Epox 9NDA3+: A New Socket 939

Final Words

The Athlon 64 Socket 939 was introduced on June 1, so it has taken the Epox 9NDA3+ about 4 months to make it to the market. Epox can be forgiven on many fronts because the only choices for Socket 939 until the last few weeks started at $400 for the cost of the processor alone. However, with recent AMD price cuts and the introduction of 90nm Socket 939 3000+, 3200+ and 3500+ processors, the Socket 939 has become the "hot" platform. Put another way, Epox has timed the introduction perfectly. Just at the time when more people are shopping for a 939 motherboard, the Epox 9NDA3+ is available to buy. It is a good thing that new 939 motherboard choices are finally appearing.

How does the Epox compare to other 939 boards?

In performance, the Epox is competitive with the best 939 boards that we have tested, but it doesn't break any new ground in performance. You will find it just as capable as any other nForce3 Ultra or nForce4 motherboard, but it doesn't rise above the others. Perhaps with the memory controller on the Athlon 64 chip, that is the best we could expect anyway.

In the overclocking area, the Epox 9NDA3+ does stand out though. The Epox matches the fastest 939 that we have tested in the maximum overclock we could achieve and in the highest clock speed that we could reach. Matching the MSI K8N Neo2 in overclocking is no small feat, but the 9NDA3+ proved up to the task in every overclocking test.

The last area is memory performance and here, the results are clearly disappointing. The Epox is a fine board with 2 DIMMs, but when we tested with 4 DIMMs, the 9NDA3+ sets the memory speed at DDR333 no matter what we set in the BIOS. This is the first Socket 939 board we have tested that has been so restrictive in performance with 4 DIMMs. This limitation is so severe that we cannot really recommend the Epox if you plan to use 4 DIMMs now or in the future. Choose another Socket 939 board for four DIMMs. We suspect that Epox can fix this limitation in a BIOS update, but until we see this problem corrected, performance with 4 DIMMs will be a disappointment.

It should also be mentioned that when we first received the Epox 9NDA3+, we could only run memory at 1T in slots 3 and 4. Any attempt to run at a 1T or Auto Command Rate setting failed boot. Epox supplied us an updated BIOD that did fix this problem, but the new BIOS did not fix our other concern. About 50% of the time, the Epox board with either BIOS would fail on reboot and freeze at the first BIOS screen. We were always able to continue a boot by hitting reset or turning the computer off first, but these failed reboots were time consuming and very annoying for a production board. Epox needs to fix this issue with a BIOS update or they will get many complaints from end users.

To sum it up, the Epox is a mixed bag right now. It is full of potential with outstanding overclocking capabilities. The 9NDA3+ performance is competitive with any 939 board that we have tested - as long as you run just 2 DIMMs. However, the immature BIOS makes performance with 4 DIMMs a problem. We also find the freezes on reboot very annoying. Consider the Epox 9NDA+ to be a Socket 939 board with lots of potential and a few warts. We are confident that Epox can fix the problems with BIOS updates, but for now, the warts prevent our waxing enthusiastic over the 9NDA3+.

The Epox is a decent 939 choice now if you will only run 2 DIMMs and you can deal with the annoying reboot problems. Once the BIOS has matured, the Epox will likely move to be among the better 939 boards that you can buy, but it just isn't there yet.