Gigabyte 7VRXP (1)
Overclocker 12 Jan 2002

Gigabyte is probably the first 1st tier manufacturer to send us their KT333 mainboard. In fact, if you have been a faithful reader of our website, you would have seen our exclusive review of the GA-7VTXH+ last month, 7VTXH+ is a KT266A+8233A which has the ATA-133 interface on board supported by the new south bridge.

Today, we will take a look at the latest from Gigabyte using VIA KT333 chipset. So what is the KT333 chipset? Basically KT333 chipset inherits the best performance of the Socket A and brings DDR333 support to the mainboard. Gigabyte 7VRXP integrated even more features onto the board and that includes the USB 2.0 supported using VIA VT6202 USB 2.0 controller*. There are also connectors for Memory Stick connector, overclocking features. The 10/100Mbps LAN port allows instant connectivity to LAN.

On the GA-7VRXP based on the AMI BIOS, the settings in BIOS allows you to change the FSB from 100~200Mhz FSB, the Vcore can also be adjusted from the BIOS by +5%,+7.5% and +10%. At 10%, you should be able to reach 1.95v if the default was 1.75v. The CPU multiplier is adjustable through a dip switch as shown in the photo below.

In our tests, we used the AMD Athlon XP1500+ and ran it under the tightest RAM timings we could. It went through all the rigorous tests at default speed. In fact, we stress the system further by pushing it to 150Mhz and above. The package as usual comes standard with a user's manual, FDD and HDD cables, a supporting CDROM. There are also USB brackets available for expansion for USB 2.0 and USB 1.1  

Below are the specifications of the board. The subsequent pages will be the gallery followed by benchmark results including SuperPI, Q3, DroneZ etc.

* 1 x 2ports USB 1.1 connector (by cable with rear USB bracket), 2 x 2ports USB 2.0 connector (by cable with rear USB bracket)

GA-7VRXP VIA KT333 / 8233A(CE) chipset
PROCESSOR
	Socket A for AMD Athlon ™XP / Athlon ™/ Duron ™processor
CHIPSET
	Southbridge : VIA 8233A(CE)
	VIA V-Link architecture (266MB/s)
	VIA VT6202 USB 2.0 controller
	Super I/O : ITE IT8705F
	Smart I/O : Winbond Smart@IO
	Promise PDC20276 ATA 133 RAID controller
	Raeltek 8100BL Ethernet 10/100Mb LAN controller
	Creative CT5880 PCI sound controller
	Dual BIOS
MEMORY
	Type : DDR333 (PC2700) / DDR266 (PC2100) / DDR200 (PC1600) -184pin
	Max capacity : Up to 3GB by 3 DIMM slots(DDR266/200)
SLOT
	1 x AGP universal slot (4X/2X-AGP 2.0 compliant)
	5 x PCI slots (PCI 2.2 compliant)
	1 x FDD port
	4 x UDMA ATA133/100/66 Bus Master IDE ports
	1 x 2ports USB 1.1 connector (by cable with rear USB bracket)
	2 x 2ports USB 2.0 connector (by cable with rear USB bracket)
	Memory Stick / Security Digital (MMC) / Smart Card Reader connectors
	2 x cooling fan pin header
I/O
	PS/2 Keyboard / Mouse
	2 x USB 1.1 ports
	2 x COM ports
	1 x RJ45 LAN port
	Audio (1 x Line-in / 1 x Line-out / 1 x Mic) connector
	1 x joystick
POWER
	ATX power connector
	Power-off by Windows 95/98/Me/2000/NT/XP shut down and Switch
FORM FACTOR
	ATX
	Dimension : ( 23.5 x 30.4 cm )
H/W MONITORING
	System health status auto-detect and report by BIOS
	H/W detect & report power-in voltage, CPU voltage, and Fan Speed
BIOS
	2Mbit flash RAM
	AMI BIOS with enhanced ACPI feature for PC98/Win98/Win2000/WinMe/XP compliance, Green, PnP, DMI, INT13 (>8.4GB) and Anti-Virus functions
	IDE#1~#4, SCSI, LS120, ZIP and CD-ROM bootable
	AC recovery ON/OFF control
OTHER FEATURES
	Suspend-To-RAM (STR)
	Supports USB KB/MS Wake up from S3
	Poly fuse for keyboard over-current protection
DRIVER
	VIA 4 in 1 service pack utility
	Promise RAID controller driver ( includes pure ATA133 driver )
	Realtek LAN driver
	Creative sound driver
	VIA USB 2.0 driver
	Winbond Smart IO driver
	Free software

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