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A few months
back, we published a
three board
round-up of products based on the
new Intel I845PE Chipset, including one from
Abit, that
being the BE7-RAID. Without regurgitating facts about
the chipset, suffice it to say that it proved to be a great
update of the original I845, providing official support
(finally) for DDR333 memory, as well as 533MHz FSB Pentium 4
CPUs, USB 2.0, and 6-channel on-board audio. All of the boards that we
reviewed really shined in the performance and overclocking
areas, and we were hoping for more of the same with today's
entry, the Abit BG7E.
At first glance, the bundle we received for review didn't appear to be much
different from the BE7. The only
notable differences appeared to be a lack of a RAID
controller and the substitution of the i845GE chipset, which
add Intel Extreme
Graphics. Will this new addition live up to the
reputation
that Abit has for producing boards with their slogan
"Speed, Stability and Power" in mind? Read on and find out.
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Specifications of the Abit BG7E
Motherboard |
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All for one, and one for all |
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Processor Support:
Supports Intel Pentium 4 Socket478 processors
with 400/533 MHz FSB
Supports Hyper-Threading Technology
Chipset
Intel 82845E Memory Controller Hub (MCH)
Intel 82801DB Enhanced I/O Controller Hub (ICH4)
Memory
Three 184-pin DIMM sockets (unbuffered Non-ECC)
Supports 3 DDR200/266 DIMMs
or 2 DDR333 DIMMs (2GB Maximum)
Expansion Slots
Five 32-bit PCI Bus Master Slots
One AGP Slot (AGP4x)
External I/O
Connections
Two PS/2 ports
(keyboard & mouse)
One Serial port
One Parallel port
One 15-pin VGA port
Five Audio jacks (front speaker, line-in, mic-in,
center/sub, surround speaker)
One S/PDIF out connector
Two USB 2.0 ports
One RJ-45 LAN connector
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Internal I/O Connections
One Floppy Disk Drive Connector
Two IDE Connectors (UltraDMA133/100/66 Support)
Two USB 2.0 headers
Two CD-IN headers
One IrDA header
Network Features
Realtek RTL8100B PCI Fast Ethernet controller
10/100 Mbit operation
Supports ACPI
Audio Features
Realtek ALC650 6-channel audio CODEC
Professional digital audio interface supports
24-bit Optical S/PDIF Output
BIOS
SOFT MENU III Technology
Supports BIOS Protect function
Supports Plug-and-Play (PnP), Advanced
Configuration Power Interface (ACPI), and
Desktop Management Interface (DMI)
Write-Protect Anti-Virus function by AWARD Form Factor
ATX form factor, 21.5cm x 30.5cm
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Below are the items that were included with the sample we
received for review:
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Abit
BG7E Motherboard
Two 80-pin IDE
ribbon cables
One 3.5-inch floppy drive cable
One bracket with two additional
USB 2.0 ports
I/O shield
User's Manual
Software & Drivers CD
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The BG7E's
included accessory bundle seemed a bit subdued. We
went to Abit's site to verify we received everything that
was to be included and have a minor gripe. When we first started researching information
about the board we came across the BE7G on Abit's website,
which had Gigabyte LAN and Serial ATA support. We were
obviously a bit surprised, then, when ours did not. We
double checked the label and realized our error (BE7G vs.
BG7E), Yes, this was a simple oversight on our part, but
nevertheless we feel Abit's naming conventions could probably
use a little work to avoid such confusion.
We didn't find the expansive bundle of
freebies that we have recently become used to when reviewing
motherboards. Actually, it
seemed that we had just enough of the basic components to
get a system up and running. Inside we found the Abit BG7E
motherboard itself, and ATA100 IDE cable and a floppy cable, a
bracket with two extra USB 2.0 ports, and the user's manual
with a driver / utilities CD. As I said, nothing much worth writing
home about, so let's get a closer look at the main features
on the board.
A Tale of a board and its BIOS:
