Abit AT8

W1zzard · Feb 2, 2006, 09:43 AM

To read this review go to: http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Abit/AT8/

Bull Dog · Feb 3, 2006, 08:31 PM

Good review. I'd get one of these boards but my DFI nForce4 Ultra-D is still humming along just fine and I don't plan to X-Fire my X1900XT anytime soon.

Quake2owns · Feb 4, 2006, 01:12 AM

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813154007

I cant decide between the Abit at8 and THAt sapphire crossfire motherboard.
The sapphire is alittle better 4.0 vdimm and i think 1.8 vcore. But sapphire has non existant usa support thats the bad thing.

AMDCam · Feb 4, 2006, 05:12 PM

yeah but screw support, if we (and by we I mean most enthusiasts) need it fixed either we'll fix it ourselves or if it has to go to support it'll take at least a week anyway. But I love Abit and Sapphire, I just thought Sapphire was focussed mostly on graphics cards so I have no idea how high quality their boards are.

Quake2owns · Feb 4, 2006, 10:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AMDCam

yeah but screw support, if we (and by we I mean most enthusiasts) need it fixed either we'll fix it ourselves or if it has to go to support it'll take at least a week anyway. But I love Abit and Sapphire, I just thought Sapphire was focussed mostly on graphics cards so I have no idea how high quality their boards are.

So if the bios in the sapphire motherboard is buggy and no support it doesnt matter how are you gonna fix the problems? edit the motherboard bios yourself? hell no support is a must. My motherboard has a poorlay out compared to the at8 well not really because x1800xt block the pci slots on the at8 doesnt on my ECS ka1 mvp extreme cf board.

www.ecsusa.com amazing support.

AMDCam · Feb 4, 2006, 10:59 PM

well dang dude don't get all defensive. An easy solution to "helo har are ryou dooring torday?" is using THIS website as an easy way to fix it. I never call support unless I'm missing a piece of hardware or the thing doesn't boot in a wierd way (like it boots but no video even though the card's in, the BIOS is running, the RAM is under load, the hard drives are loading, and the graphics card ran the last time right before you restarted). Just saying, support to me is like a "10 year powertrain warranty" on a new car or a "5 star crash test rating". SCREEEEEEEEW crash test ratings! I didn't buy a car to go crash it, and if it does I don't care, I would love that car and want to die with it, plus I don't buy anything but American so I guarantee the powertrain is gonna last well over twice that "10 year warranty" thing. That's obviously just a comparison but I'm showin you where I'm coming from, I've got different views from a lot of people, I'm just saying if the bad happens you deal with it and either way it won't be easy, so just don't plan so much for the bad to happen.

Quake2owns · Feb 5, 2006, 02:15 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AMDCam

well dang dude don't get all defensive. An easy solution to "helo har are ryou dooring torday?" is using THIS website as an easy way to fix it. I never call support unless I'm missing a piece of hardware or the thing doesn't boot in a wierd way (like it boots but no video even though the card's in, the BIOS is running, the RAM is under load, the hard drives are loading, and the graphics card ran the last time right before you restarted). Just saying, support to me is like a "10 year powertrain warranty" on a new car or a "5 star crash test rating". SCREEEEEEEEW crash test ratings! I didn't buy a car to go crash it, and if it does I don't care, I would love that car and want to die with it, plus I don't buy anything but American so I guarantee the powertrain is gonna last well over twice that "10 year warranty" thing. That's obviously just a comparison but I'm showin you where I'm coming from, I've got different views from a lot of people, I'm just saying if the bad happens you deal with it and either way it won't be easy, so just don't plan so much for the bad to happen.

No support means bios updates and chipset updates.

AMDCam · Feb 5, 2006, 02:39 AM

yeah but websites are worldwide, so unless Japan doesn't issue BIOS updates to their country then there shouldn't be a problem. I understand the literal meaning of "no support", but I'm not even sure if a company can get away with that. I also checked the website, and yeah they do have BIOS/driver updates for their motherboards so I don't know what you're talking about.

Quake2owns · Feb 5, 2006, 05:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AMDCam

yeah but websites are worldwide, so unless Japan doesn't issue BIOS updates to their country then there shouldn't be a problem. I understand the literal meaning of "no support", but I'm not even sure if a company can get away with that. I also checked the website, and yeah they do have BIOS/driver updates for their motherboards so I don't know what you're talking about.

