AT7-Max2 or MSI KT4 Ultra-FISR

[Zoomer]

I'm at the crossroads wondering which board I should be getting so I though I would see what experiences people have had with either board.

Currently I'm running the Soltek DRV5 however I don't find it to be a very stable motherboard. The Abit board seems to offer alot of features and overclocking abilities in the BIOS but is she stable?

Both boards (abit & msi) are feature rich and have serial ATA, RAID etc. However, I've heard that MSI boards are slow and don't perform all that well. I'd be interested to hear your experiences with either Abit Max2 or MSI KT4.. Thanks..

 

[pby5cat]

the abit has a heatsink constrant but an AX-7 will barly fit, also the supplied temp monitering program does not work. all of the KT400 boards preform about the same, though the abit preforms 1% better than the rest. both th abit and MSI have there problems but the MSI has the least.
ps both are stable though the MSI doesn't over clock well.

 

[madsam]

i'm currently testing a kd7-raid, and i got my xp1600 up to 175fsb, in the 4th divider, i didn't do the 5th. gonna need an updated bios first. this board absolutely rocks, but it's not mine. it belongs to a friend, but my at7-max2 will be here monday, so, i'll be expecting a lot out of it.

 

[Sonny]

Ship it already dude!

 

[madsam]

Relax already

Ship it already dude!

just shipped yesterday dude, now relax. it's coming soon. let us know your verdict sonny. imho, you are probably going to love it. my at7-max2 is coming monday or tuesday, so, i'm pretty excited too

 

[Matrix78]

I Love mine!!!

 

[pby5cat]

matrix78: did u get the "serllal" (serial to parallel ATA) converters? and does the temp moniter program work?

 

[madsam]

from what i understand, they only supp;y one sata converter and wire, and if the hardware monitor does not work, just download the ne on abit's site and you'll be all set. when my board gets here, i will post what came in the box. the kd7-raid had no converter and cable at all. also, as far as the at7-max2 is concerned, i even hear some coming from newegg, or all, have no back plate......i ordered from google, so wjen it gets here, i will see if i've been robbed of my parts also.

 

[Matrix78]

in the box came:

board
back plate
black cbls 2IDE / 1 floppy
driver disk for HPT374
abit CD for more drivers
1 - SATA converter
1 - SATA power spliter
1 - SATA cbl
pacage of blue wire ties and holders
manual

and on my system the monitering software does NOT work some dll or some other crap problem

 

[madsam]

in the box came:

board
back plate
black cbls 2IDE / 1 floppy
driver disk for HPT374
abit CD for more drivers
1 - SATA converter
1 - SATA power spliter
1 - SATA cbl
pacage of blue wire ties and holders
manual

and on my system the monitering software does NOT work some dll or some other crap problem

did the downloaded hardware monitor fail also, or just the supplied one on the cd?

i hope there won't be issues with this board

 

[Matrix78]

ummm i donno i just got MBM5. . . . does Abit have a new monitor?? i'll go check right now and reprot back as soon as i can

 

[Matrix78]

here ya go, the one on the Abit site works jsut fine

http://www.abit-usa.com/downloads/utility/

 

[madsam]

cool, i don't have my board yet, but i made a cd with all the new max2 drivers so, there won't be a problem later when i install the board. i am glad however, that you confirmed the new one does in fact work...cheers to ya.., and thanks for the link...

what voltage are you using on that 1600 to get the 1.95 gig, and did you try to see how high you can get the fsb with the 4th divider? i did on a kd7-raid, and i got to 175fsb @ 5th div. i am hoping the max2 can do that or better... i will however , use the 5th to get 2 gig on air, but stable. ....my rig hit 2 gig on air, but that was about long enough to get a benchie done, and i retreated ..... so, i assume the kt400, and the extra voltages available will do the trick

 

[Matrix78]

i'm useing the 1/5 divider, i switched ti from 4 to 5 when i got to 166FSB i didnt see any reason to try and leave it at 4 and raise the PCI that high

right now i'm at a Vcore of 2.2 but the all my monitering software reads i'm at 2.10 - 2.13 ish right now i'm at 184 FSB with the 10.5 mult i've been to 190 FSB but it wasnt stable for more than a few min 184 - 185 seems to be her spot for right now so i've gone on to playing with the mem timeings and OC'ing the grafix and in a few days / weekish i'll try to up the FSB some more again after she's been burning for a while, my whole setup is only a few weeks old at best and with school and work it hasnt had time to be stressed alot

did u get the new high point drivers too?? if u plan on using the SATA

 

[madsam]

my sugestion to run it in the 4th divider was just to see how high it can go with the kt400 chipset. i wasn't saying to leave it there, just test it there. i will try mine when i get it. the problem is that if you test to see how high it will go, it means to keep increasing til it won't boot...then reset the cmos. but if you are tweaking right now, i wouldn't want to have you cause a crash just yet. i will however try it before i get to tweaking too much at first....

 

[Matrix78]

in the first few days i reset the CMOS about 20 times a day, my chip really needed to get burnt in before it was willing to play nice talk about a virgin not wanting to pop her cherry she was a lil b'ya

and as far as this Abit monitering program go's, i say its crap its ugly doesnt keep track and jsut sits there looking stupid, i'd highly sugest using MBM5. . . . unless u want to monitor your vDimm AGPv and 2 or 3 other things that i could really care less about. . . just my .02

 

[madsam]

i also use speedfan for the monitoring. it gives the voltages and fan speeds, as well as temps. maybe you find it boring because your volatges are stable, but if had a crappy 400 watt psu like i had, you'd get to see the cool bars dance for you. i just ordered a nice psu, but it won't make the bars dance........hopefully

i see you are using a lot of voltage there. what is your stepping on that xp1600?

 

[Matrix78]

AROIA 0213 Y

 

[madsam]

not a bad o/c at all. is that chip green? i have a brown agoia y 0213, but my brother has the same week in aroia, and his is green....i like the greens because they clean up so nicely

 

[Naasar]

i'm useing the 1/5 divider, i switched ti from 4 to 5 when i got to 166FSB i didnt see any reason to try and leave it at 4 and raise the PCI that high

right now i'm at a Vcore of 2.2 but the all my monitering software reads i'm at 2.10 - 2.13 ish right now i'm at 184 FSB with the 10.5 mult i've been to 190 FSB but it wasnt stable for more than a few min 184 - 185 seems to be her spot for right now so i've gone on to playing with the mem timeings and OC'ing the grafix and in a few days / weekish i'll try to up the FSB some more again after she's been burning for a while, my whole setup is only a few weeks old at best and with school and work it hasnt had time to be stressed alot

did u get the new high point drivers too?? if u plan on using the SATA

what are ur temps looking like at such a high voltage? idle and load? is that good for a cpu to run at such a voltage for a long time?