Abit AT8: µGuru comes to the RD480

by Gary Key on 3/10/2006 12:05 AM EST
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  • FireTech - Monday, April 10, 2006 - link

    Status Update - Revised 1.1 Bios

    Abit provided us a revised 1.1 bios tonight (3-9-06) for additional testing and it will be available on Abit's website shortly. We will update the article after our regression testing is completed.


    Hi Gary, it would be great if you could please do that promised follow-up review update for the AT8 especially now the AT8 32X is out. It has beeen a while since the initial review and so things should have settled down now or possibly even a new 'beyond 1.1' beta BIOS has been produced for you?
    Please update this review and maybe have a follow up on all the Crossfire boards you have reviewed. There seem to be quite a few owners talking on various forums who bought on the strength of these reviews and are relying on you to get things moving on the manufacturer support front...
    I'm personally just waiting to see if the AT8 can be the board it was advertised to be before I take the plunge. Why buy into trouble if you don't need to, I've done the 'early adopter' thing too often already?
  • Gary Key - Monday, July 3, 2006 - link

    We are still seeing issues with Infineon based memory that is set to 2-3-2-5 in the SPD, the board will not boot. If your memory utilizes these IC chips, the only choice you is to install some Samsung TCCD, boot the board, manually change the CAS to 2.5, reboot, shutdown, install the other memory, and boot again. Hopefully, Abit will do another bios spin, otherwise, you are left with this hack.
  • Zoomer - Tuesday, March 21, 2006 - link

    Wish you could plug abit's use of the 882D more, it seems to be an excellent realtek chipset. It matches the x-fi in the 3d rightmark tests and is competitive with it even in games. Excellent job!

    Another thing: Could you guys do some objective listening tests to the audio output? Blind A/B switches between the HDA and onboard audio using good quality speakers and/or headphones will be welcome. :)
  • Gary Key - Friday, March 24, 2006 - link

    quote:

    Another thing: Could you guys do some objective listening tests to the audio output?


    Our next step in audio testing, besides subjective remarks, will be doing objective audio tests (besides sampling output from RMAA 5.5) on each new codec implemented on a board. We are still deciding how to do this and my personal preference is to provide a download link to a high quality audio output file from each codec tested. These files would be a standardized clip from a music selection, movie scene, and game sequence. The question is if we will receive permission from the involved parties to allow distribution and obviously what choice of equipment to utilize for the audio capture without distorting the file before playback through the on-board codec or discreet card. Something on the list to do besides new creating new benchmarks also....... :)
  • Zoomer - Saturday, March 25, 2006 - link

    Oh sorry, I meant to say subjective blind listening tests. But that might be a good idea too. To avoid licensing issues, you could use public domain music. However, the quality of the client output hardware and the recording method used would taint results.
  • Duplex - Friday, March 24, 2006 - link

    A suggestion to develop the audiotest is that you measure 1. the latency from input(ad) to "software" and 2. from input(ad) to "software" to output(da) with or without some well defined effect applied.
    Realtek: We don't support ASIO & GSIF directly in our driver.
    For ASIO, there is an "universal ASIO driver for WDM audio" available on ASIO4ALL. Please refer to http://www.asio4all.com">http://www.asio4all.com. It is free for end-users.
  • Zoomer - Tuesday, March 21, 2006 - link

    If I am reading it correctly, you are saying the primary slot is the 4th from the cpu, or in the middle of the board and will cover 1 pci slot when used.

    If that is correct, I suspect this will be a deal breaker for many. It effectively transforms the board to having 1 PCI slot or even none at all, and 2 usable but useless pcie slots, 1 1x and another 8x.
  • Gary Key - Friday, March 24, 2006 - link

    quote:

    If I am reading it correctly, you are saying the primary slot is the 4th from the cpu, or in the middle of the board and will cover 1 pci slot when used.