They have no support for helping you solve issues .

AMDCam · Feb 5, 2006, 06:09 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by AMDCam

An easy solution to "helo har are ryou dooring torday?" is using THIS website as an easy way to fix it.

There's your answer. If you want we can just agree to disagree because you seem to be TRYING to find problems with your Sapphire board.

W1zzard · Feb 5, 2006, 07:39 AM

i havent seen a single issue in the latest sapphire bios, have you?

Quake2owns · Feb 5, 2006, 07:45 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by W1zzard

i havent seen a single issue in the latest sapphire bios, have you?

How about a review of the sapphire crossfire motherboard?

W1zzard · Feb 5, 2006, 08:11 AM

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Sapphire/PI-A9RD480/

Quake2owns · Feb 5, 2006, 08:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by W1zzard

http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Sapphire/PI-A9RD480/

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ShowIm...d%20-%20Retail

Take a look at that sapphire crossfire board it's different from the board in your review, the names called the PC-A9RD480Adv , do you know which one is the higher end model? If you look the sata ports are in a totally different position from your review board.The ide ports the cmos battery the floppy port are all in different placements and this PC-A9RD480Adv also has 3 pci slots your review board only has 2.

wiak · Feb 6, 2006, 08:28 PM

do anyone have the FF issue?
that you have to reboot and then reboot again to get it to boot right?
check specs for system ^^

W1zzard · Feb 6, 2006, 08:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wiak

do anyone have the FF issue?
that you have to reboot and then reboot again to get it to boot right?
check specs for system ^^

i saw that once or twice

BigD6997 · Feb 7, 2006, 12:49 AM

well im looking at getting a xfire board, and i am looking at the sapphire board, but it is 30 bucks more expensive than the asus.... how is the asus xfire board cuz a lot of the companys boards are having problems.... i might go with the sapphire board, any sugestions?

wiak · Feb 7, 2006, 01:03 AM

chose AT8 for godsake!
its has 4x SATA 3Gbps !, and is pure gold (just kidding) but its way stable and boot friendly! as it booted right out of the box with my old ram, when i got AV8 (my old mb) it took some time to get it right :P

BigD6997 · Feb 7, 2006, 01:21 AM

thanks for the imput... i was taking a good look between the abit board, asus, and sapphire, but the abit looks to be the best constructed witht the best bioses....

Quake2owns · Feb 7, 2006, 07:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BigD6997

thanks for the imput... i was taking a good look between the abit board, asus, and sapphire, but the abit looks to be the best constructed witht the best bioses....

The sapphire board is actually better. Using crossfire x1800xt or x1900xtx would block both pci slots on the at8 rendering them useless.

Quake2owns · Feb 7, 2006, 07:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wiak

chose AT8 for godsake!
its has 4x SATA 3Gbps !, and is pure gold (just kidding) but its way stable and boot friendly! as it booted right out of the box with my old ram, when i got AV8 (my old mb) it took some time to get it right :P

By the time 3Gbps shows improvement over sata1 all of it will be out of date.

LAj · Feb 8, 2006, 07:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Quake2owns

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ShowIm...d%20-%20Retail

Take a look at that sapphire crossfire board it's different from the board in your review, the names called the PC-A9RD480Adv , do you know which one is the higher end model? If you look the sata ports are in a totally different position from your review board.The ide ports the cmos battery the floppy port are all in different placements and this PC-A9RD480Adv also has 3 pci slots your review board only has 2.

Attention please!
PI-A9RX480 is not the mainboard reviewed by TechPowerUp!
PI is the only mainboard that haven't xfire and go up to good overclock. Its price is around 180€.
PC-A9RD480Adv is a redesigned version for particular user that have to install a full ATX pcb vga and sata HD. This version isn't supported for overclocker!
See www.sapphire.com forum! I read it thinking that support lack and bios release isn't fast!
PC-A9RD480 is a mainstream mainboard.

LAj · Feb 8, 2006, 07:28 PM

@ Wizzard!
Will you update this review when ABIT will release a new bios to fix memory problem?
Would you test the board with samsung TCCD and found overclock limit ?
Thank you.

wiak · Feb 8, 2006, 09:05 PM

hmm
good = works out of the box right away
bad = kinda clumpsy places to set PCIE x1 & PCI slots
btw: what do you see in the picture?

