ABIT AT7 Max2 Motherboard Review

Supplied by Abit

In March of 2002 ABIT took a bold step by introducing the legacy free ABIT
AT7 motherboard. Gone were the days of backplane serial and parallel ports.
No longer would a PS/2 mouse or keyboard find a home with the AT7. Parallel
printers and scanners had to be chucked out. The legacy free approach raised
some eyebrows in the hardware community and turned away other potential buyers
who wanted to stay connected to the past.

But time marches forward and so does technology.

The past not forgotten ABIT embarked on a fact and feedback gathering mission
in late summer – early fall of 2002 in order to reassess the consumer demands.
The original AT7 with the KT333 chipset was a definite winner in our estimation.
So much so that it was chosen as the platform for
the Broadcast Box article. The AT7 motherboard was besieged by a room full of
designers who work inside the production department of a broadcast television
station.

ABIT followed up the AT7 with the now well known AT7 Max2. Some features were
brought back from the brink of extinction, others were modified and even some
new technology was introduced. The predecessor AT7 is a motherboard packed with
features and, to the disappointment of some, missing a few as well. ABIT listened
to the consumer by bringing back the PS/2 mouse and keyboard ports on the AT7
Max2 but still opted not to include serial or parallel ports on the back plane.
(who needs them anyway) Two features of the AT7 Max2 are also of great interest;
the KT400 chipset and Serial ATA otherwise dubbed by ABIT as Serillel.

Mixed emotions? Hesitant to jump on the Serial ATA bandwidthwagon? Does the
AT7 Max2 really live up to the hype?

That just sounds like another “whet your appetite for curiosity”
lead-in to an everyday AT7 Max2 review and that would be too easy. The AT7 Max2
and its predecessor, the AT7, are very similar motherboards. Which deserves
your hard earned dollar? The AT7 was already put
through the paces with the Matrox Parhelia 512 video card but now ATI comes
to the AT7 Max2 party with their gaming king; the 9700 PRO. Just for fun Icrontic
threw in a dual processor Gigabyte platform from our second
Broadcast Box article. Choose your weapons carefully for the obvious winner
depends on your expectations.

Specifications

CPU

• Supports AMD-K7 Athlon / Athlon XP Socket A 200/266/333 MHz FSB Processors
• Supports AMD-K7 Duron Socket A 200 MHz FSB Processors

Chipset

• VIA KT400 / VT8235
• Supports Hi-Speed Universal Serial Bus (USB 2.0)
• Supports Advanced Configuration and Power Management Interface (ACPI)
• Accelerated Graphics Port connector
• supports AGP 4X/8X (1.5V/0.8V)

Memory

• Four 184-pin DIMM sockets
• Supports 2 DIMM DDR 333/400 (Max. 2GB)
• Supports 3 DIMM Un-buffered DDR 200/266 (Max. 3GB)
• Supports 4 DIMM Registered DDR 200/266 (Max. 3.5GB)

Serial ATA

• On board Marvell 88i8030 Controller x 2
• Support SATA data transfer rates 150 MB/s (1.5G bps)

RAID

• High Point HPT374 IDE RAID Controller
• Supports Ultra DMA 33/66/100/133 RAID 0/1/0+1(striping + mirroring mode
  for boosting performance and data security)

Audio

• 6-Channel AC 97 CODEC on board
• Professional digital audio interface
• supports 24-bit S/PDIF Out

Media XP (Optional)

• Supports card reader function for Memory Stick™ , Secure Digital™
  and Type I/II
• CompactFlash™
• Supports Wireless Remote Control and S/PDIF Out / Mic In / Headphone Out
  / USB 2.0 IEEE 1394

System BIOS

• SoftMenu™ Technology to set CPU parameters
• Supports Plug-and-Play (PNP)
• Supports Advanced Configuration Power Interface (ACPI)
• Supports Desktop Management Interface (DMI)
• Write-Protect Anti-Virus function by AWARD BIOS