    Yes, the primary x16 slot is the lower x16 slot on the board. If you use a X1900XT (dual slot card) as an example you will render the PCI slot next to it useless.
  • Zoomer - Saturday, March 25, 2006 - link

    Well, I think it was a bad decision on abit's part. Why leave the top part of the board free while overcrowding the bottom? End users are suffering from these strange board design because of nvidia's SLI now.

    PS: Yes, I do think SLI is a terribly bad idea.
  • Operandi - Sunday, March 12, 2006 - link

    Excellent review I particularly liked the coverage on the fan control, good work.
  • Duplex - Tuesday, March 21, 2006 - link

    I really liked it you did a test with BH5 at 1T 2225 timings,
    BUT,
    I would be so much happier if you also could test at how high clocks you
    can run at 1T 2225-timings. That is at least how I define overclocking memory.
    You still have the board, so pleeeaaaaaaaaaaase give it a try!

    You overclocked with 1T 2.5-5-5-7 timings, but as I´m sure you know it´s not the same thing as overclocking the memory with 1T-2-2-2-5 timings, which BH5/UTT owners mainly gain performance from.

    This is something I miss with most of your reviews, and I think Many Many readers would appreciate if you both tryed overclocking with tight resp. lose timings in the future.
    It´s often tight timings that makes the boards stand out from the rest.
    CPU stability and overclocking seldom differs more than 10% while the RAM clocks at 1T-2-2-2-5 often is either 200MHz or something like 280MHz (40%). Many boards still can´t run 1T-2-2-2-5 at all.

    Memory Performance is about 1. tight timings and 2. high clocks
    Maybe my facts isn´t totally correct, but I hope you see what I´m aiming at :-)
  • Gary Key - Friday, March 24, 2006 - link

    quote:

    This is something I miss with most of your reviews, and I think Many Many readers....


    Hi,

    We are currently testing another RD480 board so I will provide the highest stable overclock at 2-2-2-5(7)-1T for the Abit and Asus RD480 boards along with the new one.

    Gary
  • Duplex - Friday, March 24, 2006 - link

    Great! Splendido! Magnifico! eeeeh, Excellent! Much appreciated!
  • Duplex - Wednesday, April 5, 2006 - link

    How are things going with the revised 1.1 bios, is the 256HTT limit gone?
    Has there been any time to look into it? ;-)

    I read the ECS-review. Nice to see the
    "The ECS KA1 MVP was very stable with 2 DDR modules in Dual-Channel mode at the settings of 2-2-2-5 at 2.7v. We were able to operate the memory at this configuration up to a 226HTT x12 setting." !!
    Whats happening with the tests you mentioned above with the Asus and Abit board?
    Estimated publishing date?
  • FireTech - Friday, March 17, 2006 - link

    Agreed, love the look of this MB for it's passive cooling and fan control options. I'll have to wait for the AT8 32X though as the AT8 is now discontinued here.
    Any news on the BIOS #1.1 results?
  • Gary Key - Monday, March 20, 2006 - link

    quote:

    Any news on the BIOS #1.1 results?


    So far so good. We are waiting on a particular GSkill module to arrive to complete testing.
  • SpHeRe31459 - Saturday, March 11, 2006 - link

    Dolby Digital Live is an option that a vendor must persue with Dolby and get their motherboard certified. Abit has not shown interest in this before, nothing I can find at the Abit site says this is Dolby Digital Live enabled. You guys sure about the AT8 having DDL?
  • Gary Key - Saturday, March 11, 2006 - link

    http://www.abit.com.tw/page/en/motherboard/motherb...">AT8 Specs


    The audio specifications are listed on the global site. The US site has the AL8 specs on the webpage and Abit has been notified of this. Abit is now including the ALC-882D with the DDL option on their higher end boards. We did not see it as being offered originally on the AT8-32x (complained about it) but have been told it will be included now. In fact, their Global website has been updated and shows it on the board. The board I tested had the ALC-882D codec and DDL (5.1, optical out to supporting receiver) was enabled in the drivers I used.

