*** Official ABIT IS7/G/E (865PE) Thread ***

[Retlaw5]

This is for Dgath....

Haha... wow, never knew that. And I definately make CD copies so thanks! Ok, so since after all I'm just using two HDDs and two optical drives. I'll just put my 120 gb as master IDE1 and CDRW as SLAVE IDE1 and then my 80gb as Master IDE2 and my DVD as SLAVE IDE2. Yeah, that seems right. Sorry first time builder.

Ok, check your QIG(quick installation guide) Page 3, under "6-Connecting Cables"

Keep away from connecting one legacy slow speeddrive, like CD-ROM - DVD, together with another hard drive on the same IDE channel; this will drop your integral system performance.

There you got it!!!!! What this means is... that if you connect a hard drive with a Cd-rom, the hard drive will run at the speed of the Cd-rom, which is slower than the H/D. My advice..... get a serillel 2 ,which will give you 1 IDE port, or better yet... buy a Maxtor ATA to IDE card that will give you 2 IDE ports for less money.

 

[Retlaw5]

What should I install first? WindowsXP pro, or the motherboard Drivers?. This will be a clean installation on a 160 gig H/D. Any help will be apreciated, THX

 

[jhites]

Originally posted by: Retlaw5
What should I install first? WindowsXP pro, or the motherboard Drivers?. This will be a clean installation on a 160 gig H/D. Any help will be apreciated, THX

Linky for a Install Guide
Gives a good install order for XP.

 

[MajorKong]

A couple of questions:

I'm looking to build a number of new systems for programmers and graphics designers here at our web design company. I'm seriously considering the IS7-G for the job. Generally speaking, we like to build several identical systems to ease the maintenance down the line, so screwing up the hardware choices on a bunch of fairly important systems isn't a good idea. These systems will not be running games. Nor will they be overclocked (probably running 2.8GHz CPUs).

It looks like the 875/865 motherboard market is beginning to settle down now after a pretty rough beginning. What I'm looking for is good performance and _excellent_ stability in a motherboard. The Intel motherboards look to be the safest in terms of stability but are very unimpressive perfomance-wise. Just wondering if anyone has any comments regarding using the Abit IS7-G a production environemnt, where I _don't_ want to be fiddling with RAM voltages, memory tweaking, and endless BIOS upgrades just to get stable systems.

Should I wait even longer, until either a more stable Abit BIOS or a later rev of the board is released? I'm not in that big of a hurry to build these systems and could easily wait another month or two.

What rev are the IS7 boards on?

And a comment/question: Is (or has) Abit painted itself into a corner by becoming only an "enthusiasts" motherboard company? This is undoubtedly a marketing or customer perception thing, but I find it difficult now to read motherboard reviews of Abit products without getting the impression that everyone who buys one these days is doing so to run games and/or win bragging rights in an overclocking battle. Now, that may be a good thing and it may be exactly where Abit wants to go, but it makes me a little wary in looking to them for motherboards for use in professional systems.

Thanks,
JJ

 

[jhites]

MajorKong
Abit has tweaked it's bios for performance and not stability. Abit appears to be living on the edge and that is why we see a new bios every few weeks. The IC7 canterwood would be a better choice for what it appears that you are looking to achieve. I would personally recommend going with a Asus board like the P4C800-E or the P4P800. I own a IS7-E, P4C800-Dlx and P4P800. My most stable board is definately the P4C800. Opinions vary but for non overclocked stability plus performance IMHO the P4C800 would be my choice.

 

[Retlaw5]

As far as I have read... The Is7 is an stable and relaible MB. If many people used and overclock the heck out of them and the IS7 still run reliable, imagine how stable is going to be if you don't overclock. Asus made good MB's also, but they come overclocked a little bit from factory. Every review I have read, said how good this MB is. About the revision... I just got mine last week and is Rev. 1. If you are planing to buy several systems, call the guys at www.googlegear.com cus they give discounts on quantities. I hope this help

 

[Retlaw5]

Thx Jhites, very good link, Thx again

 

[Retlaw5]

Another question. Do I have to set the bios settings Before installing the O/S? Or After?

 

[MajorKong]

Originally posted by: jhites
The IC7 canterwood would be a better choice for what it appears that you are looking to achieve. I would personally recommend going with a Asus board like the P4C800-E or the P4P800.

Thanks. Why the IC7, or are you recommending 875 boards in general? What do the 875 based boards offer over the 865's other than ECC?

I'll take a good look at the Asus offerings. I've always had good luck with Asus boards.

JJ

 

[jhites]

Originally posted by: MajorKong

Originally posted by: jhites
The IC7 canterwood would be a better choice for what it appears that you are looking to achieve. I would personally recommend going with a Asus board like the P4C800-E or the P4P800.

Thanks. Why the IC7, or are you recommending 875 boards in general? What do the 875 based boards offer over the 865's other than ECC?
I'll take a good look at the Asus offerings. I've always had good luck with Asus boards.
JJ

The Canterwood I875 is a entry level workstation environment and is more stable than the I865 chipset. The obvious factors are the support for ECC and built in PAT vs make shift PAT that many of the 865 boards have implimented. The package size of the 875 is also larger at 1005 FC-BGA vs 932 FC-BGA.

 

[SuperRob]

MajorKong,

Quite frankly, if you're building these machines for a company, and reliability is the main issue you're concerned with, why on earth are you hand building them? It used to be cheaper to do it that way, but with the discounts a company like Dell gets, you're going to get more computer for less, and pretty good support to boot.

Normally, I advocate building your own when at all possible, but when you're in an "enterprise" situation, the rules are totally different. Support and reliablility become much more important, and Dell is one of the best.