LAN

• On board 10/100Mb Operation supports ACPI & Wake on LAN

IEEE 1394

• Supports IEEE 1394a at 100/200/400 Mb/s transfer rate

Internal I/O Connectors

• 1 x AGP, 5 x PCI slots Floppy Port supports up to 2.88MB
• 4 x Ultra DMA 33/66/100/133 Connectors
• 2 x Serial ATA 150 Connectors
• 2 x USB headers
• 1 x IEEE 1394a header
• 1 x CD-IN
• 1 x AUX-IN Back Panel I/O
• 1 x PS/2 Keyboard
• 1 x PS/2 mouse
• 4 x USB
• 2 x IEEE 1394
• 1 x S/PDIF Output Audio connectors (Front Speaker, Line-in, Mic-in, Center/Sub,
  Surround Speaker)
• 2 x USB
• 1 x RJ-45 LAN Connector

Miscellaneous

• ATX form factor Hardware monitoring – Including Fan speeds, Voltages, System
  environment temperature

Touring the board

The ABIT AT7-Max2 motherboard was originally introduced with a black PCB which
looks very sexy but some months later the plain brown PCB has resurfaced as
with Icrontic’s review sample.

ABIT has now gotten into the habit of ensuring that consumers don’t miss important
facts when it comes to their product. A sticker covers the CPU socket warning
consumers to choose heatsinks with 3-ear clips as opposed to the single ear
clips. I, from personal experience, have had a single socket ear clip design
break off the ears thus rendering my motherboard useless. It also took the processor
with it as well.

South of the socket is the second warning label which is more of an advertisement
for ABIT’s video cards.

The layout is quite good with the PSU power connection placed to the right
of the socket thus the PSU power cable need not be snaked by the heatsink as
with some motherboards. The capacitors don’t block the center ear on the south
side of the CPU socket. ABIT does continue with the four DIMM memory design
which we’ve grown to like but it has two fatal flaws which will be pointed out.
The northbridge fan has also been redesigned for a sleek new look.

Note the placement of the FAN 1 and 2 power headers directly below the PSU
socket.

As previously mentioned the capacitor placement allows for some access to the
south side socket ears but it is still pretty tight for attaching a heatsink.
Caution should be taken as to not put too much bending pressure on the capacitors
when mounting the heatsink.

The northbridge fan design is a great improvements to the looks of the ABIT
motherboards. It may not actually cool any better but it certainly looks as
though it will.

Two screws are all that holds the top aluminum cover in place
and the entire fan lifts out of the aluminum base.

The fan itself may present consumers with one problem. Replacements are impossible
to find at the local PC store. If the northbridge fan dies and they often do
the AT7-Max2 owner may have to mount an entirely new northbridge chipset cooler
or RMA the board to ABIT.

The fan itself but we were unable to track down the RPM, dBA
and CFM numbers.

IDE1 and 2 are ATA133 specifications allowing up to four devices to be connected.
In the background are the four DIMM slots which present two major problems.

The first problem is with the ram clips.

All looks well but, depending on choice of video card, the AGP video card can
extend below DIMM 1 and 2. This means the ram should be installed FIRST before
installing the video card. There will be problems if the ram in DIMM 1 and 2
needs to be removed as the lifters are blocked by the video card.

This can be seen more easily in the image below with the video card removed.
The motherboard must be redesigned to move the memory DIMMS further east away
from the AGP slot or video card makers must be convince to build a shorter video
card.

The second problem is one that is unpredictable and depends on the particular
PC case. The problem ONLY exists when the Serial ATA hard drive adapter is used
in combination with ram in DIMM 4. ABIT typically likes to populate the ram
DIMMS from 4 through to 1 and that’s how we found the next glitch.

When the ram is in DIMM 4 and the Serial ATA adapter is used there isn’t sufficient
space and either the ram has to moved to DIMM 3 or a user risks damage to ram
module or DIMM slot. For the record there isn’t a problem when the regular ribbon
cable is use or, hopefully readily available soon, a Serial ATA hard drive is
installed. It’s the adapter itself the presents the problem.