Quake2owns · Feb 8, 2006, 09:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by wiak

hmm
good = works out of the box right away
bad = kinda clumpsy places to set PCIE x1 & PCI slots
btw: what do you see in the picture?
http://img.techpowerup.org/060208/ny 005546.jpg

wiak I see a pci video card or tv tuner lol something anyway is that a x1800xt or a x1900?

Feb 2, 2006, 09:43 AM	#1
W1zzard Benevolent Dictator Join Date: May 2004 Location: Stuttgart, Germany Posts: 13,758 (4.18/day) Thanks: 184 Thanked 10,208 Times in 3,157 Posts System Specs	Abit AT8 To read this review go to: http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Abit/AT8/ Last edited by W1zzard; Feb 6, 2006 at 09:53 PM.

Processor:	Intel Core i7-2600K @ 3.4 GHz
Motherboard:	ASUS P8Z68-V Pro
Memory:	3x 2048 MB Mushkin DDR3
Video Card:	ASUS GeForce GTX 670 Direct CU II TOP
Hard Disk:	Crucial C300 128 GB, WD6400AAKS 640 GB, WD15EADS 1.5 TB
Optical Drive:	BenQ DW1640
CRT/LCD Model:	Dell U3011 30", 2560x1600 + 19" 1280x1024
Case:	NZXT H2
Sound Card:	On-board Realtek HD
PSU:	Kingwin Absolute Platinum 550 W
Software:	Windows 7 64-bit

Processor:	AMD Phenom II 980 @3.9Ghz, 1.4v
Motherboard:	ASRock 790GX
Cooling:	IFX14 + 120x38mm Ultra Speed Panaflo
Memory:	4x 2GB G-Skill DDR2 @ 480MHz 5-5-5-15 2T
Video Card:	Radeon 7970 1000Mhz/1100Mhz
Hard Disk:	128GB Samsung SSD 830 + 2TB Hitachi
Optical Drive:	Asus DVD+DL
CRT/LCD Model:	Dell U2711
Case:	Cooler Master Centurion 590
Sound Card:	PCI-e X-Fi with 64MB of x-ram
PSU:	Enermax Modu 82+ 620w
Software:	Windows 7 x64

Feb 4, 2006, 05:12 PM	#4
AMDCam Join Date: May 2005 Location: Colorado, United States Posts: 1,006 (0.34/day) Thanks: 1 Thanked 6 Times in 6 Posts System Specs	yeah but screw support, if we (and by we I mean most enthusiasts) need it fixed either we'll fix it ourselves or if it has to go to support it'll take at least a week anyway. But I love Abit and Sapphire, I just thought Sapphire was focussed mostly on graphics cards so I have no idea how high quality their boards are. __________________ DEAD- JET Blue (in case gallery) STOLEN- XPS M930 (in case gallery) NEW- NEWEST EDITION Dell XPS M1710 Metallic Black with: Core 2 Duo T7200 2ghz (hopefully overclockable), GeForce 7950 GTX 512mb, 2gb DDR2 667mhz RAM, Sound Blaster Audigy HD Sound Card (hopefully), Blu Ray drive soon (when it's not $1000 for a 2x drive), 60gb 7,200rpm Hard Drive, Logitech Z5500 sound system, Windows XP Media Center 2005

Processor:	AMD Opteron 148 at (hope) 3.0ghz
Motherboard:	MSI K8N Neo2 Platinum with Nforce 3 Ultra
Cooling:	XP-90C (CPU), A400 (Graphics), 8 case fans, 92mm Tornado
Memory:	2gb OCZ Gold DDR500 dual-channel
Video Card:	Leadtek 6800GT near UEE speed (448core/1.18memory)
Hard Disk:	2x 80gb WD 7,200rpm 8mb cache Caviar SATA 150 in RAID 0
Optical Drive:	1x Memorex 52/32/52x CD-RW/DVD, 1x Memorex 8/4/8x DVD+/-RW DL
CRT/LCD Model:	(2 soon) Samsung Syncmaster 172N 17" LCD
Case:	Atrix black case with A LOT of mods
Sound Card:	Motherboard
PSU:	Aspire 520w tri-fan blue LEDs
Software:	Windows XP Home, Office 2003 Professional Edition

Feb 3, 2006, 08:31 PM	#2
Bull Dog Join Date: Jan 2006 Posts: 156 (0.06/day) Thanks: 3 Thanked 17 Times in 11 Posts System Specs	Good review. I'd get one of these boards but my DFI nForce4 Ultra-D is still humming along just fine and I don't plan to X-Fire my X1900XT anytime soon.

