The VIA Apollo KT133 chipset has without doubt been one of the most influential chipsets of last year, launched at a time
when the industry needed a real boost, VIA gave it a thunderous kick up the backside by releasing the Apollo KT133. We were
already mesmerised by the KX133, but were under no illusion that bigger and better functionality was only around the corner.
It is also fair to say the success of the KT133 has to go hand in hand with AMD's commitment to get the industry going as
well with the re-engineering of the Athlon and timely launch of the Duron processors. Intel in the last three quarters of
last year were struggling to launch the Pentium 4, which they did last quarter, so the year 2000 has to belong to AMD and
VIA for their class act enabling all of us not only to keep our job's but allowing users to have a decent upgrade path.
This brings us nicely as to why VIA could not wait for its full-blown version of the KT266 Chipset with full support for
DDR, and launching the KT133A chipset with support for the SDRAM. Strategically the KT133A is only an extension of the
KT133, with the additional support for 133MHz(266) FSB, thus allowing current users to upgrade easily, this with the
additional inclusion in the Southbridge 686B for ATA100 support on board rounds off a solid offering from VIA. The Return on
Investment (ROI) is achieved merely by the fact it still uses PC133 SDRAM, both the ATA100 and PC133 have been available for
a little time now, and pricing for both items supporting this standard have dropped substantially and therefore can be
purchased as part of a complete upgrade solution. The other reason could be as our test will reveal later, the solution
based around the KT133A chipset with SDRAM outperforms any DDR solution currently on offer - note we did not say available,
as you try finding a solution with DDR which is available for 'shipping next day' in the market.
The VIA Apollo KT133 chipset has without doubt been one of the most influential chipsets of last year, launched at a time
when the industry needed a real boost, VIA gave it a thunderous kick up the backside by releasing the Apollo KT133. We were
already mesmerised by the KX133, but were under no illusion that bigger and better functionality was only around the corner.
It is also fair to say the success of the KT133 has to go hand in hand with AMD's commitment to get the industry going as
well with the re-engineering of the Athlon and timely launch of the Duron processors. Intel in the last three quarters of
last year were struggling to launch the Pentium 4, which they did last quarter, so the year 2000 has to belong to AMD and
VIA for their class act enabling all of us not only to keep our job's but allowing users to have a decent upgrade path.
This brings us nicely as to why VIA could not wait for its full-blown version of the KT266 Chipset with full support for
DDR, and launching the KT133A chipset with support for the SDRAM. Strategically the KT133A is only an extension of the
KT133, with the additional support for 133MHz(266) FSB, thus allowing current users to upgrade easily, this with the
additional inclusion in the Southbridge 686B for ATA100 support on board rounds off a solid offering from VIA. The Return on
Investment (ROI) is achieved merely by the fact it still uses PC133 SDRAM, both the ATA100 and PC133 have been available for
a little time now, and pricing for both items supporting this standard have dropped substantially and therefore can be
purchased as part of a complete upgrade solution. The other reason could be as our test will reveal later, the solution
based around the KT133A chipset with SDRAM outperforms any DDR solution currently on offer - note we did not say available,
as you try finding a solution with DDR which is available for 'shipping next day' in the market.
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