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Specification and Accessories
You can tell the Chaintech VNF4 Ultra VE is an inexpensive mainboard when you take a look at the snapshot:
But it does have those PCI Express slots and is really based on the NVIDIA nForce4 Ultra chipset. That’s already enough to become a bestseller. Still, one feels regretful recalling a previous mainboard from Chaintech, the luxurious ZNF3-250 model on the nForce3 250Gb. Little is left of the past glory. Just read this specification:
Chaintech VNF4 Ultra VE | |
CPU | AMD Athlon 64 for Socket 939 |
Chipset | NVIDIA nForce4 Ultra |
HyperTransport bus | 1 GHz |
Clock generator frequencies | 200-400MHz (with 0.5-1MHz increment) |
Overclocking-friendly functions | Adjustable processor Vcore, Vmem and Vchipset |
Memory | 4 DDR DIMM slots for dual-channel DDR400 SDRAM |
PCI Express slots | 1 x PCI Express x16 |
PCI expansion slots | 3 |
USB 2.0 ports | 10 (4 – on the rear panel) |
IEEE1394 ports | None |
ATA-100/133 | 2 ATA-133 channels |
Serial ATA-150 | 4 Serial ATA-300 channels (with RAID support) |
IDE RAID support | RAID 0, 1, 0+1 |
Integrated sound | 8-channel AC97 codec: Realtek ALC850 |
Integrated network | Gigabit Ethernet (Vitesse VSC8201RX Gigabit Ethernet PHY) |
Additional features | None |
BIOS | Phoenix-AwardBIOS v6.00PG |
Form-factor | ATX, 305mm x 220mm |
By the way, Chaintech offers another, even less expensive mainboard (the VNF4 VE model) on the same PCB. This non-Ultra version differs from the Ultra counterpart by the nForce4 chipset supposedly used instead of the nForce4 Ultra. In other words, the Chaintech VNF4 VE lacks Serial ATA 3Gb/s, and NVIDIA Firewall 2.0 supplied with this mainboard works on the software level only. Otherwise, the two mainboards have the same functionality.
But as you remember, we are reviewing the VNF4 Ultra VE version now. The accessories supplied with this product are very meager (but what would you expect from a value-edition product?). So, we found the following things in the mainboard box:
- A CD with drivers and utilities and a CD with additional software;
- Two Serial ATA cables and a power cable for one Serial ATA drive;
- One 80-pin Parallel ATA cable and a FDD cable;
- An I/O shield for the back panel of the system case;
- Thermal paste;
- A user manual.
Not much, but the potential buyer should rejoice about the price, rather than grieve about the accessories. The price is going to be very appealing – the Chaintech VNF4 Ultra VE will probably become the best value mainboard on the nForce4 Ultra chipset. Let’s keep this fact in mind and go on with our examination of the mainboard features.
