Winfast NF4K8MC-ERS is a microATX Socket 939 NF4 board from Foxconn. Using a chipset that was suppose to support S754, Foxconn slashed the cost of ownership of a NF4 system down as MATX users usually do not need the extras that are available on the NF4 Ultra.

In our test, we compared the performance to other NF4 Ultra boards and ATi Express 200P board. From the tests, we can see that the performance is comparable and slightly better to the ATi series. This could be due to the fact that we are running the board at CAS 2.5 , 6-3-3 in contrast to the usual CAS 2, 11-2-2 on the other boards tested. The reason is because the system Vdimm is locked at 2.5v and to run CAS 2, usual vdimm of at least 2.65v or above is needed for stability.

Although the board is a microATX board, it does come with simple overclocking functions like the FSB adjustments up to 250MHz, ASync 166,133,100 operation. There are no multiplier controls or HTT width and frequency for users to adjust. HTT seems to be locked at 5x and 16 bits wide as we are unable to confirm as as VIA's HT analyzer aborted when we wanted to verify that. Ram timings like CAS lantecy, tRAS, tRP, tRCD are adjustable.

As there are not many options available in the BIOS for overclocking, we used a software Clockgen to test out how far we can go. We managed to reach 8 x 250 at 1:1 CAS 3, 8-4-4. with our FX-53 processor. I also noticed that when i move the HTT upwards, the PCI seems to increase as well. How accurate is this software, I am not sure. If you have any experience, please share it with us in our forum.

Overall, if you are looking for a stable mATX board for HTPC, Foxconn is one of the only makers that supports 1394 on board. In terms of connecitivity, Foxconn could have implemented a Gigabit Ethernet instead of Fast Ethernet. If you are not into overclocking, this board does serve the purpose well. If you do want to try, remember to replace the thermal pad with paste.

Pricing

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Pros

• 1394
• USB 2.0 
• IDE RAID + SATA RAID

Cons

• No Gigabit Ethernet
• 1394b
• No Diagnostic LEDs
• No Multiplier and voltage controls

Ratings

Here are my ratings out of 10 stars.