| Product: |
Abit KA7 |
| Date: |
06/06/00 (209 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Advantages: Excellent overcloking and good expansion
Disadvantages: Some reports says it have some incompatibilities with certain DIMMs
Abit is one of the most largest motherboards manufacturer along with ASUS, Tyan and many others. But without any doubt, the Abit motherboard is the most popular motherboard manufacturer among overclockers.
This is my first Athlon motherboard, and I'm very happy with it. First of all, this board comes with 6 (that's it: SIX) PCI slots, 1 ISA slot (shared with a PCI) and an AGP slot and NO AMR slots (I personally dislike AMR slots). Also, this board comes with 4 DIMM banks insted of 3 as most Athlon motherboard. Each DIMM bank canhold up to 512mb RAM. So this board supports up to 2gb RAM (wow!). Untill now, besides Abit KA7, the only Athlon motherboard that have 6 PCI slots is the Tyan Trinnity KX133. But it only has 3 DIMM slots, it's not so fast as the ABIT KA7 and it's not a good overclocker solution.
At last but not least, this board comes with the VIA KX133 chipset which is far superior than the AMD 750 chipset that supports AGP x4, PC133 SDRAM and Asynchronous Bus (just to name a few features. Take a look at http://www.via.com.tw/products/chipsetcompkx133.ht m to see the complete features list).
The KA7 bios comes with Softmenu III - the standout feature of Abit's BIOS. With Softmenu III, you can overclock the processor as simply as change the bios settings. That's it: No need to remove the processor of it's case and no need of overclocking devices.
If you're a overclocker fan, this board is for you. Not only for the overclock simplicity oferred by the Softmenu, but for it's stability. This is probably the most stable Athlon motherboard around. It also have 4 fan headers and 1 thermal sensor connector (cable included).
Besides the 2 serials, keyboard, mouse, parallel and 2 USB connections, it comes with a USB header so you can add 2 more usb ports to your system.
By now, I think that is only one reliable option for Athlon motherboards. And it's called Abit KA7. The only remark that USE
D TO be a problem is the AGP incompatibility under Windows 2000. But VIA already solved it with their lastest drivers for Windows 2000. You can download them at http://www.via.com.tw/drivers/index.htm
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