DFI LANPARTY UT nF4 SLI-DR Expert (LPUTNF4SLIDREXPERT) Motherboard

As with the ECS Elitegroup KV2 Lite motherboard I reviewed earlier, the DFI nF4 Lanparty UT Expert was purchased with a bundle, but the difference was that it was purchased at Monarch Computers, I had a choice in the CPU, and the combo was installed and tested at their site before they shipped it. The CPU I chose was the Athlon 64 3000 , which runs at 1.8 GHz. Why such a "lowly" CPU for the DFI Lanparty? If you read my ECS KV2 Lite review, the Athlon 64 CPU went into the ECS, while the Athlon 64 x2 3800 that came with the ECS KV2 will go into this DFI Lanparty. So let the party begin!

Why Buy the DFI nF4 Lanparty UT Expert?
This is their highest end nF4 Lanparty line, while the one just below it costs the same, but includes a front panel accessory and has a different layout. I actually prefer the Expert's layout, since it does away with the awkward jumpers to switch to SLI mode. With the Expert, you do this in the BIOS. On the Expert, the CPU is moved closer to the front of the PC, while the memory is moved back. Although this doesn't make sense (and can be worse for most users), it is perfect for water-cooled contraptions many enthusiast embark on, as the area where the CPU used to be is now where the memory is at. This area is being cooled by the PSU fan, as well as the rear fans.

However, I still am weary of water cooling, and have purchased a Thermalright SI-120 heat sink. This thing is HUGE, but very light thanks to its aluminum material. This heat sink allows for a 120mm fan to cool the CPU, and the fin-less lower half allows the air to circulate to the rest of the motherboard, including the memory chips. Unfortunately, the northbridge chipset is located in a bad spot (just like the other Lanparty lines). It is located below AND in-between the PCIe slots, which not only cuts off circulation to it when even a single large PCIe video card is installed, but may not even allow a card to install if it does not follow the physical size PCIe specification to the T.

So the major reason why I chose the Expert over the nF4 Lanparty SLI-DR (non UT) is that they both cost the same, I like the layout better, and I didn't need the front panel.

In the Box
Well, first off, it was actually opened by Monarch Computers; so unfortunately, I did not get to experience opening a pristinely packed retail box. However, everything was still there, plus a CPU and heat sink that's already installed. All the accessories were in a separate bag with the manual and CDs. Because of this, I cannot comment on how well DFI pack this motherboard. I'm not sure how many of my readers care anyways, so let's move on...

The motherboard was surprisingly compact for a full-size full-featured enthusiast motherboard! Even the box for it was compact compared to the ECS KV2 Lite. However, there weren't as many wiz-bang accessories included - just your basics. Still, you get plenty of rounded cables - enough to make me wish I got to see how everything was arranged in there when brand new and unopened. Oh well. Let's see what probably was stuffed in there like a clown car...

Motherboard itself
148-page manual (all in English!)
Quick Guide (shows jumpers and front panel headers, etc)
ATX I/O Shield (back panel)
2 rounded ATA133 cables
4 SATA cables
1 rounded floppy cable
Karajan Audio module
SLI bridge
Driver CD
nVidia RAID SATA/IDE driver floppy disk

Specification

CPU
# AMD? Athlon 64 X2 / Athlon 64 FX / Athlon 64 / Sempron
# Socket 939

Chipset
# NVIDIA nForce4 SLI - Supports NVIDIA SLI (Scalable Link Interface)

Front Side Bus
# 2000MT/s HyperTransport interface

Memory
# Four 184-pin DDR SDRAM DIMM sockets
# Supports dual channel (128-bit wide) memory interface
# Supports up to 4GB system memory
# Supports PC2100 (DDR266), PC2700 (DDR333) and PC3200 (DDR400) DDR SDRAM DIMM

SLI / Single VGA Mode
# SLI mode - Use 2 SLI-ready PCI Express x16 graphics cards (use identical cards) on the PCI Express x16 slots. - Each x16 slot operates at x8 bandwidth. When the graphics cards are connected via the SLI bridge, the total bandwidth of the two graphics cards is x16.
# Single VGA mode - 1 PCI Express graphics card on the PCIE1 slot operates at x16 bandwidth. - The other PCI Express x16 slot (PCIE4) operates at x2 bandwidth.

