NForce2
Encyclopedia
| Nvidia NVIDIA Nvidia is an American global technology company based in Santa Clara, California. Nvidia is best known for its graphics processors . Nvidia and chief rival AMD Graphics Techonologies have dominated the high performance GPU market, pushing other manufacturers to smaller, niche roles... nForce2 |
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| CPU support | Athlon Athlon Athlon is the brand name applied to a series of x86-compatible microprocessors designed and manufactured by Advanced Micro Devices . The original Athlon was the first seventh-generation x86 processor and, in a first, retained the initial performance lead it had over Intel's competing processors... |
| Socket support | Socket A Socket A Socket A is the CPU socket used for AMD processors ranging from the Athlon Thunderbird to the Athlon XP/MP 3200+, and AMD budget processors including the Duron and Sempron. Socket A also supports AMD Geode NX embedded processors... |
| Predecessor | nForce NForce The nForce is a motherboard chipset created by Nvidia for AMD Athlon and Duron microprocessors. The chipset shipped in 3 varieties; 220, 415, and 420. 220 and 420 are very similar with each having the integrated GPU, but the 220 only has a single channel of memory available whereas 420 has the... |
| Successor | nForce3 NForce3 The nForce3 chipset was created by Nvidia as a Media and Communications Processor. Specifically, it was designed for use with the Athlon 64 processor.- Features of the nForce3 :... |
The nForce2 chipset
Chipset
A chipset, PC chipset, or chip set refers to a group of integrated circuits, or chips, that are designed to work together. They are usually marketed as a single product.- Computers :...
was released by Nvidia
NVIDIA
Nvidia is an American global technology company based in Santa Clara, California. Nvidia is best known for its graphics processors . Nvidia and chief rival AMD Graphics Techonologies have dominated the high performance GPU market, pushing other manufacturers to smaller, niche roles...
in July 2002 as a refresh to the original nForce
NForce
The nForce is a motherboard chipset created by Nvidia for AMD Athlon and Duron microprocessors. The chipset shipped in 3 varieties; 220, 415, and 420. 220 and 420 are very similar with each having the integrated GPU, but the 220 only has a single channel of memory available whereas 420 has the...
product offering. The nForce2 chipset was a platform for motherboards supporting AMD's Socket A
Socket A
Socket A is the CPU socket used for AMD processors ranging from the Athlon Thunderbird to the Athlon XP/MP 3200+, and AMD budget processors including the Duron and Sempron. Socket A also supports AMD Geode NX embedded processors...
CPUs along with DDR SDRAM
DDR SDRAM
Double data rate synchronous dynamic random access memory is a class of memory integrated circuits used in computers. DDR SDRAM has been superseded by DDR2 SDRAM and DDR3 SDRAM, neither of which are either forward or backward compatible with DDR SDRAM, meaning that DDR2 or DDR3 memory modules...
. There were variations of the chipset including one with and one without an integrated GeForce4 MX
GeForce4
The GeForce4 refers to the fourth-generation of GeForce-branded graphics processing units manufactured by Nvidia. There are two different GeForce4 families, the high-performance Ti family, and the budget MX family. The MX family spawned a mostly identical GeForce4 Go family for the laptop market...
graphics processor (IGP).
Development
The nForce2 features two different southbridgeSouthbridge (computing)
The southbridge is one of the two chips in the core logic chipset on a personal computer motherboard, the other being the northbridge. The southbridge typically implements the slower capabilities of the motherboard in a northbridge/southbridge chipset computer architecture. In Intel chipset...
s, the MCP and the MCP-T. The two differ only in audio and Ethernet
Ethernet
Ethernet is a family of computer networking technologies for local area networks commercially introduced in 1980. Standardized in IEEE 802.3, Ethernet has largely replaced competing wired LAN technologies....
integration. The latter is equipped with two 100 Mbit Ethernet NIC
Network card
A network interface controller is a computer hardware component that connects a computer to a computer network....
s (nV and 3Com
3Com
3Com was a pioneering digital electronics manufacturer best known for its computer network infrastructure products. The company was co-founded in 1979 by Robert Metcalfe, Howard Charney, Bruce Borden, and Greg Shaw...
3C905) and the impressive NVAPU (SoundStorm
SoundStorm
SoundStorm was an advanced integrated 5.1 sound technology certification developed by Nvidia for the nForce and nForce2 platforms based on the nForce audio processing unit .-Certification:...
