- Oct 13, 1999
- 22,377
- 7
- 81
Abit KN8 mini review
CLIFFNOTES VERSION:
Decent overclocker if CPU is willing, great price for a "name brand." Will hit the magical 300MHz.
TEST PARTS USED:
-G.Skill 2GB dual channel kit PC3200 CAS 2
-Kingmax 1GB dual channel kit PC3200 CAS 2.5
-PCIe 16X Geforce 6600GT
-Athlon 64 3200+
-Athlon 64 x2 3800+
-retail box HSF from 3800+
-Antec TruePower 2.0 480W
OVERVIEW:
The point of this "mini review" is to give people an idea of what they can expect when purchasing one of these since most reviewers tend to ignore "bottom feeder" motherboards such as this one.
I ordered this board on 11/25/05 from MonarchComputer.com and received it on 12/02/05. My cost at that time was $226 plus shipping (mobo $86, CPU $140, pricing will vary with current market values). For that price I received the motherboard, an Athlon 64 3200+ OEM CPU and a bunch of free items - Half Life 2 Steam offer, Bet On Soldier game disc, Sapphire lanyard, LiveStrong bracelet and a Patriot kit with a 128MB SD flash card and a USB SD reader. A very nice bundle. I'll definately use the Patriot SD card and Half Life 2.
Most boards perform like any other board with the same chipset so I'm not going to do any benchmarks or anything since you won't learn anything new. Also, the x2 3800+ CPU is just that. Plenty of benchmarks to be found elsewhere.
MOTHERBOARD FEATURES:
1X PCIe 16X
3X PCIe 1X
3X PCI
4X DDR
4X SATA
7.1 Audio (ALC850)
Optical SPDIF output
10/100/1000 NIC
3 sets of USB headers plus 4 ports in rear, total 10 ports.
Phoenix/Award BIOS 12 and 14
The board is a bit above basic. No firewire but most other things people need/want.
FIRST IMPRESSIONS:
This is my second socket 939 board (both using the Nforce4 chipset). Upon opening the package what struck me was that Abit was nice enough to throw in 4 SATA cables and a floppy disk with the SATA drivers. A quick perusal through the manual shows that a native English speaker wrote it - you'd imagine that would be standard by now.
This board has three sets of USB headers, but unfortunately they aren't as well located as on the previous board. These are in the lower right quadrant, but the are located a bit "inboard" from the edge of the PCB, meaning cabling just got a bit messier.
Overall the layout of the board is pretty nice with the exception (if anybody still uses it) of the FDD port at the bottom below the last PCI slot. The power connector is on the middle right, near the edge of the PCB. The IDE connectors are at the edge of the PCB with pins parallel to the PCB - some people like this and some do not, but it does put them really close to the bottom right corner mounting hole potentially interfering with screw heads. The IDE connectors are also a bit "low" on the motherboard which is fine for the typical case with HDD bays right next to them, but makes for a bit of a stretch to reach the top 5¼" bays in a large tower case. The SATA connectors are just inboard of the IDE connectors, in the triangle outlined by the chipset, end of the PCIe 16X slot and the back of the second IDE connector. The ATX 12v 4pin connector is behind the PS/2 ports, closer to the CPU socket and a bit inboard. Nice not having to stretch cables over the CPU area.
The chipset fan spins at just under 5000RPM and isn't super noisy - definately drowned out by the video card fan on my test 6600GT. The good news is that it clears the PCIe 16x slot by almost a full slot so if your video card doesn't have anything sticking too far out the back of it, you can replace the HSF with a large passive heatsink. Note that this chipset heatsink is held on by push pins with springs, typical of most AMD system boards.
The CPU socket is far enough away from the top edge of the board and away from the chipset HSF (with PCIe 16x slot below the chipset HSF). This makes for a lot of room to fit large HSFs. I still have a Zalman 7700AlCu cooler that I never used because I couldn't fit it on my other boards. This board looks as if there's plenty of room. The RAM slots are a bit close to the CPu socket but most oversized heatsinks are flared so that they'll clear the RAM okay unless you have some exceptionally tall RAM.
There is a heatsink over the power components between the CPU and the rear ATX ports. It happened to be positioned just right to catch air coming out of the retail box HSF, a nice touch.
