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ABIT IT7 MAX i845E


Date
: 09/1/02 – 01:31:13 PM

Author
:

Category
: Motherboard

Page 1 : Introduction

Manufacturer: ABIT
Price: $155

Introduction

It's been a couple of months now since Abit announced their MAX series of motherboards to the public and the press. We got to know these MAX boards at the CeBIT trade fair back in March. We were really impressed by the huge amount of features that these MAX boards had to offer! I'm talking about stuff like USB2.0 ports, Firewire IEEE1394 support, onboard LAN and 6 channel onboard sound. Another revolutionary thing about the MAX series is the lack of legacy support. That's right, all the MAX motherboards are completely legacy-free … no more PS/2, serial or parallel ports! A small step for Abit, but a huge step for mankind! :D

The motherboards currently available in the Abit MAX series are the AT7 which is based upon the VIA KT333 chipset and supports AMD Athlon CPUs and the IT7 based upon the Intel i845E chipset for Intel Pentium4 CPUs. The latter is the one we're about the have a look at in today's review!

Let's have a look at the wide range of specifications of the Abit IT7 MAX motherboard! We'll also be comparing this IT7 against some other fine boards on todays market …

Page 2 : Specifications

Specifications

Following the good old O² tradition, we took a small copy/paste from the Abit website to show you the specifications of the IT7 MAX motherboard :

CPU

. Supports Intel Pentium 4 Socket478 processor
. 400/533MHz System Data Bus

Chipset

. Intel 845E (ICH4) chipset
. Supports AGP 4X 1.5V device only
. Supports Hi-Speed Universal Series Bus (USB 2.0)
. Supports Dual Ultra ATA/100,Ultra ATA/66,Ultra ATA/33 channels supporting 4 devices

Ultra DMA 133/ RAID

. High Point HPT374 IDE Controller
. Ultra DMA 133MB/sec data transfer rate
. RAID 0 (striping mode for boosting performance)
. RAID 1 (mirroring mode for data security)
. RAID 0 + 1(striping and mirroring)

Memory

. Three 184-pin DIMM sockets support DDR SDRAM modules
. Supports up to 2 GB MAX. (64, 128, 256, 512MB DDR SDRAM)
. Supports unbuffered Non-ECC type DDR DIMMs

Audio

. Realtek ALC650 (AC-Link)
. Supports 6CH DAC for AC3 5.1 CH purpose
. Professional digital audio interface supporting 24-bit SPDIF OUT

Card Reader

. Supports Memory card (MS or SD) Interface
. Supports LPC bus
. Supports SONY Memory Stick Interface / SD Memory Card Interface
. Supports Compact Flash ROM Interface

System BIOS

. SoftMenu III 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 Realtek 8100B single chip Ethernet controller interface
. 10/100Mb Operation
. User friendly driver included

Multi I/O Functions

. 2 channels of Bus Master IDE Ports supporting up to 4 Ultra DMA 33/66/100 devices
. 4 channels of Bus Master IDE Ports supporting up to 8 Ultra DMA 33/66/100/133 (RAID 0/1/1+0) devices
. 6 USB 2.0 Connectors
. On board VIA VT6202 USB 2.0 header for four extra USB channels
. Three P1394a fully compliant cable ports at 100/200/400 megabits per second
. Audio connector (Line-in,Center/Sub, Surround Spk, Front Spk ,Mic-in)

Miscellaneous

. ATX form factor
. 1 AGP 1.5v slot, 4 PCI slots
. Hardware monitoring – Including Fan speeds, Voltages, System environment temperature

A Closer Look At The Specifications

Let's start with a list of things you should find inside the package :

- The IT7 MAX board
- 3
black
IDE cables and 1
black
floppy cable
- USB bracket (for 2 extra USB2.0 connections)
- Driver CD, floppy disk with RAID drivers & a printed manual
- A suitable backpanel for your case
- Blue zip ties

You can see on the various pictures throughout this review that the Abit IT7 motherboard uses a 1/4/0 configuration : this means that it has 1 AGP 4x slot, 'only' 4 PCI slots and 0 ISA, CNR or other slots. Some of you might get scared away by the presence of only 4 PCI slots. Does this mean that if you plug in a soundcard, 2 NICs and a USB bracket in the board, the expansion slots are full? Yes, but that's not the right way to look at this setup! ;) Read on and see why these 4 PCI slots still leave more than enough room for expansion …

The heart of the legacy-free IT7 MAX motherboard is manufactured by Intel and is called the "i845E" chipset. This new DDR chipset for Pentium4 CPUs differs from the i845D chipset by offering OFFICIAL support for 133MHz FSB Pentium4 CPUs, the so-called Northwood B Pentium4 processors which operate at a 533MHz QDR bus. The MCH (or Memory Controller Hub) of the older i845D chipset only had official support for the 400MHz FSB Northwood P4s, but we already found out that most of the i845D based boards have no problems running a 533MHz FSB. One more important thing you should know about the i845E MCH is that it lacks support for DDR333 of PC2700 DDR memory modules. Weird, but true!

