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By Chris Angelini |
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To many, one motherboard is the same as the next is the same as the next. Whichever board costs the least sells best. And resellers wonder why differentiation is so difficult. The fact of the matter is some manufacturers devote more attention to engineering a better product than others, driving up costs at times, but ultimately yielding a more compelling upsell. |
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What, then, makes one motherboard better than another if you deemphasize price for a moment? From the most fundamental level, a chipset determines most of what a vendor can accomplish with regard to features and stability. Board-level components comprise the next level of integration, adding value that the chipset folks haven't yet addressed. Think performance components, such as Firewire 800, hardware audio processing, and PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet. Thirdly, you have bundles. Usually a combination of extra hardware and occasionally software, "extras" packaged loosely with a motherboard often satisfy popular trends. Bluetooth and 802.11g wireless cards accompany higher-end boards, while extra USB brackets and external SATA ports come with many mainstream products. The final consideration—quality— is much harder to quantify. However, it still affects price because manufacturers who spend more on good capacitors and thicker PCBs have to pass that cost down to your customers.
Chipsets: Nuts and Bolts Several prolific chipset manufacturers vie for motherboard market share, in part dictating what the motherboard folks are able to sell. On the Pentium side, Intel holds its own reigns as NVIDIA and ATI squabble over a few percent of SLI and integrated graphics sales. VIA and SiS have Intel-compatible chipsets as well, but some misfiring in the recent months has really kept both companies from making much of a dent in the channel. ATI, NVIDIA, SiS, and VIA all share the AMD chipset market a little more evenly. Analysis of second-quarter sales by Mercury Research reveals NVIDIA in the lead with 35%, ATI with 27%, and the other two manufacturers splitting the remaining 38%.
Boring as chipsets might seem, the companies that design them have to be quick on their toes else they miss an important feature and concede an entire generation of sales to the competition. That's why we've seen so much relative innovation during the past year, especially from NVIDIA with its SLI technology, built-in firewall, and network acceleration improving value starting from sub-$100 boards to the $200+ flagships. ATI is also on a roll, up from virtually no AMD64 chipset market share in Q1. Current successes are a result of Radeon XPRESS 200-series sales, which enable the only motherboards with compelling DirectX 9 integrated graphics through what's essentially an X300 PCI Express core. Extended support for discrete boards allows resellers to bundle an inexpensive ATI add-in card and drive three displays simultaneously—perfect for extremely low-cost financial workstations. NVIDIA is reportedly readying its answer to ATI's powerful core-logic lineup with an integrated core of its own called C51. "We've already announced that C51 will be available by the end of this quarter. When it launches, the chipset will offer the fastest integrated graphics out there, empowering resellers with full DirectX 9, Shader Model 3.0 support," says NVDIA's Bryan Del Rizzo. "You'll see unprecedented performance from value-oriented systems."
Bottom line—a solid motherboard starts with a fully developed chipset. Platform features don't cost extra, making it possible for the motherboard vendors to expose Serial ATA II, Gigabit Ethernet, and 7.1-channel audio without driving price northward. At the same time, strategic integration makes room for more advanced extras on big ticket boards. Board-Level Components Sometimes it isn't cost effective to add functionality to a chipset design. Sometimes core logic vendors underestimate demand for a particular "check-box" specification. And sometimes the manufacturer is simply caught amuck in bad timing. Take Intel's short-lived ICH6, for example. The SATA II specification had already been ratified when ICH6 accompanied the 925X chipset release in July of 2004. However, incorporating support for the feature just wasn't feasible at the time and Intel has to release an updated ICH7 several months later. As it were, motherboard manufacturers didn't really have to worry about lacking SATA II support since drive vendors trailed the ratification by nearly a year with retail product. Moreover, semiconductor designers were already rolling out SATA II controllers to do the job. Silicon Image, Promise, Marvell, LSI Logic, and Adaptec all developed SATA products that could either sit on a mainstream board or greatly enhance the flexibility of a workstation platform. Of course, any new chipset with a modern specification sheet comes with SATA II nowadays. But that isn't stopping manufacturers from adding complementary hard drive controllers. Silicon Image's SiI 3132 is a popular choice because it exemplifies the benefits of PCI Express and accommodates two extra SATA II devices. The greater number of ports makes future storage upgrades easier, PCI Express connectivity means full performance even if both attached hard drives are running full speed, and SATA II ensures compatibility with the latest disk technology. Then you have Gigabit Ethernet controllers, which began life as pricey commodities in the late ‘90s and have since plummeted in cost. In fact, NVIDIA even integrates its own Gigabit Ethernet MAC onto the nForce4. Most home offices never tax the true capacity of Gigabit. A majority just plug-in cable modems, which might yield 5 Mbps of Internet traffic. Those that do transfer files or stream media over a network connection will rarely ever hit the interface's 100 MBps ceiling.
