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Iwill ZB370 Review

This is one of the best Socket370 mainboards in BabyAT form-factor. It is based on i440ZX chipset.

by FastSite
06/29/1999 | 12:00 AM

It looks as if all the computer industry started moving slowly towards Socket 370. We have everyright to say so judging by the overall amount of Socket 370 mainboards, which keeps on growing dayby day. Most Taiwanese manufacturers have already begun producing a much wider range of Socket 370mainboards rather than Slot 1 ones. Besides, the growing popularity of Socket 370 mainboards gaveway to numerous rumors about the forthcoming launching of PPGA-processor with Coppermine core,which can once and for all tip the scale in favour of Socket 370 systems.<%BANNER[article]%>

All these events made us anxious to take a closer look and to review the most interesting Socket370 mainboards. The first board, which is chosen to open the series of these reviews, will be a newIwill ZB370. This mainboard is just perfect for CPU overclocking, and can be compared to ABIT ZM6 andBM6. Good processor overclocking became possible not only due to a large set of supported FSBfrequencies, but also due to the possibility of increasing CPU core voltage. That's why from nowon we can add Iwill to the list of companies supporting this feature, which already includes ABITand MSI.

Specifications

The mainboard is supplied together with a user's manual, a set of cables, and a CD-ROMcontaining the already familiar drivers, as well as the antivirus program McAfee VirusScanand Iwill's monitoring utility - PC Doctor.

Installation

Although most case manufacturers have ceased making AT-cases, the mainboards intended for thisparticular format keep on coming out. And Iwill ZB370, which is made with BabyAT form-factor, isnot an exception. Theoretically, it doesn't mean that this mainboard can't be installed into ausual ATX-case. If you simply can't help doing it, you may install Iwill ZB370 mainboard into anATX-case, because there is a special ATX power connector you will need in this situation. However,you will also need a special rear side, which may not be included into a usual ATX case set. So,in our opinion, Iwill ZB370 will perfectly suit for a smooth upgrade of an old AT-system.

Since BabyAT format doesn't allow placing a lot of slots on this mainboard, i440ZX chipset,which is the basis of the mainboard, turns out quite enough to provide appropriate functioningof all the placed slots. Two ISA and three PCI slots do not require a much more expensive i440BX.However, the use of i440ZX still imposes certain limitations. This chipset can address up to fourmemory banks, which means that all three DIMM slots of Iwill ZB370 can be utilized simultaneouslyonly in case of single-bank SDRAM modules. And as a result the maximum memory, which can be supportedby Iwill ZB370, makes 512MB.

As you have already noticed, the mainboard is pretty small that is why we can hardly definethe layout as successful. First, no slot fits for any full-size expansion card. But the secondand the most displeasing thing is the following. All IDE-ports connectors are so stupidly locatedthat you will have to stretch the cables throughout the whole case, and the floppy disk drivescable will anyway lie in the way of the air flow, which hinders the CPU cooling greatly.

As for the configuration of the system based on Iwill ZB370 mainboard, we would like to mentionthe following. The clock multipliers as well as the processor working frequencies are set in BIOSSetup by means of SoftMenu, which becomes more and more popular among mainboard manufacturers withthe time. If we are not mistaken, the only mainboards, which still possess CPU jumper configuring,are ASUS and Gigabyte, however, we doubt that they will last long. Of course, it appears a bit moreconvenient to set all the CPU parameters through BIOS, because it prevents you from opening the PCcase and resetting the tiny jumpers every time you need to change something. In other words, itundoubtedly saves you time and trouble. Moreover, the SoftMenu utilized in Iwill ZB370 prepared usanother pleasant surprise. It is absolutely ready to support Celeron processors with the FSB frequencyequal to 100MHz, which are coming out in the near future. Even the jumper used to select the busfrequency of either 66 or 100MHz, which is a common thing for most mainboards with configuringthrough BIOS, no longer exists on Iwill ZB370. All the FSB frequencies are available through BIOSSetup. Besides, Iwill invented a very funny name for this technology. It is called "Bye-byejumper". :)

