![[H]ardOCP](/images/blank.gif){kind=small}
- Date:
- Tuesday , May 08, 2007
- Author:
- Daniel Dobrowolski
- Editor:
- Kyle Bennett
- Google +1
Gigabyte N680SLI-DQ6
Rather than join the fray with just another reference design clone, Gigabyte brings the N680SLI-DQ6 to market with a touch of style and innovation that Gigabyte has been known for.
Subsystem Testing
NOTE: For all Subsystem Testing, a socket LGA775 Core 2 Duo E6300 (7x266MHz) and 2048MB Corsair Dominator PC-2 9136C5D DDR2 memory running at 800MHz was used for testing.
Audio – Subjective Listening
For subjective listening you want to listen to something that covers a range of sound types. For this portion of the review I went with System of a Down, Mesmerized.
The audio playback was good, with no popping hissing or abnormal distortion.
Audio – Microphone Port Testing
The onboard audio MIC-IN port was tested using a Logitech Internet Chat Headset. Spoken words were recorded from the Windows Sound Recorder found under the Accessories\Entertainment folder in the start menu within Windows XP. The recording was made with the Microphone Boost option disabled, then enabled. The Microphone Boost option is found within the advanced menu under the microphone section with in the Volume Control Menu.
The recording was almost in-audible with the microphone boost option disabled, and it was audible with minor distortion with the microphone boost option enabled.
Drive Performance
To test the capabilities of the on board USB 2.0 connections, we used an ACOMDATA HD060U2FE-72-USB 2.0/FireWire HDD connected first to the USB port. SATA and IDE drive tests were performed using Maxtor 80Gb ATA 133 model 6E080P0 hard drives on the IDE headers and Samsung 40 GB SATA 3G with NCQ hard drives on the SATA headers. The SATA drives were used for testing in RAID 0 16k block size configurations on all applicable controllers. Testing was also conducted using a stand alone SATA drive on all applicable controllers, and an IDE drives connected in a primary slave configuration on the JM363 controller All drive benchmarks were done using the open source Iometer program.
Oddly, the GBB36x RAID0 proved to be the fastest configuration tested. Even faster than the NVRAID controller which is odd to say the least. This is the first time I've ever seen an onboard controller not integrated into the chipset provide the best performance.
Network Utilization Tests
Hagel Technologies’ DU Meter software was used with Windows Task Manager to determine the performance levels of the onboard network interface. DU Meter was used to measure bandwidth and transfer speeds, while Windows Task Manager monitored CPU utilization on the test system. For the testing, a 750MB Archive file consisting of several compressed WMA/MP3 files was used for the large file transfer, and 750MB worth of MP3/WMA files were used ranging in sizes from 3 to 30MB was used for the small files transfer test. The test was performed using a plenum rated category 5e crossover cable to bypass any traffic, routing or other transfer issues and possible packet loss or corruption that can be caused by a router/switch or hub. They cables were connected between two test machines, one using the onboard NICs and the secondary onboard NIC of the Tyan K8SD Pro (S2882-D) which uses dual Broadcom NetXtreme GigE Ethernet ports.
The GIGABYTE N680SLI-DQ6 has an amazing four onboard Ethernet solutions. LAN 1 and LAN 2 are based on the Marvell 88E8052/88E8056 chips (10/100/1000 Mbit), LAN 3 and LAN 4 are nForce network controllers with an external Marvell 88E1116 PHY (10/100/1000 Mbit).
LAN1
The small files download test peaked at 35.89 MB/Sec. and averaged 23.99 MB/Sec with 23% CPU usage. The small files upload maxed out at 34.05 MB/Sec. and averaged 10.99 MB/Sec. with 12% CPU utilization.
For the large files test, the download reached 51.54 MB/Sec. and averaged 32.80 MB/Sec. with 20% CPU utilization. The Large files upload test maximum transfer rate was 32.63 MB/Sec. and the average transfer speed was 21.90 MB/Sec. with a consistent 15% CPU usage.
LAN2
The small files download transfer peaked at 35.97 MB/Sec. and averaged 23.10 MB/Sec. with a constant 18% CPU utilization. The small files upload test showed a 31.77 MB/Sec. max transfer speed with a average of 11.43 MB/Sec. CPU usage clocked in at 11%.
For large files, the download transfer rate averaged 32.65 MB/Sec. and peaking at 54.37 MB/Sec and just as with the small files transfers the CPU usage came in at 18%. The large files upload showed a transfer speed maximum of 36.46 MB/Sec. and an average of 21.89 MB/Sec. CPU usage was really very low compared to most boards I’ve tested at 10%.