Which board to get, NF7-S or AN7?

[ianching]

Both of them are available for similar prices in here.

Other than "uGuru" (which I won't be using), what special features does AN7 has over NF7-S? Are there any design changes or new overclocking features that makes AN7 overclock better?

In local forums here, people are saying that NF7-S overclocks better than AN7, what's your view on this?

Which is the latest board revision for NF7-S? Is it v2.0?

Thanks a lot.

 

[Soulkeeper]

i've tryed the nf7-s (v2.0 most are now) and loved that board
but if i was to get another board i would prob get the AN7 just for the new abit exclusive overclocking things
i'm sure those multiple bios settings will come in handy
some people say there were some problems with the AN7 but it appears to have only been a cosmetic issue on a few sample boards and is fixed now (a cut trace that wasn't needed)

both boards are solid but just cause the AN7 is a newer version i would give it the thumbs up

 

[Snaggle]

an7 has firewire;but the nf7-s only has it by internal cable.

 

[Actaeon]

HardOCP's review of the AN7

Well, even champions will occasionally trip and stumble, and that is exactly what the AN7 appears to be doing to ABIT. After having first hand great experiences with both the NF7-S v 1.1 and v 1.2, I was expecting an incredible board out of the AN7. With its uGuru processor, diagnostic LED, super high CPU and DDR voltage, and great layout, the board was a no brainer winner at first glance. Boy, was I disappointed.

The problems encountered seem to be mostly BIOS related issues that should easily be addressable through BIOS updates to be released in the near future, hopefully. Case in point - with BIOS 12, I ran in to major memory timing issues when attempting to manual set memory timings. The board would ignore my manual settings and use internally derived settings based on the CPU FSB selected. This especially wreaked havoc with my PC4000 RAM. However, the issue magically disappeared when I upgraded to BIOS 13. But all the other issues listed in the BIOS page still occurred with BIOS 13 loaded including: CPU voltage set statically to 2v with voltage set to manual, regardless of the selected voltage; Northbridge chipset voltage set statically to 1.65 with voltage set to manual, regardless of the selected voltage; and the BIOS reverting to fail safe and/or default settings when the board was power cycled (power down and power up, not soft reboot).

Don?t get me wrong, the board has a great deal of potential. However, at this point, I have serious reservations about recommending the board to anyone. I?d personally wait for either a major BIOS overhaul and/or a newer board revision before jumping on to the AN7 bandwagon?

I thought the AN7 was going to be awesome, but after reading that review, I'm not quite sure anymore . Either way I use an NF7-S 2.0 now, and I love the board. Can't go wrong with it.

 

[echow87]

Yup, the NF7-s is a swEEt board. As you can tell, many people use it for overclocking. And nf7-s board has quite a lot of options, including a voltage mod you can do for upping your vcore up to 2.0v+

 

[JSniper33]

NF7 has proven itself. AN7 might be just as good...but its had less time in the market. Go with what's proven.

 

[Corporate Thug]

remember guys, NF7-s had the similar problems with bios corruption when it was first released. it took abit a little while to fix the problems that the first version had

 

[Wuzup101]

You might consider heading over to www.nforcershq.com forums for info on the NF7-s (and AN7 for that matter) there are a million people over there using them (including myself). The AN7 looks like a fairly solid board, and it does have 1 firewire port onboard and spdif in/out. However the NF7-s is time tested and proven, and I doublt anyone here doesnt' have room in their case to take out and extra I/O shield and put the remote firewire ports in. Also, you can add spdif optical in and coaxal out to your NF7-s with an $8 part you can get online (and probably at radioshack) and about 10 min of soldering.

If it was up to me... i couldn't tell you which to go for... lol... I'd have to get an AN7 for myself and use it first!

 

[dqniel]

NF7-s 2.0 is better for overclocking and has better integrated sound. As far as performance goes, Soundstorm (what the nf7-s 2.0 has) is the best at keeping the cpu utilization low; it's even better than an audigy 2. But if you are a sound QUALITY freak, the audigy 2 zs would be the better choice. I kinda got off topic there, but I'm just trying to justify how the nf7-s 2.0 is the better choice

 

[ianching]

Is NF7 essentially the same board as the NF7-S but without firewire and S-ATA?

Do they overclock the same?

 

[gplracer]

The NF7-S is a great board. I have built 6 computers recently with it. Although how much fsb do you want? Most of the recent NF7-S boards that I have had top out at 210-215fsb. I recently got a DFI Infninity. I have not tried to see what the highest fsb is on it. Although a lot of users report a greater likelyhood of getting a real high fsb. If you want fsb go DFI. If not get the Abit.

 

[ianching]

Originally posted by: gplracer
The NF7-S is a great board. I have built 6 computers recently with it. Although how much fsb do you want? Most of the recent NF7-S boards that I have had top out at 210-215fsb. I recently got a DFI Infninity. I have not tried to see what the highest fsb is on it. Although a lot of users report a greater likelyhood of getting a real high fsb. If you want fsb go DFI. If not get the Abit.

My current system has a 8RDA (non +), 1700+ and Samsung DDR400 512MB CL3 which does 220MHz FSB nicely (forgot about the RAM timings but it's CL3), so I would be looking somewhere in the 220MHz~230MHz area with Kingston 512MB DDR400 CL2.5 I'm going to get.

By the way, is it still true that Dual-Channel limits your overclocking?

Thanks in advance.

 

[igr11]

I own the AN7. I wouldn't think of AN7 as "the new product". It is more a refresher of the aging NF7-S product. In fact, AN7 is identical to the NF7-S except for the following:
1. Firewire built-in
2. uGuru chip which controls BIOS functions from Windows (not a big deal, but I just love auto-updating BIOS from Windows)
3. slightly different layout (processor positioning)

It is my understanding that NF7-S is slightly cheaper. So, I would buy AN7 only if you need the extra uGuru features (which may become very useful in the future) or the peace-of-mind that you own the latest Abit board in NForce 2 line.

The board has a preset overclocking option (2500+ -> 3200+) as well was manual overclocking with every single option tweakable (from FSB, AGP speed, memory timings, voltages). I'm running Athlon 2500+ Barton at FSB 200MHz with no problems.
Igor