Socket-A Chipset Comparison - April 2001

Final Words

So now that we've taken you through the massive amounts of benchmark comparisons, what conclusions can we make about our findings?  Quite a few actually:

Without a doubt, the AMD 760 platform is the fastest out of the three chipsets compared here today.  AMD has tweaked the chipset to the point where it offers lower latency memory transfers than even solutions using regular SDRAM.  The memory read and write performance of the AMD 760 is the best you can get when it comes to the chipsets compared here, and it will offer you the best performance you can buy.  Whether or not the performance it does give you is worth the added price premium is another question, and that is one that you, yourself must answer.  It is our opinion that upgrading to the AMD 760 doesn't make sense at this point in time, but if you do want the longest lasting Athlon platform it is going to have to be a DDR solution.

Now that we know the secret behind why the KT133A performed so well in our tests we can truly say that today's applications and games aren't stressing the memory bandwidth portion of the equation enough to demand a higher bandwidth solution such as PC2100 DDR SDRAM.  However, as applications and games become more demanding and as the CPU clock to memory clock ratio increases, the need for a higher bandwidth memory solution will definitely be present.  That time however, is not yet upon us.

We have seen how large of a part latency can play in either making or braking a chipset.  In the case of the ALi MAGiK1, its extremely high latencies prevent it from being as attractive of a solution for the performance enthusiasts as even the KT133A or especially the AMD 760.  The only thing the MAGiK1 has going for it is its support for SDRAM, which is something that OEMs will definitely appreciate.  It wouldn't be too surprising if the ASUS A7A266 with its SDRAM and DDR SDRAM memory slots became quite a favorite among OEMs. 

With all of this answered there is one last piece of the puzzle that remains untouched, and that is VIA's KT266 chipset.  The chipset promises to be everything the KT133A is but with DDR SDRAM support while boasting a lower cost than the expensive AMD 760 chipset.  As we've seen from our comparison here today, the key to winning this battle isn't necessarily bandwidth, which DDR SDRAM support will grant VIA, but it is a combination of that and keeping memory latencies low.  While it is unlikely that VIA will be able to duplicate AMD's success in keeping memory access latencies as low as they have with the 760, you should never say never. 

We've actually had the KT266 in house for a while now, and shortly we will be bringing you an updated look at these three chipsets with the KT266 tossed into the mix to make things even more interesting.