 

[MajorKong]

Originally posted by: SuperRob
MajorKong,

Quite frankly, if you're building these machines for a company, and reliability is the main issue you're concerned with, why on earth are you hand building them? It used to be cheaper to do it that way, but with the discounts a company like Dell gets, you're going to get more computer for less, and pretty good support to boot.

Normally, I advocate building your own when at all possible, but when you're in an "enterprise" situation, the rules are totally different. Support and reliablility become much more important, and Dell is one of the best.

I wouldn't call ours an "enterprise" situation. We're a company of less than 20 people. I'm talking about building five or six machines and Dell offers us very little, if any, cost andvantage over building them ourselves. We've still got a few Dell's in our office from about two or three years ago and while they've got a warranty and we can get replacement parts, the customer service SUCKS. It's nothing like it was 5 or even 3 years ago. They've got a bottom line and they're holding it, mostly by outsourcing customer service to god-knows-who. We don't deal with Dell for desktops any more. I still believe that there's a lot of value to be had in building your own systems and we've done it for years with good success.

For what it's worth, I think it's fair to say that we're located squarely between the enthusiast market and the enterprise market. I certainly don't mind spending some time researching and building solid machines.

JJ

 

[NordicNINE]

I would build them using genuine Intel motherboards.
They don't have overclocking and aren't quite as fast, but they are definately the most stable.

 

[jhites]

Originally posted by: Retlaw5
As far as I have read... The Is7 is an stable and relaible MB. If many people used and overclock the heck out of them and the IS7 still run reliable, imagine how stable is going to be if you don't overclock. Asus made good MB's also, but they come overclocked a little bit from factory. Every review I have read, said how good this MB is. About the revision... I just got mine last week and is Rev. 1. If you are planing to buy several systems, call the guys at www.googlegear.com cus they give discounts on quantities. I hope this help

Don't get me wrong. The IS7 is a good board but I would not recommend it for a stable office enviornment. So far it seems that the IC7 is a better board, except maybe for the layout (I like the P4P800's layout better).

I am a bit concerned about Abit pushing speed over stability in their latests bioses. I've seen the same thing with the NF7-S v2.0 and others. Also, the P4C800-Dlx and P4P800-VE are two of the few boards that still show support for the Prescott Processor. The last time I checked, none of the Abit boards were showing support for Prescott. Of course, the Prescott issue is still up for heated debate but Asus must have been in bed with Intel to still have these showing support.

 

[Retlaw5]

Check This websites for complete systems that you can choose what you want on themIbuypower, and Abs cyberpower

 

[Night Blade]

Have a slight problem with this board, hopefully someone can help me. After overclocking a P4 1.8GHz to 2.4GHz the main SATA Maxtor HD doesn't get detected half the time at bootup, it's more of a nuisance than anything, since you need to go into bios & change the boot order, since I have an IDE drive in there aswell that takes over. Anyone else come across this little problem? If all is set to normal it works fine, but as soon as I clock the CPU...

 

[orion7144]

Originally posted by: Night Blade
Have a slight problem with this board, hopefully someone can help me. After overclocking a P4 1.8GHz to 2.4GHz the main SATA Maxtor HD doesn't get detected half the time at bootup, it's more of a nuisance than anything, since you need to go into bios & change the boot order, since I have an IDE drive in there aswell that takes over. Anyone else come across this little problem? If all is set to normal it works fine, but as soon as I clock the CPU...

There are two things you can try. 1st (not sure where) in the BIOS there is a place to change the "IDE Detect" if you put like 4 seconds in there it may help. Also there are alot of people complaining about the power adapters for the SATA HD's. see if you can plug the regular molex connector to the drive instead of the adapter that came with the board.

 

[RaymondY]

Just received my Abit IS7 back from Abit. Had to RMA it because I was having a freaky problem with my BIOS. Kept giving my a BIOS Checksum Error. I'm re-installing WinXP Pro right now.

The motherboard that I got back had 3Com GigLan and a new northbridge cooling fan. The NB cooling fan is of different design than the original version.

 

[tacom8]

Hey,

Has anyone else experienced their sound drop out at around 250fsb? i got a newer version of the board with a new (?, looks different the pics...) NB HS. I am running the latest drivers and bios, so what?s up with that?
And...
What kind of mem scores should i be posting in Sandra's mem test? I get like 3ks, but the same chipset in the comparisons has like 5k? is this right or do i have something not setup right?

<edit>
Ooops! think i got my ram installed wrong, not in dual chanel. Dang shoulda figgured those colours meant something!


No takers on the sound issue?..
</edit>

Thanks for the help guys

 

[Retlaw5]

Where are the special settings, Turbo, street racer , F1 etc? I check my bios and cant find them.

 

[orion7144]

Originally posted by: Retlaw5
Where are the special settings, Turbo, street racer , F1 etc? I check my bios and cant find them.

You have to have BIOS 13 or above. Then they are in the Advanced settings at the bottom under Game accellerator

 

[Retlaw5]

Nope, don't have the advance settings on my Bios. How do I check my Bios version?

 

[DGath]

On the topic of GAT, I've tried all the settings and I can't get it to boot on anything other than auto. I figured my system could probably handle Street Racer since I have a 2.8c with a gig of matched HyperX3200, but nope, it just freezes when Windows gets ready to boot. This happen to anyone else?

 

[orion7144]

Originally posted by: Retlaw5
Nope, don't have the advance settings on my Bios. How do I check my Bios version?

Then you need to update your BIOS or Abit has taken it out. If you goto the link in the first thread to the Official Abit site there is a cool utility that will automatically download and install your BIOS from within Windows. I recommend that you not be overclocking and your system must be stable.

 

[Retlaw5]

Thx for the Info. I think that maybe abit took it away, cus I wait until Googlegear ran out of stock and then I order 1 front they new batch they received. I got mine last week, so is a fresh board(I hope).