BFG nForce 4 Ultra Motherboard

Reviews: Hardware

Motherboards | Power Supplies | Memory | Systems | Video Cards

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Nicholas Hart
Kurtis
BFG
Mar. 22, 2006

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Board Layout

There are generally two kinds of board design: a well laid-out board with thoughtfully placed connectors, or one where connectors are in inconvenient locations that make cabling somewhat painful. Why wouldn't all board manufacturer's attempt to set component and connector locations as cleanly as possible? Well, that costs money. During board layout, special attention must be paid to the routing of motherboard traces, the signal paths on the board itself. Placing fan connectors in a grouping for example requires all of those traces to be run in close proximity. This takes up real estate on the board and other signals must be appropriately routed around or, in the case of a multi-layer PCB such as a motherboard, under or over them. A USB connector at the edge of a board will require longer traces than one closer to the chipset.

Routing traces to achieve a nice looking board with convenient connector locations takes more time and requires more physical space than just placing connectors as efficiently (i.e. shorter traces, less space) and quickly as possible. While the extra time required for an efficient layout doesn't add to component cost, the cost must be amortized throughout a specified time. The larger PCB however is a component cost that impacts every board produced.

Reducing board cost through a shorter design cycle and decreased component cost certainly isn't entirely bad. The cost savings will be passed on to the consumer and the board should ultimately perform just as well as its more expensive and attractive looking counterpart. But if you've ever built a computer around a strangely laid-out board then you already know the disadvantage of purchasing one. Cable routing becomes difficult and time consuming while often impacting airflow. You spend more time with cable ties trying to make sure that ATX power cable doesn't get caught up in your CPU fan or perhaps you have to go buy a longer IDE cable to reach that optical drive mounted high in your case.

When I reviewed the ECS KN1 SLI Extreme, I found the board to be laid out extremely well and even said the layout was attractive. Unfortunately, the BFG nForce 4 Ultra doesn't shine so brightly with the layout being rather cramped by comparison. The 24-pin ATX power connector for example is located directly behind the CPU socket. The ATX power cable, being rather stiff and unwieldy due to its large gauge wires and conductor count, will have a tendency to want to lay directly over the CPU socket. Even when you do tie it down out of the way, that large bundle of cable won't help airflow any.

Another unfortunate problem with the BFG nForce4 Ultra is that it isn't quite a full ATX motherboard. That's a problem because the board extends a good two inches past the nearest board support holes. This means you will have two inches of PCB sticking out past the standoffs of your case. This hanging edge has the connectors for floppy, IDE, and SATA meaning you will have to press down on it to use those ports. I don't know the structural properties of a piece of PCB, but I will say that any flexing makes me uncomfortable and it's not a good thing when you can see the board bend as you press connectors into place.

The onboard USB headers are located directly behind the PCI slots. If you use a longer card in slot one, it might cover up the ports or make them difficult to access. In my setup, the X850XT used a double-width cooler which made the first PCI slot unusable. With the first slot unused, I had unfettered access to the USB headers. Most likely you won't have an issue and if you do, you could probably just move a PCI card to another slot.

The memory is located at the top (from a "mounted-in-the-case' perspective) and is parallel to the bottom side of the power supply. This is very good for cooling as it allows airflow from the front of the case to flow (mostly) unimpeded across the CPU heatsink and to the rear of the case. The slots are color-coded so you know which pair to use for dual channel memory support.

Despite the lack of support underneath them, the SATA and IDE ports are at the edge of the board near where the actual drives would be located making cable runs to them simple. Front panel and floppy connectors are located at the bottom corner of the board which could be a stretch for the floppy, but since floppies are going the way of the dodo anyway, out of the way could be the best spot for it.

Internal audio-in connectors are near the PCI slots. It's been years since I've had to use the CD audio cable, but some PCI devices such as TV tuners still use these internal ports. The Realtek ALC850 audio codec chip is in a typical spot between the PCI slots and the back of the case. This is your typical AC97 codec with 7.1 channel audio, EAX support and auto-sensing audio jacks. This chip also supports S/PDIF but I'm rather confused about how to use it on this board. The box has a S/PDIF logo on it and the manual states "Supports 48KHz coaxial S/PDIF output' yet there is no coaxial connector on the rear panel and there is no header for one on the board.

A Vitesse "SimpliPhy' chip is used to provide gigabit networking on the BFG nForce4 Ultra. This is the only network controller onboard so you will have to add a NIC if you wish to use this board for a multi-homed system.

Behind the Vitesse controller are two PCIe X1 slots. These cards are currently still a little scarce so this will most likely be an open space in the chassis. This is perfect if you wish to replace your stock VGA cooler with a model that takes up a lot of space behind the video card.

The rear panel on the BFG nForce4 Ultra looks a little dated with dual serial ports and a parallel port. There are four USB ports, a six-jack audio stack and a couple PS/2 ports for the keyboard and mouse. It would have been nice to have that S/PDIF port here too!

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Page 1: Introduction
Page 2: Board Layout
Page 3: Bundle and Extras
Page 4: Test Setup and Synthetic Benchmarks
Page 5: Real-World Benchmarks
Page 6: Overclocking
Page 7: Conclusion

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