Sadly there is the ram lifter / video card problem on one side and the Serial
ATA adapter problem on the other depending on what video card and PC case is
used.

ABIT continued with the vertically mounted CMOS battery which is a “take
it or leave it” design. I don’t consider it a flaw but some do. The floppy
connector has been moved from beside IDE 1 and 2 to above IDE 3 and 4. This
is a vast improvement over the AT7 which featured the floppy connector at the
bottom of the board BELOW the highpoint IDE headers. Cabling is much more organized
with the floppy connector above.

The HighPoint 374 chipset drives IDE 3 and 4 and also helps out with the organization
of Serial ATA 1 and 2 headers in the RAID department. System BIOS will show
IDE 1 and 2 (not to be confused with the Serial ATA headers) and CTL-H at boot
will allow access to the HighPoint setup. Just be aware that the ribbon cable
connectors on the board labeled as IDE 3 and 4 will show up on the HighPoint
menu as 3 and 4. The Serial ATA headers will show up in the HighPoint menu as
1 and 2. (master and slave will be available for RAID configuration)

Serial ATA is technology on the doorstep and ABIT loses two of the four ribbon
cable ATA133 HighPoint headers that were found on the AT7 in favor of the ATA150
Serial ATA headers found on the AT7-Max2.

 

If you’ve been under a rock for the last little while and don’t know about
Serial ATA…I suggest you read on. If you are thinking that you can’t use Serial
ATA then guess again. ABIT includes an adapter to get you by in the interim
before Serial ATA hard drives become readily available.

But more about that later on.

Just Southwest of the Serial ATA headers are the speaker – power on – hdd led
– etc connectors.

ABIT ramps up the number of PCI slots by two from the AT7 to the AT7-Max2.
It seems as though consumers must have their cake and eat it too when it comes
to peripheral choice.

At the bottom left of the motherboard are two USB headers which support a total
of four USB ports. That’s in addition to the six USB ports on the backplane.

But wait there’s more!

North from the USB headers are the CD and AUX digital sound in PLUS a motherboard
FireWire header just in case the two backplane FireWire ports aren’t enough.
I suppose an enthusiast may want to install a 2 or 4 port PCI based FireWire
card and have a front mounted FireWire port too. Just for overkill.

Actually ABIT’s MEDIAXP optional front input panel makes great use of the internal
FireWire and USB headers.

The I/O backplane has a “butt load” of…stuff. PS/2 Mouse and Keyboard
inputs have found their way back onto the motherboard. The AT7 originally dropped
these. Four USB ports, 2 FireWire ports, an SPDIF (Optical) out, 5.1 sound,
MIC, Line in, LAN and two more USB ports. If you are buying this motherboard
and have an old parallel port printer…buy a new USB printer.

Don’t lose the plate that ABIT includes as they aren’t too common
in that configuration.

ABIT includes the driver CD and HighPoint floppy.

Remember this….RTFM. ABIT includes it and it is a well written manual that
everyone should skim through once and then read carefully once before installing
the motherboard. Manufacturers don’t write manuals just to keep themselves out
of the “blame game”…they do help and ABIT manuals cover most everything.

But they do miss one or two things once in a while.

It all comes neatly packed in a fully enclosed plastic tray
inside the shipping box.

Welcome to the fast lane.

Surreal Serillel

Serial ATA is the next evolution in hard drive interfaces. Currently EIDE hard
drives can operate at a theoretical maximum of 133 MB/s. Serial ATA steps it
up to 150 MB/s transfer rate. 133 MB/s or 150 MB/s is on paper and real world
tests do prove that hard drives operate at a significantly lesser throughput.
It is also important to note that a Serial ATA capable motherboard will not
provide Serial ATA speeds using ATA100 or ATA133 hard drives but Serial ATA
does leave the path open to future drives that do. Seagate has an 80
GB Serial ATA drive slated for production…soon.