Besides, Iwill ZB370 BIOS allows to manually assign IRQs to PCI slots, which is of greatimportance while trying to subdue older capricious devices. Of course, Iwill engineers didn'tleave out the possibility to disable the USB controller as well. However, there is still roomfor improvement even for BIOS. The Setup of this mainboard doesn't allow any changes of thesystem memory timings with the only exception of CAS Latency. Actually, this only setting isquite enough in most cases, but at the same time the existing possibility to change the fullparameters set for EDO DRAM strikes as really strange. Where can we find this memory in DIMMmodules? Well, this is most likely to remain a mystery as well as the intentions of Iwillengineers…

Iwill ZB370 monitoring is based on Winbond W83781D chip, which allows to control 7 voltagesand to take 3 temperatures at a time. One thermistor is situated directly inside PGA370 and henceprovides highly exact processor temperatures. And the other two thermistors aren't connected at all:there are two external sensor connectors instead. These sensors aren't included into the supply,however, Iwill has provided its mainboard with an optional additional kit, which includes threebeautiful thermistors:

However, the features, which provide cool CPU overclocking, can be regarded as Iwill ZB370main peculiarities. So, let's pass over to them.

Overclocking

Iwill decided to follow the footsteps of ABIT and MSI and started aiming at satisfyingoverclockers' demands. Iwill ZB370 mainboard can boast all the possible features an overclockercould only dream of. So, let's discuss everything in greater detail.

The first thing is that Iwill ZB370 mainboard supports a wide range of FSB frequencies: 66,75, 83, 100, 103, 105, 110, 112, 115, 120, 124, 133, 140 and 150MHz. Well, this is not thatsurprising actually, because such a large frequencies set is characteristic of a lot of today'smainboards. The matter is that this feature requires not much: just a frequency synthesizer,which can get all these values. And the modern synthesizers are exactly like that. Moreover, thepresence of so many frequencies hardly makes much sense. The today's Intel Celeron processors, unlikeIntel Celeron 300A, can't be overclocked to 100MHz bus frequency that's why 75 and 80MHz seem moreuseful for them. Of course, most overclockers wish they could get a couple of other frequencies under100MHz, however, they have to put up with the fact that all the additional ones fall directly into therange over this value. It is also not that bad, but all these frequencies will really make senseonly after the launching of Intel Celeron processor with 100MHz FSB. But even in this case someadditional FSB frequencies may turn out excessive and remain useless. If the 100MHz Celeron turnsout well overclockable, which is very likely to be so, overclockers will be much more willing toget a couple of additional frequencies over 124MHz. And as we see, Iwill ZB370 slightly lacksthem.

Ok, let's stop grumbling and say something flattering, since the board really deserves it. Iwillbecame the third company after ABIT and MSI, which introduced an absolutely legal way of changing theCPU voltage. However, this feature still seems not very impressive: it's just a small lonely jumper,which allows increasing the voltage only up to 2.1 or 2.2V instead of the nominal 2V. No wonder, it looksvery poor compared to, shall we say, ABIT ZM6, which can boast the possibility to increase its CPUvoltage up to 2.3V with the step equal to 0.5V. Besides, ABIT lets you do all the changes throughSetup, which seems quite logical taking into account the presence of the SoftMenu, and turns outmuch more convenient as well. But we should be lenient to Iwill: it's the company's first experiencein this direction and it deserves our praise rather than out censure. Anyway, let's hope for thebetter and maybe next time this function will be carried out in a bit more sensible way.

Besides, Iwill ZB370 also boasts the possibility to set AGP bus divider to 1 or 2/3, which is knownas AGP Boost due to the manufacturer's ads. Nothing special, actually. If you have a 66Mhz CPU, AGPbus automatically gets 66MHz nominal frequency. Only while overclocking the system bus to 100MHz,when the divider - 2/3 - is enabled as default and AGP again gets its 66MHz, we can get 100MHz onAGP bus as well if we switch a special jumper. You are probably wondering what for? Well, this willhelp to increase the data transfer rate through AGP. However, this feature may appear absolutelyuseless in reality, because you won't be able to find an AGP-card working on 100MHz AGP busfrequency.