BIOS
# Award BIOS
# CMOS Reloaded
# CPU/DRAM overclocking
# CPU/DRAM/Chipset overvoltage
# 4Mbit flash memory

Power Management
# Supports ACPI STR (Suspend to RAM) function
# Wake-On-Events include: - Wake-On-PS/2 Keyboard/Mouse - Wake-On-USB Keyboard/Mouse - Wake-On-LAN - RTC timer to power-on the system
# AC power failure recovery

Hardware Monitor
# Monitors CPU/system/chipset temperature
# Monitors 12V/5V/3.3V/Vcore/Vbat/5Vsb/Vchipset/Vdram voltages
# Monitors the speed of the CPU fan, Fan 2 and Fan 3 fan
# CPU Overheat Protection function monitors CPU temperature during system boot-up

Audio
# Karajan audio module - Realtek ALC850 8-channel AC'97 audio CODEC - 6 audio jacks - 1 CD-in connector - 1 front audio connector
# True stereo line level outputs
# S/PDIF-in/out interface

LAN
# Dual Gigabit LAN - Vitesse VSC8201 Gigabit Phy and Marvell 88E8001 Gigabit PCI
# Fully compliant to IEEE 802.3 (10BASE-T), 802.3u (100BASE-TX) and 802.3ab (1000BASE-T) standards

IDE
# Supports two IDE connectors that allows connecting up to four UltraDMA 133Mbps hard drives
# NVIDIA RAID allows RAID arrays spanning across Serial ATA and Parallel ATA
# RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 0 1 and JBOD

Serial ATA with RAID
# Four Serial ATA ports supported by the nForce4 SLI chip - SATA speed up to 3Gb/s - RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 0 1 and JBOD - NVIDIA RAID allows RAID arrays spanning across Serial ATA and Parallel ATA
# Four Serial ATA ports supported by the Silicon Image Sil 3114 chip - SATA speed up to 1.5Gb/s - RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 0 1 and RAID 5

IEEE 1394
# VIA VT6307
# Supports two 100/200/400 Mb/sec ports

Rear Panel I/O Ports
# 1 mini-DIN-6 PS/2 mouse port
# 1 mini-DIN-6 PS/2 keyboard port
# 2 S/PDIF RCA jacks (S/PDIF-in and S/PDIF-out)
# Karajan audio module (6 audio jacks)
# 1 IEEE 1394 port
# 2 RJ45 LAN ports
# 6 USB 2.0/1.1 ports

I/O Connectors
# 2 connectors for 4 additional external USB 2.0/1.1 ports
# 1 connector for 1 external IEEE 1394 port
# 1 connector for 1 external serial port
# 1 connector for the Karajan audio module
# 1 front audio connector for external line-out and mic-in jacks (on the Karajan audio module)
# 1 CD-in internal audio connector (on the Karajan audio module)
# 1 S/PDIF connector for optical cable connection
# 1 IrDA connector
# 8 Serial ATA connectors
# 2 IDE connectors
# 1 floppy connector
# 1 24-pin ATX power connector
# 1 8-pin ATX 12V power connector
# 1 4-pin 5V/12V power connector (FDD type)
# 1 front panel connector
# 5 fan connectors
# 4 diagnostic LEDs
# EZ touch switches (power switch and reset switch)

Expansion Slots
# 2 PCI Express x16 slots
# 1 PCI Express x1 slot
# 1 PCI Express x4 slot
# 3 PCI slots

PCB
# ATX form factor
# 24cm (9.45") x 30.5cm (12") All specifications above are subject to change without prior notice.