Serial ATA brings several positive points in favor of its adoption.

• Several hard drives may be linked to a single controller and hard drives
  no longer need to be master/slave
• Serial ATA cables are smaller resulting in better space management and reduced
  airflow blockage
• Serial ATA is theoretically a lower cost to the end user
• Serial ATA increases performance delivering 1.5 Gbps (150 MB/sec)
• Serial ATA is scalable up to 6.0 Gbps (600 MB/sec)

Serial ATA is on the horizon but it may not be around the corner. The bugs
need to be worked out as with all new technology and manufacturers have to adapt
current hardware to accommodate Serial ATA. ABIT is one of the first with their
Serillel The onboard Marvel 88i8030 Controller supports two Serial ATA headers
on the motherboard.

The Serial cable is very much smaller than the traditional ATA66/100/133 ribbon
cable.

This is a superior design as it reduces space consumption and airflow blockage.
The cable also is a point to point connection so no master/slave cables need
be used. Plug the Serial ATA cable into the motherboard and then into a hard
drive then a second cable will connect additional hard drives.

ABIT provides a single cable and a Serial ATA adapter with the AT7 Max2. It
would have been better to provide two but the plan may be to utilize a single
current ATA 100/133 drives while waiting for Serial ATA drives to become available.
ABIT was probably counting on the fact that Serial ATA drives would be in production
far sooner. (pardon the jaggies in the picture…bad crop job)

The adapter fits ATA 100/133 drive interfaces but requires a power connection.
ABIT has thoughtfully provided a connector to tap into the same hard drive power
line and convert it. The Serial ATA cable plugs into the left side of the adapter
shown below while the power obviously goes to the right.

The reverse side of the adapter has the standard 80-pin interface.

ABIT has informed us that additional adapters and cables will be available
for separate purchase for those of you who can’t wait. The problem is that the
adapter is not able to daisy chain hard drives so the limit is a single drive
to one Serial ATA controller.

The Serial ATA cable is even dwarfed by the floppy cable.

All in all Serial ATA has the promise of better performance and a more compact
cabling solution. One tech site has already tested
Serial ATA drives with favorable results.

Serial ATA installation issues

The actual installation of the Serial ATA interface was as easy as installing
a hard drive. There were no physical issues. However there were two issues that
were more of a result of lack of information rather than a software or hardware
problem. The first is that a hard drive will not be detected during the OS installation
if it is on the ATA controller. At least that is what we discovered. The OS
must be installed then the hard drive needs to be moved to the Serial ATA controller.
This should create a real challenge for those who want their OS RAID 0 with
Serial ATA and only have two drives. Most likely a third hard drive will be
required to get the two Serial ATA drives operational.

The second missing and very valuable piece of information is that the hard
drive jumper must be in the master/slave position otherwise the hard drive will
not be detected on the Serial ATA controller. If the jumper is in pure master,
slave or cable select…no drive. This would have been a very handy tidbit to
know of.

We also encountered one gremlin. During our tests we had set the temperature
alarm too low so it went off in the middle of the night during the 6 or 7 hours
it took for 3D Mark 2001 SE to complete. There isn’t much that caused me grief
except for the fact that I stumbled out of bed at 2 or 3 in the morning and
simply shut off the power to computer muttering “I deal with it tomorrow”
as I padded back to bed.

Two days later while overclocking the board the very same problem occured.
Since there was only a single drive on Serial ATA controller one the solution
was simple enough by moving the hard drive to controller two. After rebooting
the drivers reinstalled automatically. (or perhaps the computer “digitally
cleared its throat”) Controller one functioned normally after that.

That sudden shut down, and we have all done it, caused the HighPoint driver
to be kicked out thus not allowing the system to boot. The hard drive simply
wasn’t detected on one of the Serial ATA controllers. The hard drive was moved
to the other controller and up came the system allowing for the missing drivers
to be reinstalled. It’s undetermined if the Serial ATA controller is “touchy”
to such things like sudden power loss or if it was a one time event.

