Legit Reviews

I just got the Epox EP-8NPA SLI motherboard this morning for all you socket 754 users that want to use SLI, but keep the your old processor. At $102 this board is a great budget SLI board using the AMD Athlon64 processor family.

Key Specifications
* Support AMD Socket 754 CPU Athlon64 & Sempron64
* Support true SLI function, PCI-E x16 *2 (PCI-E x8*1 & PCI-E x8*1)
* Support DDR 400MHz, up to 2Gb
* Support new generation of SATA II, up to 3Gb/sec
* Support up to 400MHz CPU frequency in BIOS adjustable

Pricing: Current Pricing

The Entire Board:


The PCIe Slots & SLI:


Socket 754 and DIMM's:


Chipset HSF removed showing A3 revision nForce4 SLI:


Overall the board looks nicely laid out. For those users who already own 754 Athlon CPU this board is the perfect way to avoid a Socket 939 platform, but still take advantage of SLI.

nicely laid out are you kidding me? The power connectors should never be placed in the center of the board, not to mention the placement of the IDE slots, like that its a pain to remove one of the IDE cables, without removing both.

It's a socket 754 board that is aimed at the low end of the mainstream level. Many AMD boards have had the IDE connectors in those locations for years. I remember my ABIT KR7A (KT266a chipset) had connectors like that and it was a pain to remove the primary IDE cable when the mobo was in a case. The power connectors are in the middle of the board, but that shouldn't be a major issue for most users.

while I'm not crazy about the 20 pin and 4 pin power connector placement....its easy enough to work around that... It does remind me of older boards. As to the IDE connections, almost every board I have still uses that configuration..... and I hate it. I'd like to see companies go with the horizontal slots just for a cleaner layout and more space.
But socket 754 is so yesterday, granted its cheap, but with socket 939 boards under $80, and Venice 3000 at $140....why would you want a socket 754?

I think it's cool that they made a s754 board. Yeah it's basically a dead socket, but can't you use Newark core (Turion) processors on desktop s754 boards? That would be nice. It is a little self defeating since you don't have dual channel or the possibility of dual core, but by getting an average CPU, you can use the $$ you saved there and invest it into the second graphics card, which will show a bigger gaming performance improvement than a faster processor would. It is an interesting, but good step toward making SLI a more viable solution for "the rest of us".

And the placement of the power connectors could have been much better, and the floppy connector is a little low. And although that's the way the IDE connectors are on all boards, I hate it too. Why can't they just have them side by side?!?!

Overall, I really really like this board and think it's a great idea since there aren't really even any PCI-Express options available for s754. The only other gripe I have is the chipset cooler looks pretty weak, but fortunately it is placed above the graphics card so there is much more room giving you more options of aftermarket chipset coolers that you can use on this board (Swiftech and thermalright).

How long before you think they'll have the same thing available for s939?

gvblake22 wrote:
Overall, I really really like this board and think it's a great idea since there aren't really even any PCI-Express options available for s754. The only other gripe I have is the chipset cooler looks pretty weak, but fortunately it is placed above the graphics card so there is much more room giving you more options of aftermarket chipset coolers that you can use on this board (Swiftech and thermalright).

The northbridge heatsink fan is uber cheap, but I think their is enough room for an aftermarket cooler.

Review of the 8NPA at:

PC Stats

capper5016 wrote: But socket 754 is so yesterday, granted its cheap, but with socket 939 boards under $80, and Venice 3000 at $140....why would you want a socket 754?

Sure if you are going to buy a NEW pc, the 939 is the way to go.... What if you already have a 754 cpu and want to upgrade, alot of people are not like us, they buy things cause they need them, not just because they want them.....there is no real world speed increase between 754 and 939 @ the same Freq.... This is a great idea for people who have a tight budget and still want their machine to last. They can buy their GFX card now, keep the old proc, then upgrade to SLI later to keep-up with current games.... customers who will buy this will not be looking to play games @ 1600x1200.....or at least very few will.............Epox are giving people OPTIONS......KUDOS EPOX!!!!!

The performance according to the review is right on-par with the market they're selling the mobo to, but the thing that gets me is this: They said they used 2 different processors in comparing the board's performance against the others, but it appeared to me they only used the 3200+, so why list a processor you didn't use? I guess I'm just spoiled by the guys here because they do extremely thorough testing, and draw clear, unbiased conclusions. Otherwise, not bad for an entry market board.

i see two things i like about this mobo, altho i'm a DFI fan at this point.

1. the chipset is placed above the vid card ports so it's very easy to place a nice cooler on there.

2. It's SLI! what other 754 mobos out there offer SLI and 754? i'm unsure, but i know DFI doesn't.

....just did a quick search on newegg for a nf4-4X 754 and 10 mobos came up and none of them were SLI.

this mobo would be a decent upgrade if you want to run SLI and the new Newark Mobile 4000 @ 3.2GHz

Apoptosis, how are the bios voltages and memory timings? anything worth talking about?

TGM

kenc51 wrote:

capper5016 wrote: But socket 754 is so yesterday, granted its cheap, but with socket 939 boards under $80, and Venice 3000 at $140....why would you want a socket 754?

Sure if you are going to buy a NEW pc, the 939 is the way to go.... What if you already have a 754 cpu and want to upgrade, alot of people are not like us, they buy things cause they need them, not just because they want them.....there is no real world speed increase between 754 and 939 @ the same Freq.... This is a great idea for people who have a tight budget and still want their machine to last. They can buy their GFX card now, keep the old proc, then upgrade to SLI later to keep-up with current games.... customers who will buy this will not be looking to play games @ 1600x1200.....or at least very few will.............Epox are giving people OPTIONS......KUDOS EPOX!!!!!

right on capper5016

there is no tangible difference between the 754 and 939 cpus. the 754 internal FSB of 800mhz can only use up to 3200mb/s as it's a fixed bus speed within the cpu between the memory controller and the core. any memory bandwidth over 3200mb/s +/- 100mb/s is unused on the 754's 800mhz FSB.

same goes for the 939 cpus. but they have a 1000mhz FSB and require 4000mb/s. now if the 939 chipset were only single channel, then we'd have to run the memory bus at 250mhz as DDR500 gives a bandwidth of 4000mb/s. but they don't they use Dual Channel memory bus. another reason why the 939's must have a Dual Channel memory bus and an internal 1000mhz FSB is for greater bandwidth for the Dual Core 939's.

the socket 754 has been, in the past, overlooked for the shiney new 939 platforms, but now that the Mobile Newark cores came out, like the Mobile 4000 (2.6GHz, .09µ, 1.35vcore, SSE3, no IHS) they can run all day long at 3.2GHz with a modest water cooling setup. so when you increase the core frequency, you increase the memory controllers speed also (that's like increasing the FSB of the older nf2/Intel platforms).

so, this mobo, if it's worth it's salt, should be a nice way to run 3.2GHz cpu and SLI vid cards on the cheap, but yet still keep up with the single core 939's.

TGM

TheGeekMistress --> Welcome to LRForums....!!!!

You can formally introduce yourself HERE if you like.
The rest of then members would love to say Hi, I'm sure!!!!!

kenc51 wrote:TheGeekMistress --> Welcome to LRForums....!!!!

You can formally introduce yourself HERE if you like.
The rest of then members would love to say Hi, I'm sure!!!!!

ok, done! i have my intro thread up

TGM