X-bit labs

X-bit labs CeBIT 2005 Coverage: Day 4 (page 2)

Category: Editorial

by Anton Shilov

[ 03/14/2005 | 03:41 PM ]

Foxconn Targets Gamers with New Mainboards, Barebone

Foxconn, who decided to go into the channel business in addition to its contract manufacturing a year ago, this year shows off an assortment of products designed specifically for gamers. But Foxconn’s products are traditionally a bit different to what other makers of computer components showcase.

One of the highlights of Foxconn’s booth is its WinFast NFPIK8AA-8EKRS mainboard based on NVIDIA’s nForce Professional chips 2200 and 2050. The main idea behind the mainboard is to provide two real PCI Express x16 slots for graphics cards without limiting the bandwidth to x8 lanes per card, like the nForce4 SLI chipsets do.

While the mainboard seems to be positioned for gaming enthusiasts, it more resembles a workstation platform, as it sports Socket 940, which is used for AMD Opteron processors.

Foxconn connects the nForce Professional 2200 and 2050 chips in a rather logical way: via the HyperTransport bus. While NVIDIA suggests that the chips interact via the HyperTransport bus in a system that has two AMD Opteron CPUs, the WinFast NFPIK8AA-8EKRS can plug in only one AMD Opteron chip and the secondary –  nForce 2050 chip – I/O chip is connected directly to the processor.

The system with the nForce Professional-based WinFast mainboard ran the 3DMark05 demo without any problems. Still, it is unclear whether the AMD Opteron platform will get any popularity among gamers.

Another interesting product in Foxconn’s booth is eBot barebone for AMD Athlon 64 processors.

The barebone is based on NVIDIA’s nForce4 chipset and can support up to AMD Athlon 64 3700+ processor in PGA754 form-factor. The machine also has some capabilities that will be useful for the living room – CD and MP3 playing while operating system is off.

The products for gamers attract a lot of attention, nonetheless, Foxconn’s booth is mainly devoted to showcase the company’s products intended for more conservative customers. The maker of hardware components exposes its forthcoming 955X and 945P/G chipsets-based mainboards as well as numerous cases and even thin clients.