Another feature of Iwill ZB370 mainboard, which may be of significant use for overclockers,is the possibility to increase the memory, chipset and AGP voltage from 3.5V to 3.6V, or even upto 3.8V! Here you also have to switch a special mainboard jumper, which unfortunately, may somehowinfluence the overclocked system stability. Although we failed to find any serious changes of thesystem parameters if increasing the voltage.

In order to estimate the practical value of all Iwill's overclocking features we took IntelCeleron 300A processor and managed to overclock it in normal conditions to 464MHz (4.5x103) ontwo analogous mainboards: Iwill ZB370 and ABIT ZM6. Here is what we've got:

Iwill ZB370 ABIT ZM6
  • 450MHz (4.5x100) - passed
  • 464MHz (4.5x103) - passed
  • 473MHz (4.5x105) - passed only at 2.1V core voltage
  • 495MHz (4.5x110) - crashed during system boot
  • 504MHz (4.5x112) - crashed during Post
  • 518MHz (4.5x115) - failed
  • 540MHz (4.5x120) - failed
  • 558MHz (4.5x124) - failed
  • 600MHz (4.5x133) - failed
  • 630MHz (4.5x140) - failed
  • 675MHz (4.5x150) - failed
  • 450MHz (4.5x100) - passed
  • 464MHz (4.5x103) - passed
  • 473MHz (4.5x105) - passed only at 2.1V core voltage
  • 495MHz (4.5x110) - crashed during system boot
  • 504MHz (4.5x112) - crashed during Post
  • 518MHz (4.5x115) - failed
  • 540MHz (4.5x120) - failed
  • 558MHz (4.5x124) - failed
  • 600MHz (4.5x133) - failed
  • 630MHz (4.5x140) - failed
  • 675MHz (4.5x150) - failed

    • As you have noticed, the results are 100% alike. Though we ranked ABIT ZM6 as the best CPUoverclocking mainboard according to our own benchmarks, we have to admit that Iwill ZB370 providesabsolutely the same overclocking features. Probably, it appears a bit less convenient to work withsince ABIT ZM6 offers jumperless configuring through BIOS Setup, while Iwill ZB370 still makes youchange the processor voltage by means of a special jumper.

    Performance

    Before going over to the benchmarks and the results obtained by Iwill ZB370, we would like tomention the following. Iwill mainboards have been always known as highly stable and reliable. AndIwill ZB370 is not an exception. Even if you take a quick look at the mainboard, you will undoubtedlynotice that it has a bit more capacitors than a usual board. This fact proves that you see a reallyworthy device. And our benchmarks proved this statement, too. So, we have every right to call IwillZB370 one of the most reliable Socket 370 mainboards worth your attention.

    And now directly to the performance. We will compare Iwill ZB370 to the analogous mainboard fromABIT - ZM6, which has proven to be above average in all our benchmarks. We ran the tests for Iwillwith the processors supporting 66MHz FSB as well as with Intel Celeron 300A overclocked to 100MHz.We think that the benchmarks run with 100MHz CPU will pretty soon become quite popular, because thecoming out of Celeron with the official 100MHz bus is not that far off already.

    The testing system was configured as follows (except the mainboards used):

    We utilized the following applications in our benchmarks:

    Here are the results achieved:


    As we see, Iwill ZB370 shows very good results at FSB frequency equal to 66MHz, it even surpassesABIT ZM6. However, at 100MHz FSB the performance gets too much down than we wish it to, and ABIT takesthe lead. But the overall performance of Iwill ZB370 is still somewhat higher than the average, whichis really nice.

    Conclusions

    Summing up we are glad to admit that the numbers of mainboards for Celeron overclocking have grown.We've got another high quality product - Iwill ZB370, which is able not only to compete with suchrecognized authorities as ABIT ZM6 but also to leave them behind in certain fields, such as stabilityfor instance.

    Highs

    Lows

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