I have to mention that there is a male molex power connector at the bottom of the board next to the floppy connector. The manual states that it si for added stability. The board seems to run without anything plugged in so we'll see...
BIOS
The BIOS is the typical Phoenix - Award found in an Abit board, meaning it is feature filled and has the "SoftMenu Setup" as the first item on the list.
SoftMenu:
FSB 200-450
Multiplier 4-CPU max in .5 increments
PCIe 100-145 (I still don't know why you'd want to change this)
vcore from default to around 1.80V!!! in .02v increments
vDIMM from 2.50-2.70 in .05v increments and 2.80-3.20 in .1v increments
DDR Ref Voltage ??? have no idea what this does
nForce4 Voltage 1.5-1.7v in .05v increments and up to 2.0v in .1v increments
HyperTransport Voltage in +2/4/8/12/16% increments
The HT Frequency is under Advanced Chipset Features as well as DRAM Configuration - which has about five billion possible settings to play with. Memory multipliers in DDR MHz are 200/266/333/400/433/466/500.
I have to note that the vcore hardly fluctuates and is locked about .01v above default. That is notable considering most boards (the ECS NFORCE4-A939 included) tend to undervolt CPUs by a hair.
On defaults the BIOS automatically lowers the CPU fan speed, a nice touch.
OVERCLOCKING RESULTS:
Sad to say that my ECS board overclocked more successfully than this board. I'm heartbroken!!! At 251MHz the board will not POST, no matter what the settings. I've increased ALL the voltages, lowered HT to 3X, lowered memory to 266, CPU multiplier to 7X (default 10X)... 250MHz works fine. 251MHz results in no POST.
Checking on Abit's site...
BIOS 13
Fixed the issue that the external clock cannot be set higher than 250MHz.
Updated BIOS and now it'll POST higher than 250MHz, but I still can't get much higher. 270 will not POST and 260 will lock on Prime, just like the other board. I reduced the multiplier to 8x and was able to easily go 300MHz (133 DDR266 RAM). Definately CPU limited. Going for broke, I reduced multiplier to 7X, HT to 3X, RAM to 100 (DDR200) and it booted... but locked on Prime. Raising chipset and HyperTransport voltages let it go a hair farther before Prime gave an error - no locking this time. The voltages can go higher, but I'm not going to bother because I'm CPU limited and 300MHz with RAM at 2/3 makes for perfect DDR400.
My x2 3800+ passes Prime at 2.5GHz with only TWO changes to the BIOS on the ECS board, raising system bus to 250MHz and lowering RAM to 166 (DDR333 or 5/6). The same CPU fails Prime immediately on the Abit board with these settings.
At 2.5GHz I can get the CPU to pass Prime if I really slam down on the settings, bumping voltage on everything and lowering HT to 3X and memory to DDR266. After some more testing I found out that it was my RAM causing Prime to fail!!! With a 250MHz system bus and 5/6 multiplier (166 or DDR333 depending on how BIOS describes it) my RAM should be running at about DDR417, a tiny overclock. This RAM (G.Skill 2x1GB CAS 2 DDR400) will run happily on the ECS board at that speed using default voltage and CAS 2 latencies, but will not hit the same speeds on the Abit board even pumping 2.8v through the memory. Perhaps the board doesn't "like" the memory? Switching RAM "fixed" the problem, now running my cheap Kingmax DDR400 CAS 2.5 slightly overclocked at DDR417, all else stock.
Plugging in power to the molex connector does not seem to do anything.
CONCLUSION:
The board seems to be a solid design with most of the features that people will use. The included bundle of cabling, driver disk and nice manual is always a good sign.
This board seems an okay overclocker and CPU voltages are pretty tight. It certainly has as many settings as anything except for DFI LANPARTY boards. The ability to raise chipset and HyperTransport voltages will help attain super high bus speeds if your CPU has a lot of headroom. Monarch has it for $86 and you get a lot of really nice freebies bundled with a CPU, or you can get it from Newegg for $82. This board is as good as any other board in the price range so if you're an Abit fan on a budget, the KN8 is your board of choice.
Gone are the days of Abit being the only overclocking game in town. There are many boards from competing manufacturers (Chaintech, Epox to name a couple) using the same chipset and in the same price range which can probably overclock just as well as this Abit. However, if you want to relive the glory days this board will take you there.
