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The world's best kept secret

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lyle

Member
Joined
Dec 18, 2000
Location
Brooklyn Park MN
I've got the Epox EP-4BDSA2+ and the EP-4SDA+ and based on the number of threads in this forum section, they are the world's best kept secret. I hope it stays that way. Those of us who have them know what little jewels they are. I've already forgotten about Abit.
 
The 4sda is one heck of a trouble free stable overclocker :)

I don't have the 4BDSA2+ yet.

How high a fsb have you been able to run rdram on the 4BDSA2+?
 
It doesn't use RDRAM, it's a DDR board, and I got one too many letters in there, it should be the 4BDA2+. I'm currently running a 1.8A at 2.12, not because that's as far as it'll go, but because that's as far as it'll go at default voltage and with the retail HSF. Alpha 8942 is in the house and all I need is some time to put it on and then we'll see where it goes.
 
Hi lyle,

I was wondering whats the difference between the epox 4bda2+ and 4sda+?

Regards.
Kenn.
 
How loud is the chipset fan on the 4BDA2+?

The chipset fan on my EPoX 8K7A was the loudest thing in the box and I'm worried that it might be loud on this P4 board also.

I'm asking because one of the best things about the Northwoods is how quiet your system can be.
 
K3nnis, the difference is that the 4BDA2+ uses the Intel 845 chipset and the 4SDA+ uses the SiS 645 chipset. Both use a Highpoint chip for onboard RAID and both my boards have onboard audio. The 4BDA2+ has two DDR slots and 4SDA+ has three DDR slots. There are some very minor BIOS differences. Also, the price difference between the two is about $20.00 in favor of the SiS board.

Ralf, the chipset fan is not too intrusive. I have a lot of other fans in my box and I can't honestly tell you if the chipset fan adds a lot to the overall noise footprint. When I have the case open, I can't tell that it's running.
 
Hi Lyle.

Thanks for the info. Hmm i am thinking to either go for the sis645 chipset or the intel 845D chipset. Any recommendations? I am leaning towards the intel. Dunno why:p Is the epox 4bda2+ a good board? Is the highpoint raid good? I heard the promise ones perform better? Can i use all 6 pci slots in the epox 4bda2+? Umm is the onboard audio anygood?:) Sorry for so many questions, hope you can answer them:) I have a P4 1.6A CPU sitting here by the way:p Need a power supply too, any recommendations? 350W or 430W? I will go for an enermax.

Regards.
Kenn.
 
Yes these do seem to be awesome boards, I just ordered a 4BDA from newegg. I opted for the intel chipset because I wanted 100% stability this time around. I was actually leaning 2 the sis 645 chipset but with my absolutely horrible via experience this last time with my KT7, I wanted the extereme stability. I do think though that the sis and the intel are both good chipsets, I think my next board might be a sis. I got a stick of samsumg pc2700 in the mail also (512). I'll post here with results when I get them. Nearly all the other boards out there seem to have problems in some minor form, but I have yet to hear even 1 bad thing about the 4BDA or 4BDA2+ except that it has a hybrid raid, which actually works well. I'm not to hot on raids in general, going to switch to scsi soon, so I opted for the 4BDA.
 
Hi Zervun.
Cool. I think i will get the 4bda2+ as well. I was wondering what do you mean by hybrid raid?

Regards.
Kenn,
 
2+ is the raid board I got the one without it just the 4dba. Apparently the raid works great, but is not as nice as the promise one? don't get me wrong though. It's a hybrid, it uses part software part hardware. I've heard that it works with linux, however I'm a little scketch about these types of things, I like to have it down to the nitty gritty. I've heard quite a bit of success from them, I'm just looking into scsi, and if I stayed IDE I'd like to do a full hardware raid. The less drivers/software on my comp the better but that's just IMO. I keep an incredibly clean comp. Don't let me discourage you though at all, I havn't heard anything bad about it at all.
 
Kenn, the SiS board has three RAM slots supporting DDR333 while the i845 board only has two RAM slots, no DDR333 support. Is the onboard audio any good? Well, it seems to be OK if you are not planning on a 5.1 setup. I use the Intel board for my main office/internet box and I use the SiS board for my CD burning box and play box. I don't do any gaming on these so sound is not an issue. I don't use the RAID channels for an actual RAID setup. I use them as extra IDE channels because I have 5 IDE devices in each box. I connect my 2 HD's to the RAID connectors and my 2 burners and Zip to the standard IDE channels. Can't answer your question about the PCI slots, don't have any used except for the modem.

