• VIA K8T800 Based Mainboards Roundup

The board belongs to the high-end sector (including its version without a wireless adapter) and features good accessory pack and feature set.

ASUS didn't change the traditional design or and moved the memory slots closer to the CPU like on some prototypes. The layout looks traditional: it might be difficult to hook up cables to the connectors near the left edge, and it's not convenient to have the audio connectors in front of the PCI slots and the FDD and SATA/IDE RAID behind them (though the former is attached at 90 degrees and is not going to be an obstacle); also, the cables may lock access to the memory modules. It can be difficult to reach some jumpers when the board is already installed. Their description is provided on the PCB. The green LED indicates +5 V Standby. The 3-phase switching voltage regulator incorporates 6 capacitors of 1500 uF and 3 of 1200 uF. There are also voltage regulators of the AGP bus (2 capacitors of 1000 uF and several less capacious ones) and of the memory (4 of 1000 uF).

The CPU clock switches, IrDA and SMBus connectors are provided space for but not integrated. I have no information in which board version they are going to be installed as this board is currently the only in the VIA K8T800 based line (probably, this is heritage of the first trial versions, maybe even for the previous chipset version). The board measures 305x245 mm (wide ATX, 9 fastening screws, all edges fixed). System monitoring is supported by Winbond W83697HF chip. It controls: 

• processor voltage, +3.3, +5, +12 V
• rotation speed of 2 fans; 
• temperatures of the processor (built-in sensor) and the board (built-in sensor).

Ports & connectors onboard

• CPU socket (Socket 754); 
• 3 slots for DDR SDRAM DIMM with/without ECC (the blue one is recommended for the DDR400 mode; DDR400 allows for two modules at most);
• AGP slot (with a retention clip);
• 5 PCI slots; 
• ASUS WiFi slot (combined with the last PCI)
• Standard power supply connectors (ATX, 4pin for 12V); 
• FDD; 
• 3 IDE (Parallel ATA) - 2 on chipset, 1 at the expense of the additional controller; 
• 4 SATA (Serial ATA) - 2 on chipset, 2 at the expense of the additional controller; 
• 2 Connectors for brackets of 2 USB 2.0 ports; 
• Connector for second COM port;
• Connector for Game port;
• Connector for FireWire port;
• Connector for audio-out from CD/DVD drive; 
• Connector for AUX-In;
• Case Open sensor connector;
• Connectors for a bracket with additional audio-outs and S/PDIF;
• 3 connectors for fans (2 with rotation control).

Rear panel (left to right, units)

• PS/2 mouse and keyboard;
• 1 LPT, S/PDIF-Out (Coaxial), 1 COM;
• 2 USB (2.0) & 1 FireWire;
• 2 USB (2.0) & 1 RJ-45 (Gigabit Ethernet);
• 3 audio ports (Mic-In, Line-In, Front) and Game port.

Accessories

• Package of an effective unusual design (for the Wireless Edition only);
• Documentation: a user manual, an installation guide for WiFi-b card (in English);
• Cables: 2 Serial ATA (with power supply adapters), 2 ATA66/100/133, 1 ATA33 and FDD - all wide cables are black and marked with the company's logo;
• Bracket with 4 USB ports;
• Bracket with 1 FireWire port;
• Bracket with S/PDIF-Outs (Coaxial and TosLink);
• Expansion card with an antenna for WiFi-b wireless access (in the Wireless Edition only);

 




• I/O Shield;
• 2 CDs with:
• drivers;
• Adobe Acrobat Reader;
• DirectX 8.1;
• PC-cillin 2002;
• ASUS Live Update;
• ASUS PCProbe;
• ASUS Screensaver;
• Winbond Voice Editor;
• InterVideo WinDVD Suite;
• Software AP (for wireless access, in the Wireless Edition only).

Integrated controllers

• audio controller based on the Analog Devices AD1980; 5.1 audio system supported, front audio I/Os and S/PDIF connector provided; 
• network controller based on the 3Com Marvell 940-MV00, 10/100/1000 Mbit/s (Gigabit Ethernet);
• IDE/SATA RAID based on Promise PDC20378 chip, RAID 0, 1 and 0+1 supported, 2 SATA and 1 PATA connectors;
• FireWire based on VIA VT6307 chip, 2 ports supported.

The integrated audio quality was estimated at 16 bits, 44 kHz with the RightMark Audio Analyzer 5.1 and Terratec DMX 6fire audio card:
 

General performance: Good (in detail). 

Technologies

• ASUS AI Net (net-diagnosing utility that intelligently diagnoses and reports cable faults);
• ASUS CrashFree BIOS 2 (automatic BIOS recovery from a diskette or boot CD even if data on the flash chip are corrupted);
• ASUS POST Reporter (reports about booting problems, user can create his/her own warnings);
• ASUS Q-Fan Technology (auto fan speed control);
• ASUS EZ Flash (BIOS flashing without OS booting);
• ASUS Instant Music Lite (Audio CD playback without OS booting)
• ASUS MyLogo2 (displays your pics during OS booting);
• ASUS Multi-language BIOS (BIOS Setup language);
• ASUS WiFi@Home (onboard connector (WiFi-b card supplied for the Wireless Edition) for connecting PC to a wireless network of the respective standard).

Settings: 

We used the BIOS 1003 beta 012 as the latest available version. 

Performance

According to the preliminary tests this model hardly differs from the other VIA K8T800 based models (the difference is less than 2%).
 

Average current price (quantity of supplies): $170