) with hardware accelerated 3D audio and real-time 5.1-channel
Surround sound
Surround sound encompasses a range of techniques such as for enriching the sound reproduction quality of an audio source with audio channels reproduced via additional, discrete speakers. Surround sound is characterized by a listener location or sweet spot where the audio effects work best, and...
Dolby Digital
Dolby Digital
Dolby Digital is the name for audio compression technologies developed by Dolby Laboratories. It was originally called Dolby Stereo Digital until 1994. Except for Dolby TrueHD, the audio compression is lossy. The first use of Dolby Digital was to provide digital sound in cinemas from 35mm film prints...
encoding whereas the first features one 100 Mbit NIC and an AC'97 audio controller. For audio, both MCP units were connected to an external codec
Codec
A codec is a device or computer program capable of encoding or decoding a digital data stream or signal. The word codec is a portmanteau of "compressor-decompressor" or, more commonly, "coder-decoder"...
chip, such as a Realtek
Realtek
Realtek Semiconductor Corp. , a fabless IC design house situated in the Hsinchu Science Park, Hsinchu, Taiwan, was founded in October 1987, and subsequently approved as a listed company on the Taiwan Stock Exchange in 1998...
ALC650. With the MCP, this codec provided all software-driven audio duties, while with the MCP-T it performed the DAC
Digital-to-analog converter
In electronics, a digital-to-analog converter is a device that converts a digital code to an analog signal . An analog-to-digital converter performs the reverse operation...
duties. Unfortunately, the external codec and unavoidably noisy motherboard circuitry (EMI/RFI) were detrimental to audio quality on even the MCP-T equipped boards, and as a result the nForce audio solutions were never of high fidelity
High fidelity
High fidelity—or hi-fi—reproduction is a term used by home stereo listeners and home audio enthusiasts to refer to high-quality reproduction of sound or images, to distinguish it from the poorer quality sound produced by inexpensive audio equipment...
unless the S/PDIF
S/PDIF
S/PDIF is a digital audio interconnect used in consumer audio equipment over relatively short distances. The signal is transmitted over either a coaxial cable with RCA connectors or a fiber optic cable with TOSLINK connectors. S/PDIF interconnects components in home theaters and other digital high...
output (TOSLINK or coaxial) was used.
The nForce2 chipset was remarkable for its advanced memory controller. It introduced a dual-channel
Dual-channel architecture
Multi-channel architecture is a technology that increases the transfer speed of data between the RAM and the memory controller by adding more channels of communication between them. Theoretically this multiplies the data rate by exactly the number of channels present. Dual-channel memory employs...
memory interface to the mainstream market, doubling theoretical bandwidth. This was deemed necessary for the nForce2 IGP, with its GeForce4 MX-class integrated graphics, to be performance competitive budget solution. It was also important not to divert bandwidth, by sharing memory bandwidth with the most powerful IGP produced for Socket A, from the rest of the system. The Athlon
Athlon
Athlon is the brand name applied to a series of x86-compatible microprocessors designed and manufactured by Advanced Micro Devices . The original Athlon was the first seventh-generation x86 processor and, in a first, retained the initial performance lead it had over Intel's competing processors...
's EV6
Alpha 21264
The Alpha 21264 was a Digital Equipment Corporation RISC microprocessor introduced in October, 1996. The 21264 implemented the Alpha instruction set architecture .- Description :...
system bus
System bus
A system bus is a single computer bus that connects the major components of a computer system. The technique was developed to reduce costs and improve modularity....
was incapable of saturating the second channel, as this bus between the CPU and the north bridge was limited to the Athlon, AthlonXP, Duron, and early Sempron design to use a single 64 bit DDR channel. As a result, the second 64bit memory channel between the north bridge and the memory was almost exclusively available for the GPU
Graphics processing unit
A graphics processing unit or GPU is a specialized circuit designed to rapidly manipulate and alter memory in such a way so as to accelerate the building of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display...
. In dual-channel configurations of the nForce2 without IGP, the Athlon XP only showed gains of 5% at most in memory bandwidth intensive applications. Comparatively, in dual-channel configurations with IGP graphics, performance was demonstrably equivalent to dedicated GeForce 2 MX cards employing 64bit DDR memory or 128bit SDR memory.
Among various fixes and refinements compared to the original nForce, nForce2 featured a fixed PCI
Peripheral Component Interconnect
Conventional PCI is a computer bus for attaching hardware devices in a computer...