  • cornfedone - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    Looks like Abit, even though late to market, didn't bother testing their ATI chipset mobo before shipping it either. They must have figured if Asus could sell the completely junk A8R-MVP garbage, then there were plenty of fools who would rush out and buy the Abit version of garbage. You got to believe that judgment day isn't too far off for the Asian mobo companies if they keep shipping this kind of junk.

    It's pretty obvious Asus needs to switch product lines from PC hardware to rice cakes or chop suey so their skill set matches their products.
  • rjm55 - Saturday, March 11, 2006 - link

    Looks like the paid nVidia forum posters are at it again. They must really be afraid of ATI chipsets to go to these extremes. Wonder why?

    It's a shame this decent review got hijacked by a few crazies whose only goal was to disrupt and discredit.
  • CrystalBay - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    sorry, ;)
  • Witchfire - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    I have to disagree that the reviewers do not follow up on comments or complaints from users. Gary has been communicating with me regularly about my concerns with the AT8 I've been having, and has been very helpful. I'm no eleite member, and haven't even managed triple digit postings, yet he took the time & trouble to listen to my concerns, attempt to recreate them on his mobo, and lend assistance.

    Thanks, Gary, your help and professionalism have been greatly appreciated.
  • bthjf1 - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    The problem with all these reviews is that they don't go back to check what's is going one with the board they just tested with normal users. A number of peoples (one being me) have been arguing (with their helpdesk) and waiting for 3 months now for Abit to provide a proper support for the intel Presller core on the AW8 motherboard series (i955) or proper support for different type of memory. All I can say Abit support is very very poor and I will strongly advice anybody thinking of purchasing a board from Abit to look elsewhere. Just poppin's into http://forum.abit-usa.com/showthread.php?t=102711">http://forum.abit-usa.com/showthread.php?t=102711 and have a read ...
  • Gary Key - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    quote:

    The problem with all these reviews is that they don't go back to check what's is going one with the board they just tested with normal users.


    I cannot comment on other review sites, but I can assure you that Wes and I do go back and look at the history of the motherboards tested and take comments from users very seriously. I know I spend at least 10 hours a week assisting users with their issues and at times being an arbitrator for the customer with the supplier. We both spend a similar amount of hours each week if not more working directly with the suppliers on issues and trying to ensure problems are solved or at least corrected in the next product design. While we are not always successful, I do believe you would be surprised at the number of issues that are solved quickly. I will bring up your AW8 issue with Abit this weekend. :)
  • bthjf1 - Saturday, March 11, 2006 - link

    Thanks for any help you can provide. The comment was not direct to Anandtech but to a couple of other review sites which didn't really care (ie: not my problem). The concern with Abit is since the takeover from USI the support have not been great ~ total of communication. I've been reading Anandtech for many years (too long !) and my post was more to get some help with Abit . They will listen to Anandtech since you can reach millions but not necessary a single user ;-)

    Jon
  • Plasmoid - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    I have to agree with you, Abit need to sort out their support.

    The benchmarks prove that this is a great motherboard, interestingly it outperforms all its rivals at stock just like the AN8, but the bios lets it down (interestingly just like the AN8)
    If they can sort out these bios issues fast it should be a fantastic value motherboard. There were problems with the temperature reporting on the AN8 and incompatibility with XI-FI cards from creative that took much to long to address though. Im sad to say this kind of thing is what you can get with Abit. Hopefully it is a short term problem that they have had over the last 6 months.

    All bad things said im really happy with my abit motherboard, and the OCGuru certainly is a godsend for overclockers. Havent seen such things as completly dynamic fan speed control in any other motherboard.
  • Patrese - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    Am I the only one who finds this kind of positioning of the IDE connectors crappy? Most people who are buying PCs now are using SATA HDs, so the connectors should be exactly where they are, on the low-right of the board. But the IDEs are used for CD-RW/DVD-RWs drives mostly, and would be much better suited to the top right of the board IMO. I got a good-old AN7 and I just hate tbe IDE cables crossing my case from top to bottom just to reach the connnectors...