Performance

If you are like me and don’t have a single Serial ATA drive to your name (who
does?) then the question is if an ATA100 or ATA133 drive faster on the Serial
ATA header? Simple answer? No. If a hard drive is designed to meet a theoretical
limit of 100 or 133 MB/s then how can it go faster without either A) a firmware
upgrade or B) a hardware upgrade. If the benefits of Serial ATA are on your
list then a Serial ATA hard drive is what’s required. I do recommend them when
they are widely available.

An important point is that Serial ATA is not designed to be used alongside
our current EIDE technology. It is designed as a replacement so it is more or
less inevitable.

The following scores on ATTO were run on a 4 GB partition in the center of
the drive and are very much identical. The hard drive model was a Maxtor 60
GB D740-X ATA 133.

ATTO benchmark IDE 3 (ATA 133 header)

ATTO benchmark Serial ATA 1 (ATA 150 header)

Sorry if this disappoints if the expectation was increased performance using
“old” ATA133 technology but the bright side is that Serial ATA drives
WILL provide a needed performance boost. For more information on Serial ATA
visit the Serial ATA website.

Bios and overclocking

ABIT bios’ are highly configurable and are the reason why ABIT motherboards
are the overclocker’s choice. ABIT gives access to a host of voltage and timing
tweaks that will give days of endless fiddling to the experienced overclocker.
The novice overclocker may want to use caution as some of these voltage and
option tweaks may leave you in hot water with a cold PC.

Truthfully I am not on the razor’s edge of overclocking but the KT400 chipset
allows for full multiplier adjustment on the processor without any modifications
to the bridges. Just “plop” it in and begin overclocking. I was easily
able to approach 1.9 GHz on a 2100+ in just a few moments. I would have been
able to go higher if I spent some time learning the nuances of the timing adjustments
between ram, processor and motherboard.

I leave the suicidal, bleeding edge overclocking to the experts but the AT7
Max2 has an impressive amount of bios options available to be tweaked with until
the cows come home.

ABIT now gives access to FSB adjustment in 1 Mhz amounts plus 3,4 and 5 dividers.
The CPU voltage can ramp up to 2.325 Volts and the memory can get a rather large
jolt at 3.25 Volts.

errrr…the boring screen.

Note how APIC (vs. the standard ACPI) is now in the BIOS.

Memory timings? There’s enough to play with in the DRAM Clock/Drive Control
to keep anyone busy for a while getting to that “sweet spot”.

Two more options in the AGP bridge control. Enhance AGP Performance and DBI
(Dynamic Bus Inversion) Output which aren’t even mentioned in the manual. Dynamic
Bus Inversion is a trick to optimize signal quality and reduce noise (interferance)
on the new AGP 8x link. That’s the oversimplified explanation.

Note the addition of the Core Temperature readout for the CPU.

Benchmarks

The plethora of benchmark programs can be important when determining what does
what task faster or better. These are specific assessments of individual functions.
For this article it was decided to add a few more of what is our assessment
of real world tests. It was also thought important to show how a change in one
particular component could affect end results. It is hoped that the result of
these tests will help you assess priorities in system configuration to match
the priorities in system expectations.

The AT7 test system.

• AMD 2100+ Thoroughbred
  Core Processor
• ABIT AT7 motherboard
• Matrox Parhelia 512 triple head video card in single head mode* (1.01 drivers)
• 2 x 512 MB Micron PC2100 RAM
• Sony 52x CD
• LG 32x10x40x CDRW
• 16 x DVD
• 60 GB Maxtor ATA133 Hard Drive
• 2 x Samsung 950p 19″ Monitors
• USB Keyboard and Logitech USB wireless Optical Mouse
• Globalwin CAK4-76T HSF
• AMK
  SX1000 modded PC case (window, fans, cables, loom)
• Enermax 465 Watt FC PSU
• Windows XP Professional Service Pack 1

The Gigabyte Duallie test system.