/AGP
Accelerated Graphics Port
The Accelerated Graphics Port is a high-speed point-to-point channel for attaching a video card to a computer's motherboard, primarily to assist in the acceleration of 3D computer graphics. Since 2004 AGP has been progressively phased out in favor of PCI Express...
clock, i.e. PCI and AGP frequencies will not change when changing the FSB
Front side bus
A front-side bus is a computer communication interface often used in computers during the 1990s and 2000s.It typically carries data between the central processing unit and a memory controller hub, known as the northbridge....
. As a result, the nForce2 platform was known for its ease in overclocking
Overclocking
Overclocking is the process of operating a computer component at a higher clock rate than it was designed for or was specified by the manufacturer, but some manufacturers purposely underclock their components to improve battery life. Many people just overclock or 'rightclock' their hardware to...
AMD processors, and was a favorite for years with the overclocking community. It was also known that the chipset gave best performance with FSB and memory running synchronized, asynchronous operation delivered an unusual high performance loss.
Refresh
In 2003, Nvidia released a refreshed nForce2, called "nForce2 Ultra 400". The nForce2 Ultra 400 and nForce2 400 represented official support for a 200 MHz FSB and PC-3200 DDR SDRAM, whereas the older nForce2 had only supported a maximum of 166 MHz FSB. Ultra 400 offered dual-channel support, while the plain 400 was single-channel PC-3200-capable. Both performed very similarly because neither had the IGP and again Athlon XP did not benefit significantly from the added bandwidth because the Athlon XP's bus was only capable of bandwidth matching a single channel of PC-3200. The new chipset again was partnered with several different southbridges, including one with (MCP-T) and one without (MCP) SoundStorm and dual Ethernet NICs. In 2004 three new southbridges were introduced: MCP-S integrated Serial ATASerial ATA
Serial ATA is a computer bus interface for connecting host bus adapters to mass storage devices such as hard disk drives and optical drives...
, MCP-RAID had additional RAID
RAID
RAID is a storage technology that combines multiple disk drive components into a logical unit...
-functions and MCP-Gb featured Gigabit Ethernet. These newer southbridges did not integrate the SoundStorm unit nor the dual-Ethernet capabilities of the MCP-T.
SoundStorm
The SoundStorm audio system was one of the first consumer computer audio products to offer real time Dolby Digital 5.1 encoding. This meant that one could play games or music and output them as a 5.1 stream digitally to an external decoding speaker system. This solves a common problem with most digital sound solutions of having to hook up both digital and analog connections at the same time so you can have surround sound in both games (using the analog connections) and movies (using the digital connection). Only recently has Dolby Digital live allowed competitors such as Creative's x-fi line up to offer real time DD 5.1 encoding.Some see the passing of SoundStorm as a classic example of the bottom dollar approach to building computers sweeping the PC industry, with component quality being gradually eroded, in favor of pricing considerations. SoundStorm was good competition for Creative Labs during its time, but did suffer from driver issues and performance problems. Many computer owners also had their own discrete audio solutions, such as the popular Creative Audigy series, the VIA
VIA Technologies
VIA Technologies is a Taiwanese manufacturer of integrated circuits, mainly motherboard chipsets, CPUs, and memory, and is part of the Formosa Plastics Group. It is the world's largest independent manufacturer of motherboard chipsets...
Envy24
VIA Envy
The VIA Envy24 audio chipset series delivers true 24-bit sound for personal computers. While available as a discrete card, it is sold in greatest volume as an integrated solution for motherboards....
, or various Turtle Beach
Turtle Beach Systems
Turtle Beach Systems is a sound card and headphone manufacturer and direct competitor with Creative Labs-branded Sound Blaster. In 1995, the company merged with Voyetra, a company that made custom software for sound cards, to form Voyetra Turtle Beach Inc which is headquartered in Elmsford, New...
boards, among other high end solutions offering superior analog quality. This made the NVAPU/SoundStorm a niche product in a market where keeping board costs low is essential to sales volume.
SoundStorm/NVAPU's existence was a direct result of Xbox
Xbox
The Xbox is a sixth-generation video game console manufactured by Microsoft. It was released on November 15, 2001 in North America, February 22, 2002 in Japan, and March 14, 2002 in Australia and Europe and is the predecessor to the Xbox 360. It was Microsoft's first foray into the gaming console...
development, with the APU being directly related to the technology used in Microsoft's console. As the technology aged and consumers and OEMs showed a lack of interest in purchasing the more expensive but higher quality chipsets, Nvidia did not see reason to justify further R&D expenditures.