Okay, but there are better choices (Early Abit BX6-2)
Written: Nov 10 '00 (Updated Nov 10 '00)
|
Product Rating:
|
|
|
Pros: Processor multiplier, FSB and voltage settings tweakable in BIOS
Cons: Mediocre stability at stock speeds, may not be compatible with some SCSI adapters
|
|
|
| LetItRut's Full Review: Abit BX6 2 |
I bought this motherboard over a year and a half ago when I was tinkering with an Intel Celeron 333MHz by overclocking it. But unfortunately, my system won't boot at any speed above an 83MHz front-side bus. (Further testing on that chip on other motherboards indicate that I have a typical Celeron-333 chip.) And I had a problem with using an Adaptec AHA-2940UW Ultra Wide SCSI adapter on this motherboard: The BIOS (on PCB Revision 2.02 or earlier of this board) intermittently refused to recognize the Adaptec adapter, and thus would not initialize the adapter's BIOS. And the motherboard isn't quite as stable as the Asus motherboards I had previously used.
[The following section has been added on 11-10-00 at 9:38 AM CST.]
Despite some of the bugs on early PCB revisions of this motherboard, there are some good things about it. First and foremost is Abit's SoftMenu II, which allows a wide range of processor front-side bus, multiplier and voltage settings in the BIOS menu. Second, this motherboard is completely jumperless in its setup -- in fact, the only jumper on this motherboard is the one that clears the CMOS clock settings. Third, it has the usual four PCI slots, one ISA slot, one shared PCI/ISA slot, and one AGP slot. That means that you can have five PCI add-in boards if you need that many -- though you may run short on available IRQs. Finally, it has four DIMM slots (instead of the usual three), so you can install up to 1GB of PC100 SDRAM if you need that much.
BOTTOM LINE: The Abit BX6-2 is good for overclockers, but if compatibility and stability are what you're after, there are better choices than this motherboard.
[The following section has been added on 11-10-00 at 9:40 AM CST.]
I am writing this review on a home-built system based on an boxed Intel VC820 Desktop Board with 128MB of PC800 RDRAM running Windows Me.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 119.00
|
|
|
|
Epinions.com ID:
LetItRut
|
 - Top 1000 |
|
Location: Melrose Park, IL, USA
Reviews written: 53
Trusted by: 27 members
About Me:
An audio enthusiast and a computer geek who loves bike riding.
|
|
|
- Add to My Yahoo!: 
- Add to Google Homepage: 
© 1999-2009 Shopping.com, Inc.