Installation
Because of the relatively small size (it is still a full-size ATX board), it wasn't that bad installing it in my Antec Super Lanboy case. However, it was hard to install the floppy cable as it is angled towards the back of the board. There just wasn't enough space to comfortably insert the connector. However, it is still possible.

Although it's not exactly a tight fit, I would say "it just fits", which makes cable management harder in a mid-tower such as the Antec Super Lanboy. However, fans of full tower cases can be rest assured that you will have more than enough room for this standard size ATX for other exotic devices such as water cooling and neon lights.

The layout of each component is very thoughtful except, again, the chipset with the heat sink/fan combo. It's just slightly taller than it should be so full length PCIe cards may be a problem. It also presents a cooling problem, as a full length PCIe card will pretty create a partition within the case, which may hinder air flow depending on your particular case design.

the Karajen audio module does not come preinstalled despite what it says in the documentation. It comes in a hard plastic shell that you have to remove from and install separately. A plastic clip comes with it to anchor the module to the board via one-way clips. The module itself is interfaced with the motherboard through a connector. I would describe it as part connector, part slot.

IDE and SATA connectors are conveniently placed. However, full tower fans may have trouble using the bundled cables to hook up optical drives that are located at the top of the bay. The right-angled floppy connector is the only complaint I have. It's just harder to insert than if it was a standard connector.

Though there are 4 PCIe slots, 2 of them are capable of a physical x16 lanes. However, if one is a full time x16 PCIe interface, the other becomes a x2 lane. The other two will be x1 each. When in SLI mode, both of the x16 PCIe slots will only use x8 lanes, while the one other "smaller" PCIe slots (the physically smallest one) will be disabled. The physical x4 slot will become a full x4 lane slot (as opposed to being x1 in non-SLI mode).

One thing nice about the new Expert version of the board is that it does not require you to move large jumpers around to configure it between single and SLI mode. This is done all in the BIOS.

Speaking of the BIOS, there are way much more tweakable settings than most enthusiast boards. You will definitely need to check out their online support forum, which is moderated by real DFI technicians. Lots of tips and advice there, which make DFI a much more compelling buy for true enthusiasts and newbies alike. With so many settings, you will not have a need to hack the firmware like other enthusiasts have to do with other brands of motherboards.

Based on the nForce 4 SLI chipset, the Expert's only way to differentiate itself from other makers is to provide a highly tweakable base (firmware), and many fail safes (CMOS recovery). There are 5 save slots (like in a video game) for the BIOS settings. This way you can experiment to your heart's content. 4 of them are accessible to the user, while 1 of them is used by the system to make a back up of your last working settings every time you boot. This way, if you set something in your BIOS to cause the PC to unable to boot, there is a special jumper that you can use to load the last working CMOS save without completely resetting the CMOS. That means no more worries of re-doing all the time/date and drive settings!

Also special attention to detail such as onboard speaker, power and reset push buttons, and diagnostic LEDs built into the motherboard makes for a pleasurable experimental motherboard. It was made for people who experiment with overclocking! with constant failed OCs which requires countless reboots, having a board that can reload the last usable CMOS state (BIOS settings), as well as a window to what the board is doing while POSTing (diag LEDs) makes for less frustration than other motherboards. Also, the integrated power and reset buttons do not require you to install this in a case or insert your own push buttons when outside of the case to experiment.

While installing the board is standard fare, working with it after it is installed was a delight.

Overclocking
This is by far the most pleasant motherboard to work with in terms of overclocking. Whenever I went too far with the FSB, it would just bounce back and reset. No black non-posting screen or erasing your CMOS and start from scratch. If you go too far to the point of no return, a special jumper can be used to load the last working CMOS save. No need to completely clear your CMOS! That means no need to re-enter the date and time, and other settings not related to overclocking (voltages, FSB, HT, etc).

Only after 4 days, I found my maximum CPU frequency as well as my maximum memory frequency. This board just makes full testing and overclocking fast! In fact, the BIOS even have Memtest86 v2.6 built-in! Truly an overclocker's dream. And as said before, there are multiple saves for your BIOS settings.