    Besides that, great review and promising mobo, once the BIOS is fixed. It's great to see Abit back!
  • n7 - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    I think his comments were a tad harsh, but i am one of those users who read the Asus A8R-MVP review here, & got pretty excited.
    I actually starting spreading the praises on forums i visit of this great value mobo.

    Then i got the mobo, & actually, i was quite happy with it.
    For a few weeks, that is.

    Then i started discovering all sorts of issues, the worst being the ethernet hanging/crashing, something which many others have also had issues..

    I now hear there's a Marvell driver directly from their site that supposedly fixed the problem, but i've already bought an ethernet card, so i don't really care to try it, since both the driver from the CD & the driver from Windows update didn't work properly.

    Another issue i've encountered is wildly fluctuating vcore. (1.31-1.41V, for example! - with overvoltage disabled)
    Others have also reported this. I am using software to measure this, so it's possible that it is incorrectly reading it, but i'm guessing not.

    Another problem is that even smaller overclocks aren't stable in games for me, whereas i had much higher OCs stable with my previous Neo2.
    I cannot figure out why yet, but it seems to be either the fluctuating vcore, or it's been mentioned that the RAM isn't even stable even with a divider when using 1T.

    It's one thing for OCs to vary between mobos, but going from 2.55 GHz to 2.2 GHz with the same hardware? No way.

    I am going to test things this wknd with the RAM @ 2T, & see if that fixes the stability issues, but one shouldn't have to run RAM @ 2T on any good motherboard in the first place.

    Anyway, what i'm trying to say is that while some many not have had trouble, a lot of people have, which is why there's negativity surround that A8R-MVP reviews.

    As far as i am concerned, it seems like Asus used us who bought the A8R-MVP as beta testers so they could release the A8R32-MVP with the issues fixed...

  • Zoomer - Tuesday, March 21, 2006 - link

    I get a similar problem with vCore on their A8N-E. Perhaps its due to Asus's choice of voltage regulator?
  • Pete84 - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    With conroe ~6 months away, I wonder how badly AMD's FX and high end sales will suffer. Who is going to spend out for a brand new system when it will be destroyed by Conroe?
  • prohandyman - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    Oh, the CONROE WILL DESTROY comments! I admit, Intel has stepped up to the plate with an amazing leap... but it IS 6 months out... and all "benchies" are being done on TODAY'S AMD platform. We know AMD has had some teething problems with AM2, and is on a "delayed" launch... but somehow I can't help but wonder if AMD was Waiting for this "announcement" just to see where they need to "tweak" the AM2/F platform to compete equally?! I know... Tom's and Anand's have done testing on "prototype" platforms... but even they will admit that the cpu silicon is NOT what will be released... However, the mobo platforms are, and are very mature. The unknown is the CPU, I don't even think "AMDs partners" are even in the total know.
  • Beenthere - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    Gary, it's nice to see an honest mobo review that doesn't sugar coat the mobo problems and hype the shit outta the product.

    It's pretty clear the Abit AT8 isn't ready for prime time yet, nor is the A8R-MVP, A8R-32, RDX200, or the Sapphire Pure whatever we're calling it this week. It's a real pity the reviews of all the RD480/RD580 mobos wasn't as honest as your review of the AT8 or Xbit Labs of the A8R-MVP. If they were then the mobo companies would have been forced to fix these deficient mobos or scrap them as none of them perform properly.

    I realize that many fanboys will buy anything just to have the latest and worst product dumped into the marketplace this week. Unscrupulous companies depend on these sheep for quick revenue from malfunctioning products. Hopefully Abit will take the high road and fix their AT8 memory, BIOS, etc. issues Unlike Asus, Sapphire, et al who continue to pedle non-working mobos.

