User manual VIA P4M266 WHITE PAPER

[. . . ] S3 Graphics ProSavage8TM Integrated Graphics core: The ProSavage8TM 2D/3D Accelerator with internal AGP 8X bandwidth and DVD Motion Compensation is optimized for use with the Microsoft Windows® XP operating system and drives integrated graphics for the Intel® platform to a new level. Shared Memory Architecture (SMA) enables the P4M266 to utilize the system memory for frame buffer and texture memory on data path doubled to 128- · Page 2 10/30/01 VIA ProSavageDDR P4M266 Chipset White Paper bit capacity. Thus, the DDR memory subsystem, offering up to 2. 1GB/s of memory bandwidth, increases the overall performance of the integrated graphics core by up to 50% over SMA chipsets based on PC133 SDRAM. [. . . ] The VIA ProSavageDDR P4M266 retains these three key advantages of VIA ProSavage integrated chipsets while offering a significant increase in graphics performance through the benefits of DDR266 SDRAM memory in a Shared Memory Architecture Design. The new S3 Graphics ProSavage8TM integrated into the VIA ProSavageDDR P4M266 shares the same architecture and feature set as the ProSavage4TM but boasts internal data paths expanded to 128-bit from 64-bit giving an effective AGP 8X bandwidth capacity and increasing performance by 40-50% over PC133 SDRAM based SMA chipsets. The performance benefits this technology delivers in real world applications are evident in a Winstone 2001 comparison (see graphic below) with an Intel Pentium 4 system based on the Intel 845 chipset equipped with an external nVIDIA GeForce 2 graphics card. The VIA ProSavageDDR P4M266 system offers better performance at a lower system cost, even in graphics intensive applications like Adobe® Photoshop® and Macromedia® Dreamweaver®, as tested by Content Creation Winstone. Page 4 10/30/01 VIA ProSavageDDR P4M266 Chipset White Paper Winstone 2001 Content Creation 845 P4M266 Business Winstone 36 38 40 42 44 46 48 50 1. 5GHz Intel Pentium® 4 processor; i845 MB; 256MB PC133 SDRAM; Asus Geforce2 AGP card; 30GB IBM 307030 ATA 100 HDD; Windows 98 SE 1. 5GHz Intel Pentium 4 processor VIA P4M266 Reference Board. 256MB PC2100 DDR SDRAM 30GB IBM 307030 ATA 100 HDD; Windows 98 SE Now that the price of DDR266 SDRAM has fallen to levels almost equivalent to PC133 SDRAM the performance benefits of the VIA ProSavageDDR P4M266 come without a cost penalty. 256MB DDR DIMM 256MB PC133 DIMM Source www. crucial. com 29/10/01 $29. 69 $27. 89 Combined with the significant cost saving from the integrated graphics engine, there is now a compelling value proposition for mainstream domestic and corporate migration to the Intel® Pentium® 4 platform. VIA ProSavageDDR P4M266 Product Overview The VIA ProSavageDDR P4M266 consists of two separate chips: The 664-pin VT8751 Integrated North Bridge, and the 376-pin VT8233 or VT8233C V-Link South Bridge. Both use standard PGA packaging to reduce the cost of production and allow the use of standard heatsink solutions. The basic architecture of the chipset is shown in the illustration below. VIA ProSavage P4M266 North Bridge The North Bridge of the VIA ProSavageDDR P4M266 (model number VT8751) provides support for the quad-pumped 400MHz (8X100MHz) Front Side Bus for the Intel® Pentium® 4 processor. Deep pipelining and buffering keep the high-speed system bus supplied with a constant stream of data, maximizing the performance of Page 5 10/30/01 VIA ProSavageDDR P4M266 Chipset White Paper the processor. This system bus runs in pseudo-synchronous operation with the memory and AGP controllers, providing the low latency of a synchronous design without sacrificing the flexibility of an asynchronous implementation. The VT8751 integrates the ProSavage8TM graphics core into the North Bridge offering competitive 2D/3D performance while retaining an optional external AGP 4X port for configuration flexibility. The VT8751 also does not sacrifice support for older AGP2X models, providing OEMs and SIs with additional configuration options. The VT8751 North Bridge of the VIA ProSavageDDR P4M266 has a flexible memory controller that supports up to 4GB of DDR200/DDR266 SDRAM. [. . . ] This price parity with SDRAM will rapidly drive the adoption of DDR as memory bandwidth limitations become more constricting. VIA ProSavageDDR P4M266 Chipset Performance Through its use of high-performance DDR266 memory, high-speed V-Link bus, deep buffering and pipelining, and optimised timings, the VIA ProSavageDDR P4M266 offers superior performance across a range of industry standard applications. Offering a huge performance boost over the existing Intel® Pentium® III + Intel® 815 corporate desktop standard, the VIA ProSavageDDR P4M266 provides the Intel Pentium 4 processor platform with the bandwidth it needs for performance hungry functions like multi-tasking. The Winstone 2001 comparison below demonstrates a performance increase of up to 5% over the Intel® Pentium® III + 815 standard corporate desktop on the most commonly used applications. [. . . ]