April
1st, 2004 - One of the largest and most frequented
hardware sites PC Satats has recently reviewed the ABIT AMD Socket 939
motherboard, the KV8-MAX3. Here are the highlights:
"ABIT is a fan favorite of many computer
enthusiasts, and has been for a long time since the company began
openly embracing overclocking. To further that agenda, ABIT have introduced
several enthusiast friendly features, designed to careful notch out a
"performance oriented niche," and ensure market survival."
PC
Stats really liked the layout of the KV8-MAX3 "The layout of the
ABIT KV8-MAX3 is nicely done, with the main ATX and ATX12V line placed
together off to the left of the CPU socket. Another thing I really like
is that the first PCI slot is spaced 30mm away from the AGP slot, so there
is plenty of room for large third party coolers, or even one of those
two-PCI slot nVidia Geforce FX heatsinks. Serial ATA is the future of
storage, and the ABIT KV8-MAX3 features an additional four channel Silicon
Image Sil3114CT176 Serial ATA/RAID controller for a total of six SATA
headers."
Let's hear how PC Stats has to say about μGuru and OTES "Ask
any enthusiast about their MOSFETs and you'll no doubt hear that they
run hot. In fact it's common for MOSFET to run 70+ degrees Celsius, creating
a large hot spot in the PC. To help deal with
this situation, and hopefully decrease internal case temperatures, ABIT
equip the MAX3-series with proprietory OTES cooling system. ABIT have
been promoting µGuru technology
for months now, and so you should already be familiar with it. µGuru
is actually very similar to MSI's CoreCell but µGuru goes a bit further
in the overclocking options it offers. Essentially, for anyone scratching
their head right now, µGuru allows you to overclock your system within
WindowsXP, and also gives you the ability to change the voltages too!"
Conclusion "ABIT are one of the few manufacturers that openly
embrace the enthusiast community, and the ABIT KV8-MAX3 is a fine example
of ABIT engineering. Performance of the ABIT KV8-MAX3 motherboard was
very good but that's to be expected from an Athlon64 based system. In
all the tests the ABIT KV8-MAX3 constantly fought for top spot among all
the stock systems, and the was a decent overclocker too. If you're thinking
about putting together a new socket 754 Athlon64 rig, make sure you check
out the ABIT KV8-MAX3 motherboard. I'm positive it'll keep you happy no
matter what you do!"
For the full review go here:http://www.pcstats.com/articleview.cfm?articleid=922&page=1 |