Shuttle SN27P2

BIOS

The BIOS is a standard Phoenix BIOS and unfortunately, but not unusually it's pretty limited in it's enthusiast options. To minimise extreme outputs the voltage options are capped at pretty tame values which will hinder overclocking but minimise the oven effect in such a small case.

• HT Clock: 200-210MHz in 0.5MHz increments, 210-230MHz in 1MHz increments, 230-248MHz in 2MHz increments and 248-300MHz in 1MHz increments;
  
• Memory: 400, 533, 667, 800MHz;
  
• HT Multiplier: 1x-5x
  
• CPU Voltage: 0.8-1.525V in 0.025V increments;
  
• Memory Voltage: 1.8-2.0V in 0.05V increments;
  
• Chipset Voltage: 1.55-1.6V in 0.05V increments;
  
• Memory Timing: Tcl, Trcd, Trp, Tras.

Unfortunately due to the BIOS limitations with voltages we were only able to get 3-4-4-10-1T at 2.0V with DDR2 800, unlike the normal 3-4-3-9-1T at 2.2V which the rest of the boards attained.

Testing Methods:

With the exception of SiSoft Sandra, all of our benchmarks have been engineered to give you numbers that you are likely to find useful when actually using the products we have evaluated in the real world.

Test Setup:

AMD Athlon 64 FX-62 (operating at 2800MHz - 14x200); 2 x 1GB Corsair XMS2-6400C3 (running at DDR2-800 in dual channel with 3.0-4-3-9-1T timings - 5.0-4-3-9-2T for the KA3 MVP); BFG Tech GeForce 7900 GTX OC video card (operating at 670/1640MHz); Seagate 7200.9 200GB 7,200RPM SATA 3Gbps hard disk drive; OCZ GameXStream 700W power supply unit; Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2; DirectX 9.0c; NVIDIA Forceware 91.31 WHQL.

Intel Core 2 Extreme X6800 (operating at 2.93GHz - 11x266); 2x 1GB Corsair XMS2-6400C3 (running at DDR2-800 in dual channel with 3.0-4-3-9 timings); BFG Tech GeForce 7900 GTX OC video card (operating at 670/1640MHz); Seagate 7200.9 200GB 7200RPM SATA 3Gbps hard disk drive; OCZ GameXStream 700W power supply unit; Windows XP Professional Service Pack 2; DirectX 9.0c; NVIDIA Forceware 91.31 WHQL.

Motherboards:

• Shuttle SN27P2 (nForce 570 Ultra);
  
• MSI K9N SLI Platinum (nForce 570 SLI);
  
• ECS KA3 MVP (CrossFire Xpress 3200);
  
• ASUS M2N32-SLI Deluxe WiFi Edition (nForce 590 SLI);
  
• Foxconn C51XEM2AA (nForce 590 SLI).
  
• Intel D975XBX (Intel 975X)

Comparative Explanation

We put the Shuttle SN27P2 up against the other nForce 5xx based boards we've tested recently to show not only how the range compares but to keep a consistency to how each new product we test compares to the last with the same drivers and tests. We also put it up against the ECS KA3 MVP based on the ATI RD580 which is a direct competitor on the AMD Althon 64 AM2 platform, and also against a reference Intel Conroe system based on the Core 2 Extreme X6800 and Intel 975X Bad Axe motherboard to show how it compares on a wider market scale.