Cheers!
 
Hey.
Thanks for the replies guys. I think i will get the intel 845D chipset, the sis645 seems tempting but i think i prefer getting an intel chipset board for an intel CPU. I think i iwll get the raid epox 4bda2+ as i need those extra IDE channels. I already a scsi setup now. BUt i want to get a couple of IDE drives for big storage. I just can't afford big storage with SCSI. I have 2 X 18 gig 10K RPM scsi HD's. But they are for apps and OS.

Regards.
Kenn.
 
Well my 4BDA just arrived with my 1.6a from newegg, costa rica btw but I really don't care that much. Ram should be here later, going to test the whole setup out.

The packaging looks nice and there seems to be a nice feel with the epox stuff, never had it before. It seems to have a less plasticy feel that some of the other mb companys have IMO, everything was well packaged and the MB box with all the junk was actually quiet heavy, nice graphics on it IMO nothing flashy but looks professional. The booklet that came with the stuff is way way better than the kt7 manual I had before. Also just wanted to note that both newegg and kommax (for ram) are awesome, quick orders and super prompt shipping, everything got here over a day early.

Lets try and keep this section live and try to help each other out with settings and so such. These 2 boards seem to be diamonds in the ruff, and I mean huge honkin diamonds.

I'm so damn excited to get my ram
 
Hi Zervun.
Glad to here you got the stuff ready:) Let us know how you go:) I think i am getting closer and closer in purchasing the Epox 4bda2+, by the way you are having the non-RAID EPOX?

Regards.
Kenn.
 
I got the non raid version the 4dba, and it's booting up right now installing windows xp. The only concern I have right now is in my bios I can't disable acpi even though the mb booklet shows I can, I'm assuming I need a new bios. I had acpi disabled, and of course windows wouldn't boot with the new mb having it on. I'm not reformating yet, just really want to play on it hehe, so trying to do an xp repair and see if it will let me boot. btw I LOVE THIS MB. got some samsung pc2700 from kommax for 157 which isn't a bad price, it's supposed to do well. Havn't overclocked it yet, don't want to screw up any of the windows install stuff, I know it's pansy but I really want to play on it before I get to work.
 
This board is great. Here's what I'm running.

P4 1.6a
Epox 4bda2+
512mb OCZ PC3000 rev. 2
Thermaltake 478 Volcano
Visiontek Geforce3 Ti200


Running it at 2.53GHz with these settings:

158FSB
209 x 2 = 418DDR!!!
Vcore = 1.85 bios (1.75-1.8 actual)
Vdimm = 2.9 bios
Memory settings 2.5-3-3-6


Sandra memory scores are over 3100.
3Dmark is 9270 w/ Ti200 overclocked to 240/500


I'm hitting the max of the memory at 209Mhz so if I want to clock the cpu any higher I will have to use the 1:1 memory divider and lose a ton of memory performance.

My processor is also hitting it's threshold at 1.8volts at 2.55GHz. Does anyone know how to do a voltage mod to this board so I can bump up the Vcore up to atleast 1.9volts?

Temps are still pretty good.

37C CPU idle
29C Board idle

48C CPU Max load
31C Board Max load
 
There is a volt mod where you tie the wires with a wire to make a raw 1.85, if you have the highest voltage on the board set already, it's probably not running at what you set it, check your boot up screen. The epox's seem to run a little under voltage of what you set. So when u set it at 1.8 it's probably running 1.75 or so. You can also actually solder the 2 pins together also, do a search on it on how to do the volt mods. Great overclock though. As soon as I get a my watercooling setup I'm going to up my bus some more.
 
Already did the Vid mod to 1.85volts. When I said 1.8 earlier I ment what the motherboard was giving the chip at the 1.85 setting. So basically I maxed out my CPU voltage. I'm looking for a Vmod for the motheboard simular to the one for the 8KHA+ where you soldier a resistor to up the voltage range. I did it to my old 8KHA+ and it worked great for a XP1800, now I need the same for the Woody.
 
I don't think that people have done this yet, at least I havn't heard of any. Pushing it past 1.85v is pushing alot of volts through it though, but you are obviously a gambler =).
 
zervun said:
I don't think that people have done this yet, at least I havn't heard of any. Pushing it past 1.85v is pushing alot of volts through it though, but you are obviously a gambler =).

Quite a few over at [H]ardocp have done this mod. Man I love my Epox 4bda2+ mobo. :cool:
 
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