Brace yourself everyone... I am currently running.... AN ABIT!

[jonnyGURU]

yes. It's true. I finally found an Abit KT7-RAID in the bunch that doesn't crash, have a slow ATA100 controller, have a dead mouse port, has poor AGP performance or isn't DOA.

It hasn't done anything unpredictable, yet. Except for I have a RAID 0+1 set up and the Mirror RAID just completely DISAPPEARED off the controller so I had to go in an reconstruct that part of the array, but I don't blame Abit for that. I was warned ahead of time about Highpoint controllers.

I also have a little jar next to the PC with $25 in it just in case it dies on me and I have to RMA the board.

 

[Bakwetu]

...so you finally went over to the dark side, tell me how many mobos did you have to go through before you found a working one? How about trying out the new msi k7t pro2 instead, it seem to be very promising with multipliers and all?

 

[jonnyGURU]

It does seem promising, but we don't have any.

I went through three boards, to answer your question.

Third times a charm!

Had a 1 GHz T-Bird in it (that wasn't mine) and could only overclock w/ the FSB since the BF only goes up to 10X, but once I went over 110 MHz, the AGP card would go wacko.

Now I'm running a 650 Duron and can get up to 850 with it and still be game playing stable.

Hasn't crashed yet.

 

[Bakwetu]

So then why are everybody complaining over high rma rates for Abit boards 66% is not all that bad is it?

 

[Stealth1024]

Alright, so if someone like me is looking to construct a quality T-Bird system, what motherboard should I purchase (single processor, 5 or 6 PCI and hopefully 0 ISA, ATX)?

 

[jonnyGURU]

Nope. This boards going into the circular file.

I'm done.

I've had enough abuse.

I sware to God some people's idea of stable is that it runs more than an hour.

After three hours of use last night, I completely lost my video card and couldn't get it to reinstall. Also, my AWE64 has sounded choppy ever since I put it in (the card sounded fine in every board I put it in prior).

I decided to put ME on the machine to see if my issues were just software (even though all of the same hardware was on another PC working fine) and it's locked up twice.

I haven't even gotten into OVERCLOCKING IT yet!

What a piece.

Also, I lost my mirror drives AGAIN, so I'm just pulling those off altogether. Having redundacy doesn't help if I can't even keep the data from that in tact!

:| :| :|

 

[pdo]

hehe. So which board are you going to use next Jonny? MSI? I haven't had a single problems with my A7V how's your experience with. I've been with Asus from the beginning of time(P5A-->P3B-F-->A7V) till now and never had a problems with it.

 

[Mem]

LOL.. if jonnyGURU is wise he will buy the MSI K7T PRO2 board ,or at the least the normal version,btw mine(MSI K7T PRO) as been rock stable since I brought it & I have been busy playing games being that it`s so stable.

 

[ToBeMe]

Jonny......seems you have the same kind of luck with the Abit boards as I have always had with Asus......Some things just aren't meant to be! If i were you, I'd just stay away from them....that's what Ive done to halt the chest pain & boiling blood pressure I seem to get every time I have to build a system with an Asus board......thing of it is, it's almost always "stupid" things...things you would just take for granted....oh well, not gonna worry about that anymore!!! Hey, wanna sell me that board? I promise, I'll never tell ya' what became of it!

 

[jakinney]

JohnnyGURU,

I just find it amazing that you actually went through three boards, and none of them worked properly. It must be that I am just incredibly lucky, since my board has performed perfectly ever since the day I bought it.

I consistently get 56000 - 57000 kps. from the highpoint and two maxtor 7200 rpm drives. (according to hdtach) here are the benchmarks to prove it.

And as far as stability goes, almost all I do is write reports, using my machine for hours on end, and I've never had a system crash.