    Until such time as the problems are fixed on all of the ATI chipset mobos, they simply are not ready for sale to the public. It's simply amazing how inept the mobo makers were in rushing the ATI chipset mobos out the door when they can't even operate with standard industry memory. With the AM2 socket mobos only a couple months away it looks like the ATI chipset mobos are not worth the trouble for a half-baked POS.

    Maybe on the next go around ATI will get their act together and deliver a quality northbridge and southbridge (SB600)? ATI should also show the mobo companies how to copy the ATI reference mobo design which worked just fine and didn't have any of the foolish problems on the rushed out the door POS RD480 & now the RD580 mobos.
  • Gary Key - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    quote:

    Gary, it's nice to see an honest mobo review that doesn't sugar coat the mobo problems and hype the shit outta the product.


    I think you would find several Asus P5N32-SLI users that would disagree with you in regards to my review and conclusions about that product. ;-)

    While I will agree there have been teething issues with the ATI RD480/580 products, overall I believe their launch was not any worse than the NVIDIA nFx series. In fact, there are numerous people who would say the nF4 is not ready for sale based upon issues they continue to experience. Some of the board manufacturers are clearly better than others at times but they all have issues as well as success in product launches. It is the determination of what a true issue is that makes the difference and how well a supplier responds to these issues.

    Obviously, this board (AT8) has a bios issue with various types of memory from certain manufacturers. Who do we blame? Our first thought and reaction is to blame Abit. In this case, they deserve some of it as the memory incompatibilities are with a few well known and widely purchased modules. However, what happens when we find out in regression testing that one of the memory module suppliers has tweaked their SPD settings to the point that it is near impossible for Abit or ATI or anyone else to ensure their board or chipset will work properly with the component? How many people are having memory related issues with the other boards because of this tweaking but do not realize it is the memory and not the board at fault? Who gets the blame because the memory worked fine in one board and not another, we typically blame the board manufacturer, right or wrong. We find the board manufacturer's tweaking the memory performance to gain an advantage and the memory supplier is doing the same, it is a recipe for disaster at times. There have been numerous complaints about the memory voltages available on the newer boards as they do not allow the older BH5 type memory to be fully exploited in overclocking situations. Everyone is upset with the board supplier when they are trying to protect us from ourselves when running 3.3V or higher with the newer Infineon or Samsung modules will blow the DRAM in short enough time. At times the supplier cannot win but this does not excuse them from trying to assist, solve, or acknowledge issues.

    We complain about the voltage fluctuations and inability for a system to remain stable yet we want to use the least expensive power supplies and other components while trying to run the system at 325HTT with CrossFire or SLI, voltages maxed on the CPU and DRAM, along with a couple of hard drives and optical drives attached to the system. Most people will call the board sub-standard or its components instead of wondering why we have video solutions pulling 275w and 30amps or better along with CPUs coming close to that number in overclocked conditions. We all want high quality components and as many features as possible on a board but as some point the suppliers have to make a cost decision as to what will get cut or reduced in order to sell the component at a competitive price and still make a profit.

    I will be the first person to say I do not like seeing the voltage fluctuations on my A8R-MVP, but has it affected the ability of the system to perform 24/7 or caused a stability issue in numerous hours of continuous LAN play or testing, NO. Would it be an issue if I overclocked the system to the max (all components) and expected the same stability results, YES. I look at this board as a great bargain and one offering very good performance for $95. I expect it to have issues when pushed, but no more so than any other $95 board. I realize some corners were cut in the choice of components in order to make this price target but then I know what to expect when the board is being pushed to the edge. After testing the AT8, do I believe Asus could have done a better job in the voltage fluctuations, layout, and options, YES, but at what cost? The answer might be none or it might be the product ended up costing $25 more. I would be willing to pay it but is the target market willing to and do they even care. Our expectations are sometimes different than reality.

