 3D/2D graphics;
• Hardware Motion Compensation and IDCT technologies, hardware MPEG2 (DVD) decoding;
• Shared memory buffer size between 8 and 256 MB;
• 24-bit 300 MHz RAMDAC core;
• Support for the simultaneous image display on the monitor and TV;
• Integrated TV-converter, support for Macrovision, composite and S-Video TV-outs, support for Pal and NTSC;
• Maximum resolutions 2048x1600x 32 bit;
• Support for DirectX and OpenGL.

Coming back to Sapphire company, let me share one suspicion with you. It's highly probably that boards for it are manufactured by PC Partner. It's up to you to decide how our board in question and PC Partner A4AS4-985 strongly resemble (even the names are almost identical :) See for yourselves.

PC Partner's A4AS4-985 board

Boards built on the Ati A4 chipset are aimed primarily at the value sector of the market where they face a strong confrontation with the produce of SiS, a leader in this area (I mean, boards based on the SiS650 chipset).

Sapphire A4-A985 specifications

Package bundle

The board comes bundled with a drivers CD, a very thin user's manual, and a header with one COM2 port. Besides, a standard set of cables is enclosed.

The user's manual is a thin booklet (16 pages) that lists only the basic information. The contents of the CD is not rich either: drivers for the chipset, and Drive Image 4.0, PartitionMagic 6.0 SE, PC-Cillin 2002 software suites All in all, a standard kit for a value motherboard.

Sapphire A4-A985 Board Features

Although the board is aimed at the value sector, it is of middle bulk.

The power connectors are placed near the AGP slot, which hinders assembly. There is no additional 4-pin connector onboard. Therefore, the board is able operating old power supply units.

Two fans can be connected to the A4-A985 board: the former (CPU_FAN) is meant for the processor cooler, with the latter (SFAN) positioned on the other end of the board.

But despite the presence of integrated video core, Ati A4's North Bridge is cooled by a passive radiator firmly fitted with thermal glue.

There are 2 DIMM slots under the chipset, and the total memory capacity is 1 GB. This is more than enough for a value system. There is no LED indicating voltage on the slots on board. But the latches of the DIMM slots are pretty distant from the AGP slot. This makes it possible for the user to insert memory modules with a video card fitted in place.

Note that despite the integrated video core, the board allows to install an external video card (only 1.5V AGP 4x video cards are accepted).

Besides the AGP slot, there are 5 PCI slots on the A4-A985 board.

The remaining expansivity options are not impressive: there are 4 USB 1.1 ports onboard, two of which are integrated. And this is while the USB 2.0 standard has been commonly accepted. In fact, it's no wonder - the board features the VIA VT82C686B South Bridge that does not support USB 2.0.

Lastly, the board features integrated audio codec ALC101. The options of the disk subsystem are standard - you can plug in up to 4 disks to the integrated 2-channel IDE-controller. The respective connectors are in the bottom corner of the board (Primary IDE - blue). A bit to the right of it there is a socket for connecting an FDD.

The board's rear panel is standard for all boards that offer integrated graphics.

As you see, in the place of COM2 port there is a VGA output. And the COM2 port is implemented as a header plugged in to the socket near the PCI5.

Now on to the BIOS settings.

BIOS

The BIOS of Sapphire A4-A985 is based on the AWARD - Phoenix version.

Let's move straight on to the section dealing with the RAM operating parameters.

The only thing we were able tweaking was the CAS Latency parameter. Other parameters are simply missing. You can also note that the memory runs at a frequency equal to that of the system bus, and there's no way increasing it :(

As for the system monitoring, the boards keeps track of rotational speeds of both fans, measures the processor's and board's temperatures as well as voltage levels.

Performance and conclusions

As you can see, the section to do with overclocking is missing. That's right - Sapphire A4-A985 has no functions like these at all. Or, more precisely, the PCB design provides for an installation of the dip-switch block SW1 (near the processor socket) with which the user is able varying the processor voltage between 1.1V and 1.85V. Unfortunately, no such block is there on this board.

As for stability, Sapphire A4-A985 has nothing to complain about. The power converter is built on the 2-channel scheme and has nine 3300 mkF capacitors.

It's interesting to note that the transistors are equipped with radiators, which in turn tells of increased loads at the power converter.

A couple of words on the performance. In our testing system we used the following hardware:

Prior to moving on to the bechmarking, let me remind you that the i845GE platform has a certain advantage - the memory runs at 166 MHz (DDR333) versus 133 MHz (DDR266) in ATI A4. On the other hand, the ATI chipset features a perfect graphics core. Let's first take a look at the results of synthetic benchmarks.

In the synthetic benchmarks, Intel utterly defeats this ATI's novelty.

Now on to the gaming benchmarks.

The performance in Id Quake3 is direct dependence on the memory bus bandwidth. So, it's no wonder that the board built on the Intel chipset takes a lead both at using an external video card and operating with the integrated graphics core.

But at Serious Sam, the memory bandwidth has a much less effect on the result. Anyway, the board on Intel chipset provides a better performance.

The same story is observed with the Comanche game as well as 3D Mark 2001. The only peculiarity is that with the ATI A4 chipset the game started fine with the integrated graphics core (although played slowly :). But with the Intel 845GE board the game issued a warning requesting T&L support.

At any rate, both these platforms are not meant for gaming. Their purpose is to run 2D office applications (Excel, Word etc. ) at which the performance of both systems is about the same.

Resume: since the Sapphire A4-A985 is aimed at assembling office/budget systems, it is unjust to impart them with the requirements which matter to the home user. What matters is the board runs stably and the integrated video provides acceptable 2D quality and speed.

Finally, the price of the board is about $70-75, which in my view is a bit too high for a board without support for USB 2.0 and integrated LAN.

Conclusion

• Good stability;
• Good 2D quality.

• No support for USB 2.0;
• Overstated price.

• Complete lack of overclocking options;
• Scarce package bundle.

Read more on budget-class motherboards