Tests and results

Our first Pentium 4, with the mean B2 stepping was a boxed one, therefore, we used Intel's own heatsink+fan and the 2 pieces of Samsung 64MB PC800 non-ECC RDRAM for our tests.

Click the RDRAM chips!

To tell the truth, after seeing Kyle's review at HardOCP about the P4 and TBird shootout, we were almost sure that our magical 1.4GHz C1 stepping P4 will take us to above 2GHz. Why? Kyle had a 1.7GHz CPU which he overclocked to 2.1GHz and our 1.4GHz one was even younger (produced later) than his, but with a 1.7-1.8GHz core. Our hopes quickly vanished when the MSI board refused to do anything at a 135MHz FSB, while we would have needed 150MHz to reach 2.1GHz. At first we were left with a bitter taste in our mouth (I guess HardOCP isn't Hard OC(P) for nothin' :-)), but later came up with the idea of getting an ASUS P4T as well, just to make sure the MSI board isn't holding us back. Fortunately or unfortunately, we replicated our results with the P4T and 133MHz was the absolute top there too. In fact, having used the P4 system for almost two weeks now, we have to lower our results by another 3-4MHz. 130MHz is where both boards end (with the CPU being truly stable, not just for benchmarks), but since Anand of AnandTech was able to run his engineering sample P4 in an ASUS P4T at over 140MHz FSB, it is a safe thing to conclude that the CPU is holding us back in this case.

The P4T did have a few additional features that we found quite amazing, one is the metal backboard that you can attach to the mainboard, fix the heatsink to the backboard (and not the ATX 2.03 ready PC case) and later screw the whole thing in any ATX case, like with any older mainboard. The other was a BIOS feature - if you overclock your CPU to an extent where it fails to boot, the P4T recognizes this and without you touching any INSERT keys, resetting the CMOS or any other hooplah, it just resets the computer and the overclocked settings, enters the Setup for you and warns you that your CPU has failed to initialize! Quite elegant, we must add. Sure, even the P3B-F had this feature, but we are still amazed when we see it kicking in. Apart from these extras, however, the P4T had an interesting role in our tests: it didn't prove to be more stable than MSI's offering, while being significantly more expensive. All in all, this is an example of mainboards maturing with time... The P4T is simply obsolete (for the price) now and the 850 Pro2 is clearly the P4 board to have. It has all the features and is cheaper. In the meanwhile, ASUS is preparing its P4T-F with a 4 layer design, so the current situation might change (and to be fair: the P4T simply blows away the original 850 Pro.).

However, until ASUS, Gigabyte or anyone challenges MSI, the 850 Pro2 is all safe from any competition and MSI can sit back and relax knowing that they are on rampage :-). Being first does matter, I guess, just ask their Sales Department. Back to the tests (we are almost done, however is still with me: thanks, I know it's a bit "too long"): one measurement we were determined to make was the maximum tolerance of the RDRAM chips, in other words, the highest achievable FSB speed without scaling the RDRAM multiplier back to 3X. This turned out to be 115MHz with the 850 Pro2 and our B2 processor and we got some INCREDIBLE results. The ASUS P4T actually fell behind MSI - even with RDRAM set to Turbo - by quite a margin, something we were not used to in our tests before.

Now THAT should do it...

If we set the RDRAM multiplier to 3X, we could overclock the FSB from 115MHz to 118MHz, where our B2 stepping P4 simply maxed out. It is not hard to guess that the additional 3MHz in FSB is simply not worth the loss in RDRAM speed, but just to make sure noone argues, here are the results:

Not enough

The true ride however is with our C1 stepping P4, for sure. Although we weren't able to match RDRAM scores at 115MHz FSB with the default 4X multiplier (133MHz x 3 x 2 is the default 800MHz, whereas 115 x 4 x 2 = 920MHz... the 133MHz x 4 x 2 = 1066MHz is a no-go, of course), the increase in FSB and CPU speed greatly compensated for all this. We won't be giving you any Quake, 3DMark and Unreal scores as we have reviewed at least 3 different P4 combos with GeForce3 video cards in the last month and the goal of this review was to find the place the 850 Pro2 amongst other P4 solutions. The Sandra scores are here, however :)

This, we accept :)

"Whoever thinks there isn't a difference between a Pentium 4 and a Pentium 4 is wrong. Whoever may think that all Pentium 4 mainboards are created equal is also wrong." - You have seen appropriate examples proving both statements above. The MSI 850 Pro2 board is one of the participants that are the cause these inequalities, as it simply trashes the competition in the price/performance battle. It has EVERY SINGLE feature that is needed for a top quality Pentium 4 mainboard and is cheaper than anything else currently available for the P4, not only its main competitor, the P4T. The other thing we learned to look out for is Pentium 4 sSpec information, as a CPU from the right batch can take you to 200-300MHz higher, with ease. To put it simple: if you are planning on investing in a P4 setup now, the 850 Pro2 is the board to get and a C1 stepping (lower speed) Pentium 4 is the CPU to plug in that board.

(Marton Balog, alias Parci)

This is the first time we see MSI truly standing out of the competition, no matter where we look at it. The 850 Pro2 is the first 4 layer board on the market. The 850 Pro2 is the cheapest available P4 board. The 850 Pro2 is right there with the ASUS P4T regarding features and both boards are miles away from competitors. It is without a question that until someone successfully challenges MSI, the 850 Pro2 is the worthy one for our PLUS A LOT Golden Award. Congratulations!