Thanks to the i845E MCH (the Northbridge), the IT7 offers 3 DIMMs which can hold a maximum of 2GB unbuffered NON-ECC DDR memory modules. According to the Abit specs, the board doesn't take 1GB DDR modules, but we haven't tried that ourselves because we simply don't have access to 1GB DDR modules :(

Now let's have a look what Southbridge Abit has put on their P4 MAX board …. OMG, it's the I/O Controller Hub 4 (or ICH4)! This southbridge now offers us 2 ATA100 IDE channels, onboard 6-channel audio, an onboard 10/100 network interface and last but not least support for no less than 6 USB2.0 ports! Let's just say that the days of the expansion cards are over when you buy an IT7 MAX board.

That concludes the chat about the Northbridge and Southbridge of our IT7. Let's see what else this board has to offer besides the stuff that's already integrated in the i845E chipset …
First of all, the IT7 sports a total of
10 USB2.0 ports
, 6 of them are controlled by the ICH4 while the other 4 USB connections are 'powered' by an onboard VIA VT6202 USB2.0 controller. These 10 USB2.0 ports should provide you with enough connections to plug in a USB keyboard (remember .. no PS2 connections), a USB mouse, a webcam, a flatbed scanner, and so on … These USB2.0 connections are backwards compatible so you can easily use your older USB1.0 devices on this board without having to worry about compatibility issues! ;) I've tried all the available USB ports on this IT7 and they all work flawless.

Another feature which makes this Abit MAX board one of a kind is the IEEE1394 Firewire support by Texas Instruments. Besides the wide range of USB2.0 ports, Abit has also included 2 IEEE1394A ports with a bandwidth of 400Mbps. This is great for DV camera owners!

Both the onboard sound and the integrated networking solutions are handled by Realtek. The Realtek ALC650 supports a true 6-channel output with 24-bit SPDIF-out. This means 5.1 cinematic sound effects are no problem for this CODEC! Being a hardcore audio freak myself, I compared the audio quality of this chipset to other AC97 onboard sound solutions or the popular C-MEDIA chip. And I must say the Realtek performs way above average. The quality of the audio is clear but when you crank up the speaker volume a little further, you can hear a crackling noise on the background. You could call it hardware distortion from your videocard, hard disks, etc. Nevertheless, the onboard 5.1 audio is more than good enough for normal everyday use! Another Realtek item on the IT7 board is the 8100BL onboard networking which supports 10/100Mbit connections for easy access to fast networking & broadband internet. Because of these 2 Realtek-powered toys, you can save 2 PCI slots by not having to use a soundcard or a NIC …

Many of today's motherboard come with onboard RAID support. And the IT7 MAX from Abit is no exception. On the contrary, the IT7 MAX is the first motherboard to arrive at the O² testlab to feature the new Highpoint HPT374 RAID controller! The HPT374 integrated chip offers 4-channel ATA133 RAID support (RAID0, RAID1, RAID0+1) and allows you to simultaneously connect up to 8 ATA133 IDE devices. Combined with the 2 native ICH4 connectors (support for up to 4 ATA100 IDE devices), this board enables you to connect a maximum of no less than
12 IDE devices
at the same time. Way to go, Abit! Oh yeah, for those who still use a floppy drive (besides just to setup a RAID config), the IT7 also has a standard floppy connector.

If you should have any problem with this board during POST, you can rely on the onboard diagnostic LED to do some fast and easy troubleshooting. If your system doesn't POST, the debugging LEDs will show you a code that you can lookup in the manual. This should allow you to determine which part of your system is causing troubles so you can fix it.

Let's see how Abit has managed to put these tons of features together on one single PCB …

Page 3 : Layout

Layout

A good board layout is a basic element of a good airflow inside your case. A bad motherboard layout caused by for example a bad placement of the IDE connectors can result in the IDE cables blocking the path of the air inside a case that is needed to cool down various pieces of your precious hardware.

Abit seems to have done another excellent job on this matter. At first sight, the IT7 MAX looks like its overloaded with chips, transistors, and other electronic components. But that's just because the IT7 has such a truckload of features for you to enjoy. If you look at the layout a little closer, you'll start understanding the sweet work the Abit engineers did with the design of their MAX board. While the whole thing is loaded with stuff, the layout remains clean and decent.