I've built more than my fair share of machines, and I was impressed at how easily this system went together. Perhaps you should take a little more time when choosing components.

justin

 

[billyjak]

I got mine 3 days ago and am one happy camper.
Updated bios to 103 and the Raid Drivers to 103
Rock stable
Using VIA 425a drivers
It didn't install the V-Gart driver though, after manually installing it, my video problems disappeared.
My voltage was reporting 1.85 default and causing instability. Set it to 1.75v and alls well. it was reporting 1.99v , now it's corrected
Rock stable, on 24hrs 3 days now, playing UT, NFSHS, Quake, Nascar Racing and Nascar heat
Had it set to 1.05 rock stable but went back to 1Gig to play with the bios and break in the chip first.

Athlon 1 Gig
196 pc 150
Hercules 32meg GF2 oc 218/378
Hitachi 19" 753 Superscan
56x CDRom
Philips CDRW

7159 3 D Marks
54000 to 55000 in raid
2500 non raid
Rock Stable
I was losing faith when I fist got mine but after playing with the bios, it's now Rock Stable
I highly doubt 3 board in a row are faulty
This is one stable board, as there are alot of settings in bios that will crash this if not set properly.
I now have faith in Abit again.
One happy Abit owner here.

 

[FluxCapacitor]

So, what you're really saying is that its "rock stable"... and stuff.

 

[DaddyG]

I want the movie rights . JonnyGURU vs the Evil ABIT Empire.

 

[ToBeMe]

No....How about..MOBO MAYHAMStarring JONNY GURU As Super Tech 008And Featuring..........THE EVIL ABITS FROM HELL!!!............(LOL)

 

[SuperSix]

After all the RMA's, problems and issues with the Abit. You HAD to have the lame (non-working) features. For shame Jonny. You knew better..


MSI or NOTHING when it comes to Athlon.

"Doctor.. It hurts when I do this!"

Doctor repiles..

"well.. Don't do that."

 

[jonnyGURU]

Well. I am now PC-less. The Abit just got worse and worse until the point where it didn't do anything in Windows without locking up.

SuperSix: Yeah. You're right. Any board that has a 12% RMA rate, I should know to stay away from.

Red: Not ASI. Our local warehouse doesn't carry Abit. Besides, I'm the one opening the boxes and cutting the Abit packing tape myself, so I don't see how where they came from matters.

 

[SuperSix]

I am eagerly awaiting the arrival of the MSI K7TPro2. If it indeed has UDMA100, and adj multipliers and what not in BIOS, I may swing back over to AMD.

 

[jonnyGURU]

I'm not gonna go back to Socket A for a while after this experience.

I stuck all of my parts in an SD11 board and it's running beautiful.

The Biostar board doesn't like my Enermax power supply or I'd still be using it. At least the SD11 does 1G T-Birds!

Anyone want to make an offer on a 650 Duron stable at 850????

 

[ToBeMe]

I'll Take both....The Board & Chip!!!!!!

 

[jonnyGURU]

Not the board. It went back to Abit.

The CPU is available, though.

By the time I switch to socket, the 650 Duron will be like the K6-III is today.

 

[WetWilly]

jonny,

Ignoring your Abit jinx for the moment , I'm kind of curious - why didn't you just move your Promise controller and RAID array over to the KT7 instead of putting it on the relatively inferior Highpoint?

 

[jonnyGURU]

Because I couldn't afford the four drives >> AND << the RAID card.

Gotta admit that the Abit with RAID >> included << has a VERY attractive price.

If I >> JUST << wanted a board to overclock my Duron, I would've just bought the Asus A7V since they have a lower RMA rate.

Instead, I just sold the Duron to a fellow Anander and I move on.

 

[HardwareAddicted]

Ok, so forgeting about the raid/hpt problem...
how high can the voltage go on a Abit KT7 &amp; KT7Raid???

Asus A7V I guess can only do 1.85?

Jonny??

 

[jonnyGURU]

I didn't have a RAID problem.

Remember, I pulled the RAID off an reinstalled everything on one WD with the RAID disabled and the board still SUCKED.