Feb 4, 2006, 01:12 AM	#3
Quake2owns Banned Join Date: Dec 2005 Posts: 361 (0.13/day) Thanks: 0 Thanked 1 Time in 1 Post	http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16813154007 I cant decide between the Abit at8 and THAt sapphire crossfire motherboard. The sapphire is alittle better 4.0 vdimm and i think 1.8 vcore. But sapphire has non existant usa support thats the bad thing.

Feb 4, 2006, 10:59 PM	#6
AMDCam Join Date: May 2005 Location: Colorado, United States Posts: 1,006 (0.34/day) Thanks: 1 Thanked 6 Times in 6 Posts System Specs	well dang dude don't get all defensive. An easy solution to "helo har are ryou dooring torday?" is using THIS website as an easy way to fix it. I never call support unless I'm missing a piece of hardware or the thing doesn't boot in a wierd way (like it boots but no video even though the card's in, the BIOS is running, the RAM is under load, the hard drives are loading, and the graphics card ran the last time right before you restarted). Just saying, support to me is like a "10 year powertrain warranty" on a new car or a "5 star crash test rating". SCREEEEEEEEW crash test ratings! I didn't buy a car to go crash it, and if it does I don't care, I would love that car and want to die with it, plus I don't buy anything but American so I guarantee the powertrain is gonna last well over twice that "10 year warranty" thing. That's obviously just a comparison but I'm showin you where I'm coming from, I've got different views from a lot of people, I'm just saying if the bad happens you deal with it and either way it won't be easy, so just don't plan so much for the bad to happen. __________________ DEAD- JET Blue (in case gallery) STOLEN- XPS M930 (in case gallery) NEW- NEWEST EDITION Dell XPS M1710 Metallic Black with: Core 2 Duo T7200 2ghz (hopefully overclockable), GeForce 7950 GTX 512mb, 2gb DDR2 667mhz RAM, Sound Blaster Audigy HD Sound Card (hopefully), Blu Ray drive soon (when it's not $1000 for a 2x drive), 60gb 7,200rpm Hard Drive, Logitech Z5500 sound system, Windows XP Media Center 2005

Feb 5, 2006, 02:39 AM	#8
AMDCam Join Date: May 2005 Location: Colorado, United States Posts: 1,006 (0.34/day) Thanks: 1 Thanked 6 Times in 6 Posts System Specs	yeah but websites are worldwide, so unless Japan doesn't issue BIOS updates to their country then there shouldn't be a problem. I understand the literal meaning of "no support", but I'm not even sure if a company can get away with that. I also checked the website, and yeah they do have BIOS/driver updates for their motherboards so I don't know what you're talking about. __________________ DEAD- JET Blue (in case gallery) STOLEN- XPS M930 (in case gallery) NEW- NEWEST EDITION Dell XPS M1710 Metallic Black with: Core 2 Duo T7200 2ghz (hopefully overclockable), GeForce 7950 GTX 512mb, 2gb DDR2 667mhz RAM, Sound Blaster Audigy HD Sound Card (hopefully), Blu Ray drive soon (when it's not $1000 for a 2x drive), 60gb 7,200rpm Hard Drive, Logitech Z5500 sound system, Windows XP Media Center 2005

Feb 5, 2006, 07:39 AM	#11
W1zzard Benevolent Dictator Join Date: May 2004 Location: Stuttgart, Germany Posts: 13,758 (4.18/day) Thanks: 184 Thanked 10,208 Times in 3,157 Posts System Specs	i havent seen a single issue in the latest sapphire bios, have you?

Feb 5, 2006, 08:11 AM	#13
W1zzard Benevolent Dictator Join Date: May 2004 Location: Stuttgart, Germany Posts: 13,758 (4.18/day) Thanks: 184 Thanked 10,208 Times in 3,157 Posts System Specs	http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Sapphire/PI-A9RD480/

Feb 6, 2006, 08:28 PM	#15
wiak Join Date: Sep 2004 Location: Norway Posts: 1,681 (0.53/day) Thanks: 15 Thanked 199 Times in 156 Posts	do anyone have the FF issue? that you have to reboot and then reboot again to get it to boot right? check specs for system ^^ __________________ My rig @ overclock.net \| My new friend OpenShot

