925X's revenge
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Now comes Abit's AA8 DuraMax motherboard, and things look different for a couple of reasons. First, Intel's 925X review kit didn't arrive at Damage Labs until a couple days before Intel pulled the curtain back on the product launch, so we didn't get time to tweak the Intel D925XCV mobo as we'd have liked. We've had some time to tweak and tune the AA8, and we've discovered a surprising amount of headroom in both the chipset and its associated DDR2 memory. Second, the Abit AA8 is a true enthusiast's mobo, with more tweakage options, voltage settings, and overclocking facilities than your average button-down corporate motherboard could even contemplate. Not only that, but the board is fast, stable, and robust enough to handle some abuse.
As a result, we've seen the 925X Express chipset in a new light, and we like what we see. Keep reading to find out more.
Abit's AA8 DuraMax motherboard
The specs
The AA8 DuraMax packs in all the fancy new features you'd expect from a 925X-based motherboard. Here's a quick summary.
| CPU support | LGA775 Intel Pentium 4 processors with 800MHz front-side bus |
| Form factor | ATX |
| Chipset | Intel 925X Express |
| North bridge | Intel 925X MCH |
| South bridge | Intel ICH6R |
| Interconnect | DMI (2GB/s) |
| Expansion slots | 1 PCI Express X16 3 PCI Express X1 2 32-bit/33MHz PCI |
| Memory | 4 240-pin DIMM sockets Maximum of 4GB of DDR2 533 SDRAM |
| Storage I/O | Floppy disk 1 channel ATA/100 4 ports Serial ATA 150 via ICH6R south bridge with RAID 0,1 support |
| Audio | 8-channel HD audio via ICH6R integrated audio and ALC880 codec |
| Ports | 1 PS/2 keyboard 1 PS/2 mouse 1 serial 1 parallel 4 USB 2.0 with headers for 2 more 1 IEEE 1394 port via TI TSB43AB23 Firewire controller with headers for 2 more 1 RJ45 10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet via Realtek 8110S-32 1 line out/front out 1 rear out 1 surround out 1 bass/center out 1 mic in 1 line in 1 optical SPDIF in 1 optical SPDIF out |
| BIOS | Phoenix AwardBIOS |
| Bus speeds | 100-300MHz in 1MHz increments (400-1200MHz quad-pumped) |
| Bus dividers | Locked PCI speeds of 33, 36, 40MHz |
| Voltages | CPU: 1.3625-1.7125V in 0.015V increments DRAM: 1.9-2.2V in 0.05V increments North bridge: 1.50-2.05V in 0.05V increments |
| Monitoring | Voltage, fan status, and temperature monitoring |
| Fan speed control | CPU, north bridge, and system fans |
