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- Date:
- Thursday , June 12, 2003
- Author:
- Morry Teitelman
- Editor:
- Kyle Bennett
- Google +1
ABIT IS7-G
The Springdale has been the buzz lately as some boards are showing signs of better-than-875P performance. Find out what ABIT "Game Acceleration" is all about.
Introduction
Editor's Note: About six hours before we were going to publish this review, we got word from ABIT in Taiwan that they had something for us. What they had was a new BIOS for this IS7. That is not unusual but in this case, much like Asus, ABIT had unlocked some secrets on Springdale that are just a bit more than normal. Of course at that point it meant going back and running every single benchmark over again. It looks as though the work was worth the effort.
ABIT is a company well known for their relentless pursuit of quality and speed across their product lines. They are a favorite especially of the enthusiast community for their motherboard and BIOS innovations in the overclocking sphere. ABIT continues to push the limits, and will not disappoint with their i865PE based solutions.
The IS7-G is one of ABIT’s offerings featuring the Intel i865PE chipset. As is the current trend among the i875P and i865PE based boards, the IS7-G is a feature complete solution, offering everything needed built in to the board with performance to back it up. The Intel 865PE chipset offers support for all Intel processors, including the 800 MHz FSB processors with Hyper-Threading technology. The chipset also offers support for Dual Channel memory operation using DDR RAM of up to 400 MHz speeds. The IS7-G itself includes the following built-in features: 2 ATA 100 IDE ports; 4 SATA 150 ports; integrated 3Com Gigabit Ethernet, 8 total USB 2.0 capable ports, 3 total IEEE 1394 capable ports, S/PDIF digital input and output, as well as the standard serial, parallel and PS/2 ports.
Main Specifications Overview:
CPU | Intel Socket 478 Pentium 4 or Celeron |
Chipset | Intel 865PE / ICH5R |
FSB | 100/133/200 |
BIOS | Phoenix AwardBIOS |
Memory | 4 DDR DIMMS, up to 4 GB |
Expansion slots | 1 x AGP, 5 x PCI |
Onboard IDE | 2 x ATA 100 headers, 2 x SATA 150 Silicon Image based headers, 2 x SATA 150 Intel ICH5R based headers |
USB | 4 rear panel / 2 headers supporting 2 ports (8 ports total) |
AGP | AGP 2x/4x/8x |
Audio | 6-Channel AC 97 CODEC with rear panel S/PDIF input/output |
NIC | 1 x 3Com Gigabit Ethernet controller in rear panel |
Detailed Mainboard Specification List:
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Board Layout
The board’s overall layout is adequate, but there are a few problem areas. The serial number clearly shows that the motherboard is a version 1.0 board. I found that all the capacitors used on the motherboard seem to be from the noted Japanese based manufacturer Rubycon.
The area directly around the CPU socket is sufficiently clear of capacitors and other obstacles, allowing for easy seating and removal of the CPU HSF unit. The CPU HSF unit is mounted to the board by the standard P4 type mounting cage. The CPU has a dedicated BIOS monitored fan header just below the socket assembly, labeled CPUFAN1. To the left of the CPU socket is the i865PE Northbridge chipset. The chipset is actively cooled by a four prong mounted HSF. The hold down mechanism allows for removal of the HSF unit without having to remove the motherboard from the case. The HSF unit is plugged in to the BIOS monitored NBFAN1 header, situated just above it.
Just above the AGP slot and Northbridge chipset are two of the board’s four jumpers. The jumpers, USB-PWR1 and USB-PWR2, control system wake-up based on activity from the rear panel USB ports. To the right of the jumpers and above the CPU socket, you can see the BIOS monitored SYSFAN1 fan header, and the ATX12V connector. The location of the 12V connector offers shortened power trace lengths for the delivery of much needed 12V based power. However, the connector location also forces routing of the power cables over or around the CPU socket, possibly interfering with air flow.
The board’s four DIMM slots are located just below the CPU socket area, situated in two sets of two slots. Each set of slots corresponds to a single memory channel. Further, the slots are color coded between sets, to ease in enabling Dual Channel memory mode. To enable Dual Channel mode, simply place the same sized DDR memory stick in both the colored slots across the sets. One thing that irks me here is the proximity of the AGP slot to the left side of the DIMM slots. With a full sized card seated, such as a Radeon 9700, you are unable to engage or remove memory in to the DIMM slots.
Just below the lower set of DIMM slots is the ATX connector, with the board’s floppy connector just below it along the edge of the board. To the right of the ATX connector is the unmonitored AUXFAN1 fan header and the CMOS reset jumper. The system battery is to the right of the floppy connector. The location of the CMOS reset jumper and the system battery was a bad design decision. You try getting to either to reset the system BIOS with the hard drive bays and various system cables in the way. The infra-red header and the PS2-PWR jumper are placed to the right of the battery. The PS2-PWR jumper controls system wake-up based on activity on either rear panel PS/2 ports.
The board’s ICH5R southbridge chipset is located below PCI slots 1 and 2, with its two control SATA ports located just below the chipset. The two ATA-100 connectors are located below the ICH5R chipset, along the edge of the board. ABIT rotated both IDE connectors ninety degrees so that the cables run parallel to the plane of the board. Two additional USB 2.0 headers are located just to the left of the ICH5R chipset. The Silicon Image SATA controller chip is located just below PCI slot 4, with its controlled SATA ports to its left along the board’s edge. The front panel jumper block is located in the lower left corner of the board, along with two status LEDs. The upper LED glows green when the board has been turned on, with the lower LED glowing red when the board has a power source connected.
The IS7-G has a total of 1 AGP slot and 5 PCI slots. Sandwiched between the AGP slot and PCI slot 1, you can see two IEEE1394 headers. The unmonitored AUXFAN2 fan header and an SMBUS header are located next to PCI slot 5, along the board’s edge. Just above and between PCI slots 3 and 4 are the board’s CD-IN and AUX-IN audio connectors, with the front panel audio header just to the right of them. Note that you must jumper pins 5/6 and 9/10 for the rear audio ports to function.
The rear panel contains the standard complement of ports, with some interesting surprises thrown in to the mix. The ports available include a PS/2 keyboard and mouse port, a parallel port, a serial port, 4 USB 2.0 capable ports, an IEEE1394 capable port, a 3Com based Gigabit Ethernet port, 5 audio ports, and S/PDIF optical input and output ports.