ASRock 939Dual-SATA2

Conclusion:

From the results, it is very evident that the powerful Tyan K8E-SLI S2866 had a definitive advantage over the ASRock 939Dual-SATA2, and the results differed from a slight advantage in some benchmarks to a sizable win in others. However, it is important to note the price differences between the two boards, as the K8E-SLI is one of the most expensive Socket 939 solutions available for workstations while the ASRock 939Dual-SATA2 is one of the most economically efficient. The ULI M1695 motherboard has a prime price of approximately $70 USD, while the Tyan K8E-SLI is selling upwards of $250 USD, that is if you're fortunate enough to find one now due to the limited quantity. With the 939Dual-SATA2 being based upon the ULI M1695 + M1567, the motherboard does offer AGP 8x as well as PCI Express x16 making it a logical choice for AMD Athlon 64 users looking for an upgrade. In addition, this budget motherboard will support the possibilities of making a CPU socket upgrade later, which will likely be upon the AMD M2 launch. On top of all this, the 939Dual-SATA2 is definitely a better overclocker than past ASRock motherboards we have had our hands on along with the possibility for a modified BIOS and volt modifications. Even with this motherboard offering competitive performance, it would not be the choice for those looking at this for any sort of workstation or server environment due to its poor performance in EnSight and Pro/Engineer with SPECViewPerf v8.1 as well as other intensive benchmarks. In addition, the motherboard lacks any Gigabit networking, Firewire, and additional SATA ports. The Chipset itself is fabulous, and we hope NVIDIA will continue in this tradition with their recent acquisition of ULI Electronics. For $70 USD the retail ASRock 939Dual-SATA2 is definitely a buy for enthusiasts and gamers on a budget that are looking for a transitional motherboard for their AGP to PCI Express migration as well as to AMD's upcoming next generation processors. Topping off the 939Dual-SATA2 motherboard is terrific Linux compatibility, except for the previously mentioned ASIC, and LM_Sensors support. It will certainly be exciting to see what new challenges the creative engineers at ASRock will take on next year.

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