Nevertheless, Gigabit Ethernet is a standard on almost all of today's popular motherboards. Most high-end boards go so far as to include dual Ethernet controllers. Potential justifications for such a feature vary, but perhaps the most compelling reason is to share an incoming Internet connection with other network computers. That's an especially attractive proposition on a motherboard with NVIDIA's hardware firewall feature. Your customer won't even need to buy a SOHO router. The best values don't come from adding redundant extras, such as Serial ATA II controllers or Gigabit controllers, though. Rather, the real deals are Firewire 800, onboard 802.11g, and unique innovations, such as dual BIOS chips. You'll only find those specialty components on pricier boards. However, for the customer who'd buy a wireless adapter or Firewire board two months later, spending $20 on a better motherboard today makes more sense. One of the best examples of tasteful integration is MSI's P4N Diamond and K8N Neo4 Platinum/SLI motherboards. They both boast a number of noteworthy value-adds, such as Firewire, dual Gigabit, and supplemental SATA II processing. But the crown jewel of both boards is Creative Labs' Sound Blaster Live! 24-bit audio processor, soldered right onto the PCB. In a market where all other products sport some multi-channel software codec, hardware acceleration is an incredible boon to value. Better still, MSI sells the pair at prices below many competing SLI boards. That's an easy sell to value-minded gamers who understand the benefits of hardware processing and appreciate top sound quality. Toys In The Box A high-end motherboard might offer 10 USB 2.0 ports, 7.1-channel audio with optical and coaxial outputs, externally accessible SATA plugs, Firewire, and dual Gigabit Ethernet controllers. That's way more I/O than a creative manufacturer can cram onto a back panel, which is why many companies include a series of PCI-shaped brackets with their boards. Those brackets are the most basic bundled components.
Certain manufacturers notoriously lean on extravagant bundles to justify elevated board prices. Gigabyte, for example, often features its DPS (Dual Power System), an additional four-phase bundled power module that plugs into compatible motherboards to improve stability. "The DPS module has two main purposes. The first is to allow more voltage regulation margin by adding double the power phases of any other manufacturer. This is especially ideal for supporting upcoming processor designs. The second is that the DPS acts as a backup voltage regulator helping SIs reduce return rates," says Joyce Leung, marketing specialist at Gigabyte.
Bundled value might also take the form of a freebie—some of Gigabyte's current boards feature Bluetooth dongles for establishing communications between a PC and cell phone or printer. ASUS is known to include 802.11g cards in some of its models. ABIT and Chaintech have both experimented with bundled sound cards. The key is to make sure bundles are relevant to your customer. After all, a bundle might help you sell a motherboard, but nobody is going to pay extra for a premium product with unneeded swag. Quality Control There's a lot of work that goes into making sure a motherboard purrs straight from the factory. Manufacturers recognize that resellers don't have a lot of time to process returns and with margins slim to begin, each vendor unanimously agrees on the importance of quality assurance. Gigabyte, Foxconn, MSI, and Tyan all claim to use multi-point QA at each step of the manufacturing process, resulting in failure rates than dip below 1.5%. The top vendors actively address quality in a few difference ways, beginning with fundamental design. Some companies make it a point to emphasize the reliability of certain components and with good reason. A couple of months ago, the mighty Dell acknowledged customer complaints regarding faulty capacitors on some of its motherboards and took steps necessary to rectify the situation. Channel suppliers are adamant that their acquisition processes weed out any such faulty building blocks. "Components are purchased based on design requirements and AVLs (Approved Vendor Lists). To get on an AVL the suppliers go through a very rigorous qualification process. However, getting on an AVL does not guarantee getting zero defective parts. So, there are various stages of IQC (incoming quality control) based on the type of component. Then there are line tests, end-of-line tests, and spot checking of finished goods. Using AVL components in excellent board designs is just the beginning of how we guarantee reliability," says Ed Leckliter, director of channel products for Foxconn.
Manufacturers also juggle PCB layout in order to determine the best cost and quality, shifting between 4- and 6-layer boards. Leckliter continues, "Chipset manufacturer's reference designs are developed to support 4-layer implementation. Some high-performance models may initially be released as 6-layer designs but almost always, over time, they will migrate to 4-layer. The extra layers provide the component placement flexibility needed to optimize board layout—routing paths, isolation, signal integrity, etc." For companies such as Tyan who appeal to a different market, extra layers help enable complex and exotic processor configurations. That's one reason why you pay more for a server or workstation platform. "Sometimes we use more than 6 layers, depending on the project requirements," says John Nguyen of Tyan sales. "Every layer adds more cost (both to the materials and design resources). One key reason for having extra layers, however, might be to increase the number of power planes for more device support onboard." For example, Tyan's Thunder i7525 employs a massive 8-layer PCB in the name of enabling dual Xeon processors, up to 32GB of DDR2 memory, integrated SCSI, PCI Express, PCI-X, and Gigabit Ethernet. Each of those Xeons has its own 4-phase power circuitry. And while the board approaches $500, that's the price to be paid for massive loading, unfaltering stability and the very utmost in performance. Reseller Support No matter how much effort manufacturers dedicate to quality and value, problems do still occasionally arise. Fortunately, even the largest firms offer reseller support. At MSI, the Star Reseller Program helps facilitate sales, marketing, and technical information. Tyan is a little more specialized in the products it sells and every case is handled separately through an RMA team. "Tyan has clear, written policies on support and service which are freely available for viewing by all customers on our website and documentation. We do this in order to help customers understand the wide extent of service available to them as well as to provide a good-faith example through our products," according to John Nguyen. Gigabyte's vision for supporting the channel is enabling new markets. The company plans to push SLI support down into the mainstream with sub-$100 motherboards. Paired to GeForce 6600 or 6600 GT graphics cards, you're looking at the possibility of SLI systems under a grand. In Retrospect You might add value to a gaming system by using a motherboard with gratuitous onboard integration and a bundled wireless card. Or, value in a budget box might consist of integrated Radeon XPRESS 200 graphics, built-in networking, and a dual-core Pentium D processor. In either case, understanding how motherboard manufacturers add value to their products will help you identify the best-fit components. |
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