All the IT7 goodness is 'mounted' on a yellow-brownish PCB following the good old Abit tradition. You have access to no less than 5 fan headers which is nice to hook up some additional case fans.

The immediate surrounding of the socket is free from capacitors, condensators, and other components so you should be able to put some big-ass heatsink or any other type of extreme cooling (H²O, Vapochill, …) on that overclocked P4 Northwood CPU. You can make your fantasies become a reality ;)

One the backpanel of the board we can see 6 USB2.0 connections, the 5.1 sound connection, 2 Firewire IEEE1394 ports and one 10/100Mbit network connector.

To the right of the CPU socket, we see the 3 DIMM slots where you need to put in the DDR memory. On top of the 3 DIMMs, we find the ATX power connectors which is placed horizontally in the top right of the motherboard. This means we don't lose any room on the motherboard and the ATX power cable will not get in the way of the airflow! Nice! However, you might experience some problems when you try to replace a memory module if the ATX cable is connected because the ATX power connector is placed a little too close to the DIMM slots in my opinion. Same story at the bottom of the 3 DIMMs … if you have a large videocard (like a GF4 Ti4600 or something), you may need to remove that card first before you start to add or remove DDR RAM sticks. Minus one point for Abit on this one …

To the right of the 3 DIMM slots, we have the 2 native ATA100 connectors and the floppy drive connector which are all mounted vertically on the motherboard.

The northbridge is cooled only passively by a rather large aluminum heatsink. The nifty retention mechanism takes care of the pression of the heatsink on the northbridge die. The clip and the stock heatsink can be removed very easily in case you want to replace the stock cooling with mount a bigger actively cooled one or even a waterblock ;) Go ahead, there plenty of room around the northbridge.

The AGP 4x slot comes with one of those sweet locking mechanism. These are very welcome to make sure your videocard stays in the slot at all times. Because I'm using a rather heavy waterblock to cool down my GF4 videocard, the locking mechanism is like a gift from God for me ;) I'd never want a board without it anymore …

If we go down the motherboard a little more, we can see the chips that control the various features on this IT7. We have the ICH4 southbridge at the bottom right of the AGP slot, the VIA VT6202 USB2.0 controller, the Realtek LAN controller, the Texas Instruments IEEE1394 controller and the lovely Highpoint HPT374 RAID controller. Right next to the chips, we can see the 4 PCI slots of our IT7 and to the right of the RAID controller Abit has put the 4 IDE RAID connectors mounted in a horizontal position.

At the very bottom of the motherboard, you have access to the debugging LEDs and some buttons : a restart button and a power button. Extremely useful if you run a motherboard outside a case like we often do ;)

Page 4 : BIOS

BIOS

Most overclockers will probably agree with me if I say that Abit always manages to equip their boards with one of the most highly tweakable BIOS's of the entire hardware scene. The Award BIOS on the IT7 MAX motherboard is no exception …

There are
3
important menus in the IT7 MAX bios :
The SoftMenu III Setup, the Integrated Peripherals and the Advanced Chipset Features
.

The "Advanced Chipset Features" menu allows you to adjust options like memory timings and AGP settings. The DRAM timing can be set to the automatic setting (By SPD) or you can also chose to adjust the timings manually which I think all overclockers and tweakers will want to do anyway.

The second menu I want to discuss includes the "Integrated Peripherals". This menu allows us to turn certain features of the motherboard on or off. For example, if you don't use the IDE RAID connections and don't want to have the RAID controller on all the time, you can simply disable the RAID in this menu and save some time during the POST. Same story for the Audio, LAN, IEEE1394 FireWire, USB2.0 and FDD controllers … If you don't need one of these options for some weird reason, you can simply shut them down in this menu!

Then we have the most important menu in the IT7 BIOS (and probably every other Abit board) : The
SoftMenu III
. This menu enables overclockers & tweakers to manually adjust every possible option concerning the BIOS and the CPU. You can set the P4 CPU operating speed to one of the preset CPU speeds in the menu that matches your stock CPU speed or you can set it to the User Define setting. That's the option every overclocker will need to chose because it opens the door to all the fun! ;) The SoftMenu III offers multipliers up to 24x and the ability to increase the FSB from 100MHz all the way up to 250MHz in 1MHz increments. I very much doubt you'll ever need a 250MHz FSB on a P4 CPU, but that's just the way Abit likes their SoftMenu III. Another superb option in this menu is the ability to lock the PCI bus frequency. This means we don't have to worry another minute about data loss or BSODs causing by a PCI bus that's running out of specs. I'm sure hardcore overclockers WORSHIP this feature! :)

The CPU voltage can be adjusted from 1.1V to 1.7V in 0.025V increments while the DDR voltage can be set between 2.5V and 2.8V in 0.1 increments. As you will find out in the overclocking part of this review, you could be amazed what you can accomplish with a Northwood @ 1.7V, but I would loved to have seen the ability to change the core voltage on this board to 1.85V instead of the 1.7V. The only way to increase the voltage of your P4 Northwood CPU to 1.85V on this board is to do some voltage modding on the CPU pins. (If you want to know how to do this, just search the O² Forums for the VID P4 Northwood voltage mod and enlighten yourselves!). I would also have loved to see a DDR voltage of +3V, but I'll say it again … 2.8V DDR RAM voltage is enough to achieve some nice overclocking results!