    Was I upset that Asus did not release the features in the AR8 bios we utilized for testing until well after the board was in the market, YES again, but Wes ensured the test bios was available to anyone who needed it. We have addressed this issue on numerous occasions with them and other board manufacturers upon receiving a board now. We will call them out on it in a more direct way now. Personally I really learned a lesson the hard way with the Asus P5N32-SLI as some of the features in the bios and components on the board I tested are not available. That affects my integrity as a reviewer and I do not like the situation I was put in.

    Do I think some suppliers rush a product to market; absolutely they do at various times. Do we like it, NO but there are just as many that will say YES as they want the latest and greatest no matter the cost. The suppliers will do it for a variety of reasons at times and we all have an opinion on the subject. There are several products we have received that we sent back in short order with advice to the suppliers not to release it and at times we will not review a product knowing there could be an issue with supply, pricing, or quality.

    Have we made mistakes before, yes. However, I think you will find we are very honest about admitting it and will do whatever it takes to correct it. I also believe we are very consistent in our results and product recommendations. Probably 95% of the review sites had the same opinion about the Asus ATI boards, some better than others but overall most recommended a buy decision on the boards. I saw our initial test results, spoke at length with various people testing the boards, and knew the conversations with Asus about the positives and negatives. I bought two of the boards (A8R) for use at home and do not regret it. I am not saying this to excuse any issues that have been reported by the user community but just stating my expectations were probably different than others who bought the board for a different purpose. I really think not having the SB600 is an issue far deeper than what we first realized when the boards came out as the development time with the ULi M1575 minimal but those issues have been solved now.

    As long as we have the freedom in the PC marketplace to mix and match an almost unlimited amount of components together there will be hardware/software issues with various configurations. We do our absolute best to ferret out these issues in our testing but we cannot test every possible combination of hardware and software available. We utilize our best judgment on the range of components that probably 85% of the general population will utilize and do our absolute best to test several different items in each category. As an example, utilizing several different power supplies, memory types, and video cards during testing to verify the capability of the system with these various combinations along with a wide variety of software (how many sites will test Office, Skype, and a webcam together) titles.

    We have a stack of power supplies from just about every supplier setting on the floor now that are useless (we blew them) due to our new testing regimen in overclocking the systems to find their limits. Where do you draw the line? We would love to take however much time we could to fully explore every combination and nuance of a motherboard before publishing an article. This is not feasible so we do our absolute best to test the systems in the same manner in which they will be used by the target market separate of our standard test suites. A $220 DFI board built and marketed for those 5% of people who absolutely push a system to its limits will be looked at totally different way than a $65 board with on-board graphics whose primary purpose in life is to allow someone to connect to Internet and do their home/office work. We sometimes blur the lines between the two as our expectations are different than what the product really is intended to do. Is it that we got hyped or the supplier pushed the product too hard in the wrong market area, sometimes it happens but more often than not we call it right; however there are times when we need to fully communicate our position on the product so those expectations are not set incorrectly. What we perceive, experience, and test as being the best bang for the buck at $XX might very well fail to meet the expectations of a user who needs product that is designed for their actual purpose and is settling for less. In this case we will have a difference of opinion, a difference that hopefully we can work out in this open forum.

    I am not being defensive but wanted share my opinion and thoughts. The readership of this website has the right to openly express their opinions about the articles we publish and we find the information invaluable. It is these comments, opinions, and discussions that allow us to improve our services and hopefully provide more meaningful feedback to you and the suppliers regarding issues. It also pushes us to improve the information and testing feedback we provide in the articles and hopefully overtime we address any testing shortcomings while providing a few surprises along the way.
  • Wesley Fink - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    There are NO sugar-coated motherboard reviews here. It is also getting very old to see your A8R-MVP trash comments on every motherboard review we post. You may be surprised to learn that Gary owns two Asus A8R-MVP motherboards and he is very happy with them, but he can speak for humself.