CLIFFNOTES VERSION:
Decent overclocker if CPU is willing, great price for a "name brand." Will hit the magical 300MHz.
TEST PARTS USED:
-G.Skill 2GB dual channel kit PC3200 CAS 2
-Kingmax 1GB dual channel kit PC3200 CAS 2.5
-PCIe 16X Geforce 6600GT
-Athlon 64 3200+
-Athlon 64 x2 3800+
-retail box HSF from 3800+
-Antec TruePower 2.0 480W
OVERVIEW:
The point of this "mini review" is to give people an idea of what they can expect when purchasing one of these since most reviewers tend to ignore "bottom feeder" motherboards such as this one.
I ordered this board on 11/25/05 from MonarchComputer.com and received it on 12/02/05. My cost at that time was $226 plus shipping (mobo $86, CPU $140, pricing will vary with current market values). For that price I received the motherboard, an Athlon 64 3200+ OEM CPU and a bunch of free items - Half Life 2 Steam offer, Bet On Soldier game disc, Sapphire lanyard, LiveStrong bracelet and a Patriot kit with a 128MB SD flash card and a USB SD reader. A very nice bundle. I'll definately use the Patriot SD card and Half Life 2.
Most boards perform like any other board with the same chipset so I'm not going to do any benchmarks or anything since you won't learn anything new. Also, the x2 3800+ CPU is just that. Plenty of benchmarks to be found elsewhere.
MOTHERBOARD FEATURES:
1X PCIe 16X
3X PCIe 1X
3X PCI
4X DDR
4X SATA
7.1 Audio (ALC850)
Optical SPDIF output
10/100/1000 NIC
3 sets of USB headers plus 4 ports in rear, total 10 ports.
Phoenix/Award BIOS 12 and 14
The board is a bit above basic. No firewire but most other things people need/want.
FIRST IMPRESSIONS:
This is my second socket 939 board (both using the Nforce4 chipset). Upon opening the package what struck me was that Abit was nice enough to throw in 4 SATA cables and a floppy disk with the SATA drivers. A quick perusal through the manual shows that a native English speaker wrote it - you'd imagine that would be standard by now.
This board has three sets of USB headers, but unfortunately they aren't as well located as on the previous board. These are in the lower right quadrant, but the are located a bit "inboard" from the edge of the PCB, meaning cabling just got a bit messier.
Overall the layout of the board is pretty nice with the exception (if anybody still uses it) of the FDD port at the bottom below the last PCI slot. The power connector is on the middle right, near the edge of the PCB. The IDE connectors are at the edge of the PCB with pins parallel to the PCB - some people like this and some do not, but it does put them really close to the bottom right corner mounting hole potentially interfering with screw heads. The IDE connectors are also a bit "low" on the motherboard which is fine for the typical case with HDD bays right next to them, but makes for a bit of a stretch to reach the top 5¼" bays in a large tower case. The SATA connectors are just inboard of the IDE connectors, in the triangle outlined by the chipset, end of the PCIe 16X slot and the back of the second IDE connector. The ATX 12v 4pin connector is behind the PS/2 ports, closer to the CPU socket and a bit inboard. Nice not having to stretch cables over the CPU area.
The chipset fan spins at just under 5000RPM and isn't super noisy - definately drowned out by the video card fan on my test 6600GT. The good news is that it clears the PCIe 16x slot by almost a full slot so if your video card doesn't have anything sticking too far out the back of it, you can replace the HSF with a large passive heatsink. Note that this chipset heatsink is held on by push pins with springs, typical of most AMD system boards.
The CPU socket is far enough away from the top edge of the board and away from the chipset HSF (with PCIe 16x slot below the chipset HSF). This makes for a lot of room to fit large HSFs. I still have a Zalman 7700AlCu cooler that I never used because I couldn't fit it on my other boards. This board looks as if there's plenty of room. The RAM slots are a bit close to the CPu socket but most oversized heatsinks are flared so that they'll clear the RAM okay unless you have some exceptionally tall RAM.
There is a heatsink over the power components between the CPU and the rear ATX ports. It happened to be positioned just right to catch air coming out of the retail box HSF, a nice touch.