• 2 x AMD 2100+ MP
  Processors
• Gigabyte GA-7DPXDW+ motherboard
• Matrox Parhelia 512 triple head video card in single head mode* (1.01 drivers)
• 2 x 512 MB Micron PC2100 RAM
• Sony 52x CD
• LG 32x10x40x CDRW
• 16 x DVD
• 60 GB Maxtor ATA133 Hard Drive
• 2 x Samsung 950p 19″ Monitors
• USB Keyboard and Logitech USB wireless Optical Mouse
• Globalwin CAK4-76T HSF
• AMK
  SX1000 modded PC case (window, fans, cables, loom)
• Enermax 465 Watt FC PSU
• Windows XP Professional Service Pack 1

The AT7 Max2 test system.

• AMD 2100+ Thoroughbred
  Core Processor
• ABIT AT7 Max2 motherboard
• ATI 9700 PRO Video Card Catalyst 2.3 drivers
• 2 x 512 MB Micron PC2100 RAM
• Sony 52x CD
• 16 x DVD
• 60 GB Maxtor ATA133 Hard Drive
• 2 x Samsung 950p 19″ Monitors
• USB Keyboard and Logitech USB wireless Optical Mouse
• Globalwin WBK38 heatsink
• Koolcases
  Panther PC case
• Enermax 465 Watt FC PSU
• Windows XP Professional Service Pack 1

*dual and triple monitors enabled for Adobe After Effects and Softimage benchmarks
only.

Programs used

• 
  Sisoft Sandra 2002
• MadOnion
  3DMark 2001 SE
• Quake
  III Arena
• Commanche
  4
• GL
  Excess
• Drone
  Z
• SpecviewPerf 7.0
• PS Bench
• Adobe Photoshop 7.0
• Adobe After Effects 5.5
• SoftimageXSI 2.0.1
• MediaCleaner Pro 5

All tests were run at default video card settings with VSYNC disabled. Bios
was optimized for system match but not tweaked for optimal performance. In other
words the BIOS settings were standard as far as anyone can set the time and
date, ensure the ram is 2 or 4 way interleave and at CAS 2.5 and AGP is chosen
as the first boot video card. The BIOS settings were kept as close to conservative
or default value. Individual performance will vary with any particular or specific
timings or tweaks enabled by you. These may result in lesser or greater scores.
Void where prohibited by law. Don’t run with scissors. Chew each bite 32 times
and always floss between meals.

3D Mark 2001 SE

Codecreatures

Commanche 4

DroneZ

GL Excess

QuakeIII normal quality

Quake III high quality

Serious Sam

Sisoft Sandra CPU Arithmetic

Sisoft Sandra CPU Multimedia

Sisoft Sandra Memory Benchmark

Specviewperf 7.0

Adobe After Effects 5.5

Adobe After Effects is a tool to produce motion
graphics and visual effects for film, video, multimedia and the web. It is primarily
a 2D application using imported graphics or digital footage or self generated
effects. A project was created that was a combination of many video footage
files, resizing and rasterizing effects, text animations and multiple layer
effects. This “average” combination was felt to best demonstrate advantages
and/or disadvantages that a real world user may experience rather than isolating
and benchmarking a particular effect.

PS Bench is a series of isolated
Photoshop effects tested 3 times individually then the combined scores were
used. Need we say more about dual processors moving along at the speed of light?
Especially on the SMP aware program Adobe Photoshop.

Media Cleaner Pro 5 is a software-based
video and audio file compression program. A 651 MB 640 x 480 NTSC video file
was compressed down to 3 different formats.

Softimage XSI can simply bring
any computer to its knees. It’s an incredibly powerful 3D animation program
that has the ability to become so complex that single processor systems have
been known to “think” for days when rendering an animation. Softimage works
on somewhat similar principle to After Effects. A faster and more powerful video
card will translate to a smoother interface where complex scenes can be manipulated
in real time. Note that Softimage does not have an interface to real-time preview
a finished frame as unlike After Effects. Users can manipulate objects in a
choice of views from wire frame mode to simulated real-time shading mode. In
order to look at a finished frame a user must render the frame to disk which
bypasses the GPU. A faster processor will result in the faster render. The amount
of RAM is not as great an issue as the user is working frame by frame and the
graphics card is doing the bulk of the work while working within the GUI.