    Gary and I both take our review responsibilities very seriously, and we have spent countless hours working with manufacturers and readers when problems crop up before, during, and after a review. Both Gary and I worked on an x2 issue with the A8R32-MVP the last few days that resulted in a fix and new BIOS in 2 days.

    If you check the reviews, Tech Report, Hard OCP, Hot Hardware, and almost every site that reviewed it posted very positive reviews of the Asus A8R32-MVP when it launched on March 1.

    We hear you. We do NOT agree.
  • samuraiBX - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    I appreciate the level of professionalism Gary and you bring to your reviews. I was actually impressed by the speed at which you responded to questions raised in the forums in the Conroe testing as well as mentioning in this article that you will be testing using the new bios. The only ask for one thing; would it be possible to add a graphically intensive RTS to the tests? I don't tend to play as many FPS games, and while I understand they are the most graphically intensive, I would like to see the benchmarks for something like Rome:total war. Thanks again guys.
  • Gary Key - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    quote:

    The only ask for one thing; would it be possible to add a graphically intensive RTS to the tests? I don't tend to play as many FPS games, and while I understand they are the most graphically intensive, I would like to see the benchmarks for something like Rome:total war.


    I am a RTS/MMORPG/Simulation gamer big time. We have looked at the various games available and thought we had a good demo for AOE III but the game has a bug in the AA/AF settings that greatly affect the outcome of scores at different resolutions. We are still working on providing a benchmark in this gaming area without resorting to FRAPs. Hopefully we will have one available soon that is repeatable and consistent.
  • CrystalBay - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    Yeah, I have to agree with you guys. I hope Abit starts rolling big again.
  • Sh0ckwave - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    Agreed. It would be awesome for Abit to compete with DFI and ASUS in the enthusiast market again.
  • tuteja1986 - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    Abit is back in business and making awesome board again. I want to read the ABIT's SLI-32 motherboard review :)
  • prohandyman - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    I wonder why the review of "the older/ now economy" Abit ATI 200 chipset for crossfire board, especially since it is known to have some problems (the chipset and microcode)? The recently announced AT8-32X looks to be an even more exciting board, and from what I can see, is laid out better then the Asus equivalent. The newest addition to crossfire looks to be even more exciting then this first attempt! However, I see Asus/Ati are having microcode growing pains with the recently released A8R32-MVP Deluxe.

    Don't get me wrong, great review... very informative. Hopefully a follow-up using the Crossfire 3200, AT8 32X shows an even more mature, and higher performing board!
  • Gary Key - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    quote:

    I wonder why the review of "the older/ now economy" Abit ATI 200 chipset for crossfire board, especially since it is known to have some problems (the chipset and microcode)?


    Abit plans on this board becoming a value performance leader with the AT8-32x being slightly more upscale in the price range. We will be reviewing this board once it is available. However, given the current price range of the RD580 boards, the RD480 boards are the better value at this time given the incremental performance differences of the RD580 (although this would be my personal choice).

    There have been some growing pains with the ATI chipsets but there were also growing pains with the NVIDIA/SIS/VIA/ULi/ALI/Intel/etc. chipsets at product launches also. :) Overall, both the ATI RD480 and RD580 are very good chipsets, the fact the SB600 Southbridge was not available in time for either product launch is where I think ATI failed. This forced the board suppliers to utilize a Southbridge solution (ULi M1575) that was not designed in conjunction with the RD480/580 Northbridge. While it is an excellent Southbridge solution, some of the storage access and timing issues that have been reported and now solved, were not seen on the few SB450 equipped boards. I personally expect the ATI equipped boards to mature quickly and provide an excellent competitive alternative to the nForce boards. This is good for all of us.
  • n7 - Friday, March 10, 2006 - link

    Even with the OCing issues, this is still a far better value Crossfire choice for anyone than the craptastic A8R-MVP

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