Microstar's GNB Max-FISR: solid as granite

PENTIUM 4 mainboards are advancing by the day in both features and performance - here we take a look at what is one of the most sophisticated 533 MHz FSB Pentium 4 mainboards in the market today: the Microstar GNB Max-FISR.

Based on Intel's Granite Bay (E7205) chipset, currently its top Pentium 4 chipset, GNB Max is MSI's first Intel-based mainboard to offer Dual Channel DDR memory architecture. Using two parallel DDR266 paths provides full bandwidth that precisely matches the 533 MHz FSB of Pentium 4 CPU. The added memory bandwidth is particularly useful in HT (HyperThreading) enabled environment. I created a test system around it to evaluate the mainboard...

While adhering to the usual features, like five PCI slots and AGP 8x, this board goes well beyond. For instance, it uses a full PCI sound chip (C-Media CMI8738) that saves the CPU some work, instead of on an AC97 audio codec, which would bog down CPU with sound processing (not good if you're aiming for the best game frame rates). It is among the first to have a built-in Intel Gigabit Ethernet controller on board as well. There is also a 3-port VIA FireWire controller and a combined IDE-cum-Serial ATA Promise RAID controller from Promise.

MSI includes three extra modules: the first one, a D-bracket, offers another USB port, a Bluetooth module and D-LED, a kind of error reporting device. The system status is deciphered depending on four LED lights and a deciphering table. So if the computer doesn't start, in many cases you no longer need to bother with searching for the culprit. The second module, is a 3-port Firewire extension module, and the third one, the S bracket, with extra audio jacks, including digital out.

Since the board is quite big, we had to find a big enough case to install it, like those from CoolerMaster, LianLi or SuperFlower - and yes, a 400W power supply, at least, should go along. With a spacious chassis, the installation was simple.

I installed WinXP Pro SP1 on the 3.06 GHz P4 system configuration, together with 512 MB Corsair RAM (which ran as DDR266 CL 1.5, very fast latency) and with ATI 9700 Pro 128 MB graphics card - here are some example benchmark results:

Sysmark
Internet 417
Office 223

PC Mark
PCMark CPU 7503
PCMark memory 7323 (versus 7631 on old i850E)

Sandra 2003 3309

As you can see, the chipset with Dual DDR-266 memory does have a bit lower performance than its predecessor, the i850E dual RDRAM chipset when it comes to the memory throughput. Why? Because RDRAM technology allows more fast-access memory pages to be open at the same time than DDR SDRAM. Other benchmark tests are pretty similar to its predecessor.

Value-wise, this is an excellent board because of its excellent set of peripherals, even integrated Bluetooth controller for mobile users, plus the full set of usual devices: IDE RAID with serial ATA, PCI sound, Gigabit LAN and FireWire. MSI also provides a lot of diagnostic, monitoring and antivirus software with it as well. µ

* THE CARD for this review was provided by Corbell, a Microstar International distributor in Singapore.