First Look: Abit AW9D-MAX

BIOS:

Abit uses a modified Phoenix AwardBIOS on the AW9D-MAX mobo - the version we have used for our 'preview' is pre-production, so there are some bugs at the moment. However, the BIOS should give you an idea of what will be in the final BIOS when Abit releases the board to the public.

Highlights:

• CPU Clock adjustable from 133-600MHz in 1MHz increments;
  
• PCI-Express Frequency adjustable from 100-200MHz in 1MHz increments;
  
• Processor Voltage - CPU vCore from 1.3625V to 1.7125V in 0.0150V increments;
  
• DDR2 Voltage - adjustable from 1.80V to 2.10V in 0.05V increments, 2.20V, 2.25V, 2.30V, 2.35V, 2.45V, 2.55V, 2.65V;
  
• Memory dividers - SPD, 533MHz, 667MHz, 800MHz;
  
• MCH & PCIe 1.5V Voltage - 1.50V to 2.00V in 0.01V increments;
  
• Memory Timings - CAS, tRCD, tRP and tRAS;
  
• An impressive selection of fan and voltage monitoring tools under Abit EQ.

The BIOS is incredibly feature rich, but there are some areas where we would like to see improvements. There is currently a bug, where we are unable to increase the Core 2 Extreme X6800's multiplier above its default multiplier. We were able to lower the multiplier on this CPU though. Also, there is no multiplier adjustment available in the BIOS for the standard Core 2 Duo chips - something that Asus has managed to do on its P5B Deluxe.

One area where there is room for improvement is on the memory timings front. For an overclocker-friendly motherboard, we were quite disappointed to only see control for CAS Latency, RAS to CAS Delay, RAS Precharge and Precharge Delay. In fact, we believe that the board would be a much better overclocker than it currently is with a more fruitful array of memory timings available to the enthusiast. We have passed our concerns on to Abit, so hopefully the company will take them on board and unleash some of the potential that is there to unlock.

Overall though, if we forget the shortcomings on the memory timing front, the BIOS is comprehensive and will please overclockers out there if and when Abit introduces some better memory tweak options. One thing that we've not mentioned thus far is the incredibly cool pimped out black BIOS skin - it's so cool that it made my teeth hurt.