I have to mention that there is a male molex power connector at the bottom of the board next to the floppy connector. The manual states that it si for added stability. The board seems to run without anything plugged in so we'll see...
BIOS
The BIOS is the typical Phoenix - Award found in an Abit board, meaning it is feature filled and has the "SoftMenu Setup" as the first item on the list.
SoftMenu:
FSB 200-450
Multiplier 4-CPU max in .5 increments
PCIe 100-145 (I still don't know why you'd want to change this)
vcore from default to around 1.80V!!! in .02v increments
vDIMM from 2.50-2.70 in .05v increments and 2.80-3.20 in .1v increments
DDR Ref Voltage ??? have no idea what this does
nForce4 Voltage 1.5-1.7v in .05v increments and up to 2.0v in .1v increments
HyperTransport Voltage in +2/4/8/12/16% increments
The HT Frequency is under Advanced Chipset Features as well as DRAM Configuration - which has about five billion possible settings to play with. Memory multipliers in DDR MHz are 200/266/333/400/433/466/500.
I have to note that the vcore hardly fluctuates and is locked about .01v above default. That is notable considering most boards (the ECS NFORCE4-A939 included) tend to undervolt CPUs by a hair.
On defaults the BIOS automatically lowers the CPU fan speed, a nice touch.
OVERCLOCKING RESULTS:
Sad to say that my ECS board overclocked more successfully than this board. I'm heartbroken!!! At 251MHz the board will not POST, no matter what the settings. I've increased ALL the voltages, lowered HT to 3X, lowered memory to 266, CPU multiplier to 7X (default 10X)... 250MHz works fine. 251MHz results in no POST.
Checking on Abit's site...
BIOS 13
Fixed the issue that the external clock cannot be set higher than 250MHz.
Updated BIOS and now it'll POST higher than 250MHz, but I still can't get much higher. 270 will not POST and 260 will lock on Prime, just like the other board. I reduced the multiplier to 8x and was able to easily go 300MHz (133 DDR266 RAM). Definately CPU limited. Going for broke, I reduced multiplier to 7X, HT to 3X, RAM to 100 (DDR200) and it booted... but locked on Prime. Raising chipset and HyperTransport voltages let it go a hair farther before Prime gave an error - no locking this time. The voltages can go higher, but I'm not going to bother because I'm CPU limited and 300MHz with RAM at 2/3 makes for perfect DDR400.
My x2 3800+ passes Prime at 2.5GHz with only TWO changes to the BIOS on the ECS board, raising system bus to 250MHz and lowering RAM to 166 (DDR333 or 5/6). The same CPU fails Prime immediately on the Abit board with these settings.
At 2.5GHz I can get the CPU to pass Prime if I really slam down on the settings, bumping voltage on everything and lowering HT to 3X and memory to DDR266. After some more testing I found out that it was my RAM causing Prime to fail!!! With a 250MHz system bus and 5/6 multiplier (166 or DDR333 depending on how BIOS describes it) my RAM should be running at about DDR417, a tiny overclock. This RAM (G.Skill 2x1GB CAS 2 DDR400) will run happily on the ECS board at that speed using default voltage and CAS 2 latencies, but will not hit the same speeds on the Abit board even pumping 2.8v through the memory. Perhaps the board doesn't "like" the memory? Switching RAM "fixed" the problem, now running my cheap Kingmax DDR400 CAS 2.5 slightly overclocked at DDR417, all else stock.
Plugging in power to the molex connector does not seem to do anything.
CONCLUSION:
The board seems to be a solid design with most of the features that people will use. The included bundle of cabling, driver disk and nice manual is always a good sign.
This board seems an okay overclocker and CPU voltages are pretty tight. It certainly has as many settings as anything except for DFI LANPARTY boards. The ability to raise chipset and HyperTransport voltages will help attain super high bus speeds if your CPU has a lot of headroom. Monarch has it for $86 and you get a lot of really nice freebies bundled with a CPU, or you can get it from Newegg for $82. This board is as good as any other board in the price range so if you're an Abit fan on a budget, the KN8 is your board of choice.
Gone are the days of Abit being the only overclocking game in town. There are many boards from competing manufacturers (Chaintech, Epox to name a couple) using the same chipset and in the same price range which can probably overclock just as well as this Abit. However, if you want to relive the glory days this board will take you there.
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