What is nice as well is the fact that everything that is related to overclocking is located in one menu area. This way, if you are messing with your CPU frequency settings, you don't have to go out to the main page to go to a section dedicated for memory or voltages, wasting your time. In one shot, you have access to HT multipliers, CPU multipliers, CPU voltages, memory voltages, memory frequency, and memory timings.

As for memory timing goes, they allow much further settings than the standard CL-CAS-RAS-TRAS. In fact, it is even overwhelming for me! I left what I didn't understand at default values. This is where DFI's forum shines - you have a wealth of info there from DFI enthusiasts as well as DFI techs themselves!

Performance
These benchmarks are done with this setup:

DFI Lanparty nF4 UT SLI-DR Expert
AMD Athlon 64 x2 3800 (Manchester core @ 2.0 GHz stock, E4 stepping)
2x 1GB G.SKILL DDR500 3-4-4-8 timing HZ series RAM (total 2GB)
eVGA 7800GT CO 256 MB PCIe video card (N517-AX) factory OCed to 470 MHz core, 1100 MHz memory (550 MHz actual frequency)
Thermalright SI-120 heat sink
Silverstone FM121 120mm fan (for CPU)
Seasonic S12 600W PSU
2x Western Digital 36 GB Raptors SATA HD (RAID0)
1x Seagate 300GB HD (PATA)
NEC 3550A DVD recorder
Mitsumi floppy drive
Antec Super Lanboy ATX mid-tower case
Microsoft Windows XP Pro SP2


Before I start with the benchmarks, I would like to inform you that entries that were personally tested by me (not a reference) are indicated by two stars (**).


SiSoft Sandra 2005 - Arithmetic Benchmark
**DFI nF4 Lanparty UT SLR-DR Expert at 2.0 GHz, 200 MHz FSB
Dhrystone ALU 18055 MIPS
Whetstone iSSE3 8234 MFLOPS

SiSoft Sandra Reference - AMD Athlon 64 x2 3800
Dhrystone ALU 15473 MIPS
Whetstone iSSE2 7477 MFLOPS

SiSoft Sandra Reference - AMD Athlon 64 x2 4200 (mislabeled 4000 )
Dhrystone ALU 17192 MIPS
Whetstone iSSE2 8308 MFLOPS

**DFI nF4 Lanparty UT SLR-DR Expert at 2.62 GHz, 262 MHz FSB
Dhrystone ALU 2375 MIP
Whetstone iSSE3 10841 MFLOPS

SiSoft Sandra Reference - AMD Athlon 64 x2 4800
Dhrystone ALU 20630 MIPS
Whetstone iSSE2 9970 MFLOPS

Not sure why at stock speeds it is still faster than a 4200 , but not sure if we should trust SiSoft Sandra's reference, since even the 2.2 GHz 4200 was mislabeled as a 4000 . AMD does not have an Athlon 64 x2 4000 . But the score that the DFI/Athlon 4 x2 3800 was very respectable.

When overclocked, however, even the 4800 had to bow down. The 4800 runs at 2.4 GHz, so the extra 220 MHz gives the overclocked CPU an edge, even though it has half the cache of the 4800 (1 MB x2 versus 512 kb x2).


SiSoft Sandra 2005 - Multi-Media Benchmark
**DFI nF4 Lanparty UT SLR-DR Expert
Integer x4 aEMMX/aSSE 37918 it/s
Floating-Point x4 iSSE2 41362 it/s

SiSoft Sandra Reference - AMD Athlon 64 x2 3800
Integer x4 aEMMX/aSSE 34466 it/s
Floating-Point x4 iSSE2 37111 it/s

SiSoft Sandra Reference - AMD Athlon 64 x2 4400
Integer x4 aEMMX/aSSE 42126 it/s
Floating-Point x4 iSSE2 45357 it/s

SiSoft Sandra Reference - AMD Athlon 64 x2 4800
Integer x4 aEMMX/aSSE 45955 it/s
Floating-Point x4 iSSE2 49481 it/s

**DFI nF4 Lanparty UT SLR-DR Expert at 2.62 GHz, 262 MHz FSB
Integer x4 aEMMX/aSSE 49432 it/s
Floating-Point x4 iSSE2 53993 it/s

We are seeing the same trend here with the Multi-Media portion of the test. Again, for some reason my stock setup is still significantly faster than SiSoft Sandra's reference 3800 scores.

