You get what you pay for!
Written: Aug 29 '01
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Built in ATA/100, choice of ATA/100 or RAID, RAM expandability, peripheral connectivity.
Cons: A bit pricey
The Bottom Line: If you want blistering performance out of your AMD Athlon or Duron, get this board!
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| solrosinberg's Full Review: Asus A7V |
I have recently purchased the Asus A7V-133 and have noticed that this board is probably one of the best ones on the market thus far. I have had no stability issues arise from it, and my processor has no heat problems at all. I don't really notice the noise much because my computer room has ALWAYS been noisy, and no more so with this board than any other.
The configuration:
Here is a list of what is connected to this board:
AMD Athlon T-bird 1 GHz (266 MHz FSB)
256 MB RAM (1 stick)
Elsa Gladiac (Geforce 2 GTS) 32 MB DDR graphics card
Creative Sound Blaster Live! X-Gamer (old one, not 5.1 YET)
Asix 10/100 Ethernet card
Maxtor 30 GB Ultra100 hard disk
Quantum Fireball 10 GB Ultra33 hard disk
Hewlett-Packard 8x/4x/32x CD-RW drive
Pioneer 10x DVD-ROM drive
Setup and installation
As someone who does all of their own configuration and installation, I have noted this board as being the easiest by far to set up. The only things I changed were the DIP switches (I like to manually set things, in case the BIOS decides to go nuts) which are located in a handy place on the board. Connectors and slots are definitely abundant on this board, and although some people find ISA slots necessary, I find I do not miss them at all. The BIOS setup utility looks much like the PhoenixBIOS setup utility, but it in fact is an Award BIOS. Once I set things up appropriately (something not many people realize they need to do), the system was up and running.
*NOTE* If the Trend ChipAwayVirus that is on the board causes problems, you CAN turn it off in the BIOS. Many things that may or may not cause problems can easily be enabled/disabled through the setup utility.
Stability, anyone?
This board has proven to be very stable. After installing the board and re-installing the OS (another necessary step) and installing all of the necessary VIA drivers, Windows ME has been chugging along happily without many problems at all. I have ran the Distributed.net client on this computer (you should see how fast it goes!) and still only get a processor temp of 56 Celsius. I also do NOT overclock my processors, as that it can shorten the life of the processor and possibly damage components. I certainly would do so if I could afford some of the more exotic cooling solutions, but to me it's just not worth all of the expense.
Performance to spare
One of the major tests I ran was to run Quake 3 and the Nvidia Bunker map (nv15 is the map name). This runs so nicely now that it is actually playable. There is no pausing at the high triangle areas anymore. Unreal Tournament, which also had speed issues, is now running full speed and has no more issues at all. Also, MP3 encoding (using Jet-Audio Extension) of a whole CD at Medium quality now takes only 17 minutes, which is what it took in Fast quality with my old system. There were also no glitches or problems during any of these tests, which means it can withstand any torture you may have in mind for it. Also, it's integration of the Promise Ultra ATA/100 controller allows it to control newer hard disks with blazing speed.
Cooling tips
The way I cool my system off is to take a standing fan and point it directly into the open case. This keeps the board at 71 degrees Fahrenheit and the CPU at 130 degrees Fahrenheit (56 Celsius). The CPU has a heatsink/fan about the size of a mini model of the Rock of Gibraltar. I also have a blower fan installed below the graphics card which keeps airflow going over it as well. I have not done a temperature measurement with a closed case, but I will post those results once I have done so.
In summary, this board is one of the best solutions for your AMD Athlon/Duron CPU. Its performance, stability, and ease of use definitely make this board one of the best. This board is a little pricey, however I have no regrets about getting it.
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 140
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Epinions.com ID:
solrosinberg
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Reviews written: 22
Trusted by: 2 members
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