System Name:	Wiak's Gaming Rig v4.0
Processor:	AMD Phenom II 965 125W Rev. C3
Motherboard:	Gigabyte GA-MA790FX-UD5P (8+2 Phase)
Cooling:	1x 140mm 3x 120mm, Zalman CPNS9500LED
Memory:	OCZ Platinum XTC 4096MB DDR3 1600mhz Dual Channel @ 1333mhz 6-6-6-24
Video Card:	Sapphire Radeon HD 7970 3GB GDDR5 (Stock Cooler)
Hard Disk:	1x Cruical M4 128GB 1x Samsung F3 1TB 1x WD My Book 3.0 2TB
Optical Drive:	LH BH10 Blu-Ray Writer and CH08 Blu-Ray Reader
CRT/LCD Model:	Dell UltraSharp U2410 24" 1920x1200 H-IPS
Case:	Antec Three Hundred
Sound Card:	Asus Xonar DX
PSU:	Corsair AX 850W
Software:	Windows 7 Home Premium x64 Edition SP1

Feb 7, 2006, 12:49 AM	#17
BigD6997 Join Date: Sep 2005 Posts: 819 (0.29/day) Thanks: 12 Thanked 9 Times in 9 Posts System Specs	well im looking at getting a xfire board, and i am looking at the sapphire board, but it is 30 bucks more expensive than the asus.... how is the asus xfire board cuz a lot of the companys boards are having problems.... i might go with the sapphire board, any sugestions? __________________ 8800gts 640mb oc'd to 600mhz core 7800gt 3d05- http://service.futuremark.com/compare?3dm05=2019412 im in the oc club hbu? opti 170 @ 3ghz 1.425v

Processor:	e8400 @ 4ghz 1.344v
Motherboard:	EVGA 780i
Cooling:	Thermalright Ultra-Ex lapped
Memory:	OCZ Reaper HPC 2GB (3-5-5-17) @ 450mhz
Video Card:	8800gts
Hard Disk:	200G WD
Optical Drive:	Plextor DVD-RW window modded
CRT/LCD Model:	23in samsung lcd hdtv
Case:	stacker 831
PSU:	OCZ stealthxstrem 600watt
Software:	Xp-Pro

Feb 7, 2006, 01:03 AM	#18
wiak Join Date: Sep 2004 Location: Norway Posts: 1,681 (0.53/day) Thanks: 15 Thanked 199 Times in 156 Posts	chose AT8 for godsake! its has 4x SATA 3Gbps !, and is pure gold (just kidding) but its way stable and boot friendly! as it booted right out of the box with my old ram, when i got AV8 (my old mb) it took some time to get it right :P __________________ My rig @ overclock.net \| My new friend OpenShot

Feb 7, 2006, 01:21 AM	#19
BigD6997 Join Date: Sep 2005 Posts: 819 (0.29/day) Thanks: 12 Thanked 9 Times in 9 Posts System Specs	thanks for the imput... i was taking a good look between the abit board, asus, and sapphire, but the abit looks to be the best constructed witht the best bioses.... __________________ 8800gts 640mb oc'd to 600mhz core 7800gt 3d05- http://service.futuremark.com/compare?3dm05=2019412 im in the oc club hbu? opti 170 @ 3ghz 1.425v

Processor:	Winchester3000+@2700
Motherboard:	939DualSATAII
Cooling:	Liquid
Memory:	Centon TCCD Samsung Brainpower@290-2.5-4-3-8
Video Card:	GTO2@570/600
Hard Disk:	Maxtor 250GB MaxDiamond10
Optical Drive:	NEC
CRT/LCD Model:	Samsung 244T
Case:	AOpen
PSU:	PurePower 680W

Feb 8, 2006, 07:28 PM	#23
LAj Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: Avellino, ITALY Posts: 14 (0.01/day) Thanks: 0 Thanked 0 Times in 0 Posts System Specs	@ Wizzard! Will you update this review when ABIT will release a new bios to fix memory problem? Would you test the board with samsung TCCD and found overclock limit ? Thank you.

Feb 8, 2006, 09:05 PM	#24
wiak Join Date: Sep 2004 Location: Norway Posts: 1,681 (0.53/day) Thanks: 15 Thanked 199 Times in 156 Posts	hmm good = works out of the box right away bad = kinda clumpsy places to set PCIE x1 & PCI slots btw: what do you see in the picture? __________________ My rig @ overclock.net \| My new friend OpenShot

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