SiSoft Sandra 2005 - Memory Bandwidth Benchmark
**DFI nF4 Lanparty UT SLR-DR Expert
Int Buff'd iSSE2 5162 MB/s
Float Buff'd iSSE2 5121 MB/s

SiSoft Sandra's reference: nVidia nForce 4 SLI 2xPC5300 CL5 DR2 (Intel Pentium 4)
Int Buff'd iSSE2 5038 MB/s
Float Buff'd iSSE2 5043MB/s

**DFI nF4 Lanparty UT SLR-DR Expert at 2.62 GHz, 262 MHz FSB
Int Buff'd iSSE2 6707 MB/s
Float Buff'd iSSE2 6636 MB/s

SiSoft's fastest reference chipset: Intel 925XE 2xPC2-5300 CL4 DDR2
Int Buff'd iSSE2 5702 MB/s
Float Buff'd iSSE2 5709MB/s

Unfortunately, the fastest reference score does not even compare to the overclocked DFI setup. As for the stock setup, it seems that nVidia's Intel version of the chipset comes closest to the stock AMD version of the chipset. Of course, this is apple to oranges, as they are different memory types as well (DDR vs DDR2).

It just seems as though SiSoft Sandra 2005 is pretty outdated when it comes to their reference scores. I think some of the non-existing models listed were actually speculation of the model # before it actually came out. After all, who knows what AMD will call their next AMD Athlon x2 processor when it runs at 3 GHz and have half its cache castrated? what about when it's the same processor with the all it's cache available?

The Take
If you are someone who is looking for a motherboard that is easy to understand, this is not your board. However, if you already know most of the overclocking and PC building jargon, this board is calling for you.

While most people who run into walls while overclocking will have to speculate which component failed first, owning this DFI motherboard will most likely take one component out of the questionable mentions. Pair it up with known good RAM and you have less of a reason not to get a decent overclock.

Which is good memory for this board? Well, this is a great question to get answered by some informative "stickied" threads that already exists at www.dfi-street.com. :) Before you post your questions, do a search - it probably has already been asked and answered. Because I did my homework here, my setup was relatively trouble-free. You will also know what to expect while overclocking.

For all intent and purposes, the DFI nF4 Lanparty UT SLI-DR is almost the same as the Expert - just a different layout, and requires jumpers to switch between SLi and non-SLI modes. However, you save about $50 if you go with the non-Expert. For those who can live without RAID, you even more with the SLi-D. And for those who do not need SLI, the Ultra is around $100. What's even better for the penny pinchers is that the Ultra could be modded to function like the SLI! You will have to find your own SLI bridge though.

But for me, I wanted a top-of-the-line motherboard that has a whole lot of options. I know that AMD M2 sockets are coming soon, but this PC may hold me out until they mature. And when that time comes, I'm sure the next motherboard I will buy is a DFI. Their firmware design is simply unmatched.

So again, why did I buy it? Why would I recommend it? Simple.

1) Highly overclockable - most arguably the highest overclocked results compared to other boards.
2) Extensive tweakable settings via BIOS.
3) SLI mode can be switched on from the BIOS - no jumpers required!
4) Multiple CMOS saves.
5) My Favorite! - Tech support via enthusiest forum that is somewhat seperate from DFI corporation, but started, maintained, and moderated by DFI technicains - who ALSO HAVE COMPLETE ACCESS TO THEIR ENGINEERS!