One last thing I have to mention about the SoftMenu III is the DRAM Ratio option which controls the frequency ratio between the CPU and the RAM. The available options are 1:1 and 3:4 (if the 400MHz FSB H/W strap setting is selected) or 4:3 and 1:1 (if the 533MHz FSB H/W strap setting is selected)! This means that although DDR333 is not officially supported on an i845E motherboard, you can still set your memory to 178MHz (DDR356) when the FSB is at 133MHz (533MHz QDR)!

Page 5 : Overclocking

Overclocking

A P4 1.6GHz Northwood CPU is like a dream for all Pentium4 overclockers. Although the 1.6A didn't overclock past 2.3GHz in our review of the EPoX 4SDA+ SiS645 motherboard due to the SiS645 chipset limitations, I had a better feeling about the IT7 and its overclocking potential …

I'd like to note that we used original Samsung PC2700 DDR RAM during all overclocking and benchmark tests.

First I started to increase the default 100MHz FSB (400MHz QDR) of my 1.6A P4 to 133MHz (533MHz QDR). As planned, we didn't even have to touch the default CPU voltage (1.5V) so this really didn't satisfy our overclocking needs. So I decided to crank up the CPU core voltage to the board max. at 1.7V and start my quest for a 166MHz FSB … The IT7 MAX board and my 1.6A CPU passed all torture tests at 150MHz FSB, 155MHz FSB, 160MHz FSB and 166MHz FSB! 16 x 166MHz FSB (664MHz QDR) = 2.65GHz P4 CPU power! Simply amazing huh! BUT the story has not come near its end yet, so keep on reading folks …

Still being all excited from my 1GHz overclock, I kept thinking : 'Will the board handle even higher FSB speeds?' The answer is YES! With the CPU voltage still at 1.7V and the DDR memory voltage at 2.8V (board max), I managed to run my 1.6A @ 175MHz FSB (700MHZ QDR) on the IT7!! Folks, this results in a massive
2800MHz
of raw CPU power with a Pentium 4 1.6Ghz Northwood CPU. That's
a 1.2GHz ultra-stable overclock
! :D

SIMPLY IMPRESSIVE!

Page 6 : Benchmarking

Benchmarking

Test System :

- Intel Pentium 4 1.6GHz Northwood CPU
- ABIT IT7 MAX (i845E) Motherboard
- 256MB Samsung PC2700 DDR RAM
- Visiontek GeForce3 videocard
- Maxtor 60GB ATA133 7200rpm hard drive
- WinXP + latest drivers
- Detonator 29.42

3DMARK2001 SE

Quake 3 Arena v1.17 – Demo001

Quake 3 Arena v1.17 – Torture Demo

Sisoft Sandra 2002 Pro

Page 7 : Conclusion

Conclusion

Good

- Highly Overclockable
- Stable
- Excellent performance
- BIOS tweaks
- Loaded with features (LAN, USB2.0, FireWire, ATA133 RAID, 5.1 sound, etc.)
- Debugging LEDs

Bad

- Passive northbridge cooling
- "Only" 1.7V core voltage & 2.8V DDR voltage
- Placement of the DIMM slots

ABIT sure has a winner with their IT7 MAX Pentium4 motherboard! That's for sure. The board combines what's probably the best Pentium4 chipset at the moment, the i845E, with a truckload of features, excellent layout, stability and performance. The overclocking potential of the IT7 is also simply impressive. We managed to clock the slowest Pentium4 Northwood CPU aka the 1.6A all the way up to 2.8GHz which is exactly the speed of today's fastest P4 Northwood processor! And since we're using a 175MHz (or 700MHz QDR) FSB, this baby will even outperform a stock 2.8GHz Pentium4 CPU running at 133MHz (533MHz QDR) FSB. At these kind of speeds, the IT7 MAX didn't give us one single lockup or random crash during our benchmarks. Of course, the rate of success with an overclocking project differs from CPU to CPU, but at least you know the IT7 MAX would never let you down. To conclude the review, I'd like to recommend this board to everyone who wants one of the best P4 motherboards on today's market. If you have the necessary $$$, go ahead and buy this board … you wont regret it AT ALL!