Written: 6/8/2000
Written by: MotoŽ
Price: $115.00US
Manufactured by: ASUS

In many ways, the ASUS P3V4X is the motherboard the Abit VT6X4 should have been. The P3V4X is based on the VIA Apollo Pro133A chipset with ATX form factor. It supports Intel Pentium II/III 233 to 933+MHz Coppermine and Celeron processors. The chipset is equipped with 133MHz Front Side Bus (FSB), and support for PC133 SDRAM, AGP 4X, Ultra DMA/66, Wake-On LAN, Ring, Keyboard/Mouse, as well as Chassis Intrusion Detection. It is also bundled with ASUS PC Health Monitoring to monitor and ensure maximum safety for your PC. Finally, there are SIX PCI Slots! This will enable multiple hardware devices (SCSI, CD-RW, DVD-ROM, etc) and should help solves the problems of any future expansion you may have.

The P3V4X is the same size as the Abit VT6X4. Both boards share a lot in common. The main difference is that the P3V4X gives you more; more PCI slots, more DIMM slots and most important, more bus speeds. The amount of bus speed selections, while not as great as the Abit BE6-II, should be more than enough to satisfy even the most hardcore overclocker. The P3V4X offers the following bus speed selections: 66, 68, 75, 80, 85, 90, 95, 100, 103, 105, 110, 112, 115, 116, 118, 120, 124, 126, 130, 133, 135, 138, 140, 142, 144, 146, 148, 150, 155, 160, 166. Now we're talking! This is what the Abit VT6X4 should have came with. Where the highest bus speed offered by the VT6X4 is 150Mhz, the ASUS P3V4X offers three more bus speed above that. Now, the chance of your RAM or processor living at the speed is rare but it's still nice to have.

A nice feature of all VIA Pro motherboard is its ability to adjust RAM speed independent of Front Side Bus speed. You have the option to set the RAM speed 33Mhz higher or lower than the Front Side Bus speed. This allows you to get the most out of your expensive PC-133 RAM. If you were using the P3V4X on the 100Mhz FSB you can increase the RAM speed to 133Mhz. Likewise if you're on the 166Mhz FSB, you can decrease the RAM speed by 33Mhz if your PC-133 RAM can't handle that high a bus speed.

The VIA Pro chipset also offers a 1/2 AGP divider. AGP video cards like the Elsa Gladiac GeForce2 GTS is meant to run on a 66Mhz AGP bus. When running your system on the stock 100Mhz FSB the AGP bus runs at 2/3 of that speed (66Mhz). The problem comes when you increase the FSB. By going to 150Mhz, the AGP bus increases to 100Mhz (2/3 of 150 = 100Mhz). A 100Mhz AGP bus is way too high for the GeForce2 GTS video card. However using that 1/2 AGP divider will give an AGP bus speed of 75Mhz (1/2 of 150 = 75Mhz). This is well within the operating limits of every AGP video card. Even when running the 166Mhz FSB, the AGP bus would be 83Mhz. Most AGP video cards can handle this.

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