This is a most basic overview and there are specialty
hardware components that can enhance the speed and interactivity of complex
3D scenes and programs. The designers working on the test system use Softimage
on a less complex level to provide enhancements and elements to commercials,
promos and station ID elements. Though their work is quite complex to some it
a far cry from that of special effects in major film productions.

Summation

The AT7-Max2 motherboard is an incredibly feature rich platform. It literally
has most every feature a PC builder would need except for the on-board video.
Serial ATA will prove itself in the future when Serial ATA drives become widely
available.

 

 

The AT7 Max2 is a solid platform offering the future of Serial ATA. ABIT has
taken the best of the AT7 and combined it with technology the has a lot of promise.
Some may argue that the KT400 chipset may not be worth the effort or expense
but it is still a chipset in its infancy for driver support.

Now comes the most important point. The KT400 chipset will support 400 MHz
or PC3200 RAM. There are a few important points when playing around with the
amount of DIMMS filled. It is known that when 3 and 4 DIMMS are utilized that
the ram speeds can drop down to PC2100. 1 or 2 sticks are supported at DDR400
speeds. Also there comes a timing issue between processor and memory. Matching
processor front side bus speeds with ram speeds plus achieving CAS 2 stability
will produce better results. The AT7 Max2 may have fell behind the AT7 for this
reason. A 266 FSB processor and 266 MHz ram was used in the tests and it may
just be a matter of tweaking to get the timing correct to nudge up the performance.

It will be interesting to pit these two boards against each other with a 2600+
333 FSB processor and some PC3200 Corsair ram but that’s a future article.

The AT7 Max2 was neck and neck with its predecessor in most of the multitude
of benchmarks. The ATI 9700 PRO video card certainly made the difference for
gaming performance against the Matrox Parhelia. The KT400 chipset showed its
weakness by allowing the AT7 Max2 to fall behind in the more non-gaming applications
that utilized intensive CPU load for rendering. This, to mention again, could
be a matter of a timing issue between RAM and processor. This may be the trade
off to get the full load of onboard features that the AT7 Max2 offers.

Our jury is still out on the KT400 Chipset and that is the Achilles heal of
the AT7 Max2. If this chipset is nudged into place by some driver updates and
the proper memory and processor then the AT7 Max2 comes close to the “perfect
motherboard”. The jury won’t be out long as the rumors of KT400A float
about. Personally I’d like to see the chipset fall into stride to really take
this motherboard places.

This reviewer is not doing handsprings and cartwheels about the AT7 Max2. It’s
an excellent board that I would have no hesitation to recommend but, for me
personally, I would have liked a little bit more of a performance jump from
KT333 to KT400. It is always the case that consumers continually expect “newer”
to be “faster” and forget about the many options and improvements
made by the manufacturers. Take away the personaly criteria for a performance
jump from KT333 to KT400 and I’ll be dancing in the street…but that still
may be the case when the 333 FSB Athlon and DDR400 gets its chance on the AT7
Max2.

ABIT sets the pace for features, tweakabilty and innovation. ABIT’s reputation
is still secure as they forge new ground where others only follow. Now if they
would make a dual processor AT7 Max2 I’d be ecstatic

Well done ABIT!

Short-Media would like to thank ABIT,
AMD, ATI,
AMK Computers and
Koolcases for their
generous support and kind assistance.

Scores Breakdown

Attribute	Score	Comments
Bonus items & software	9.5
Documentation	9
Features & options	9.5
Fine-tuning features	9
Overclocking features	9
Performance & stability	8
Presentation	8.5
Price / value	8
Total score	70.5/80	88.1%