Abit AB9 Pro: A sneak peek at Intel's new P965 chipset
by Gary Key on July 3, 2006 3:45 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
Test Systems
All three boards we're including in the benchmarks support current socket 775 Intel processors, and the Abit AB9 Pro and NVIDIA 590 SLI Intel Edition will fully support the Intel Core 2 Duo processors upon release. We did our benchmarking with the Pentium D 805 processor but will follow up shortly with the Pentium 950D and 955XE benchmarks once we receive our production release BIOS. The Abit AB9 Pro fully supported our E6300, E6600, and X6800 Core 2 Duo processors, but we cannot provide results at this time due to NDA restrictions.
A 2GB memory configuration is now standard in the AT test bed as most enthusiasts are currently purchasing this amount of memory. We chose memory from Corsair that would offer a wide range of memory settings during our stock and overclocked test runs. Our memory timings are set based upon determining the best memory bandwidth via MemTest 86 and our test application results for the Asus and NVIDIA boards. Our current beta level Abit BIOS locked the memory timings at 5-5-5-12 so we also tested the Asus board at this setting in order to provide a fair comparison.
All other components in our test configurations are exactly the same with the boards being set up in their default configurations. Our video tests are run at 1280x1024 resolution for this article at standard settings. We will not report on 1600x1200 4xAA/8xAF single and SLI until we have a production ready BIOS to review. This holds true for the balance of our Networking, Storage System, and Audio benchmarks.
All three boards we're including in the benchmarks support current socket 775 Intel processors, and the Abit AB9 Pro and NVIDIA 590 SLI Intel Edition will fully support the Intel Core 2 Duo processors upon release. We did our benchmarking with the Pentium D 805 processor but will follow up shortly with the Pentium 950D and 955XE benchmarks once we receive our production release BIOS. The Abit AB9 Pro fully supported our E6300, E6600, and X6800 Core 2 Duo processors, but we cannot provide results at this time due to NDA restrictions.
| Test Systems | |
| Processor: | Intel Pentium D 805 |
| RAM: | 2 x 1GB Corsair TWIN2X2048-6400C3 |
| RAM Settings: | 5-5-5-12 533MHZ, 2.100V - Abit 3-2-2-8 533MHZ, 2.250V - Asus/NVIDIA |
| OS Hard Drive: | 1 x WD Raptor 74GB 7200 RPM SATA (8MB Buffer) |
| System Platform Drivers: | NVIDIA Platform Driver - 9.35 Intel Platform Driver - 8.0.1.1002 |
| Video Card: | 1 x EVGA 7900GTX (PCI Express) for all tests |
| Video Drivers: | NVIDIA nForce 91.31 WHQL |
| Optical Drive: | BenQ DW1640 |
| Cooling: | Retail Intel HSF |
| Power Supply: | OCZ GamexStream 700W |
| Case: | Gigabyte 3D Aurora |
| Operating System: | Windows XP Professional SP2 |
| Motherboards: | Abit AB9 Pro NVIDIA nForce 590 SLI Intel Edition Asus P5WD2-E Premium |
A 2GB memory configuration is now standard in the AT test bed as most enthusiasts are currently purchasing this amount of memory. We chose memory from Corsair that would offer a wide range of memory settings during our stock and overclocked test runs. Our memory timings are set based upon determining the best memory bandwidth via MemTest 86 and our test application results for the Asus and NVIDIA boards. Our current beta level Abit BIOS locked the memory timings at 5-5-5-12 so we also tested the Asus board at this setting in order to provide a fair comparison.
All other components in our test configurations are exactly the same with the boards being set up in their default configurations. Our video tests are run at 1280x1024 resolution for this article at standard settings. We will not report on 1600x1200 4xAA/8xAF single and SLI until we have a production ready BIOS to review. This holds true for the balance of our Networking, Storage System, and Audio benchmarks.
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JarredWalton - Monday, July 3, 2006 - link
Corrected - the retail HSF was used, but it doesn't really matter since we didn't perform thorough overclocking, noise, or temperature testing yet. As mentioned in the article, we're waiting for a new BIOS release with memory timing adjustments before we do that.Heidfirst - Monday, July 3, 2006 - link
"This heatsink is part of the Abit Silent OTES technology that includes a heatpipe system and additional passive cooling for the VRM components. This system kept the MCH cool enough that additional chipset voltage was not a factor in our overclocking tests. Our only concern is the lifespan of the fanbut it is very quiet during operation"What fan?
JarredWalton - Monday, July 3, 2006 - link
Sorry - that was a fragment from an earlier article that slipped in. No fans. :)ALCX - Monday, July 3, 2006 - link
You didn't mention anything about how well this board overclocks! I would think with this 'stable' power and the D805 you would have an excellent opportunity. I'm also thinking getting a mboard like this with a $100 D805 and wait out Conroe supply issue/price until XMAS....ALCX
jones377 - Monday, July 3, 2006 - link
Do you have any plans to investigate I/O performance on this chipset? Those Winrar benches suggests these were vastly improved somehow. Memory latency/bandwidth benchmarks would be nice too. All compared to 975x, nvidia and ATI chipsets (for the Intel platform).mine - Saturday, July 8, 2006 - link
yes rightthis is what I am exspecting from anand in near future
if you like the info a little bit earlier
over@ xs
Chadder007 - Monday, July 3, 2006 - link
Im thinking about getting a motherboard like this and a Pentium D 805....and then waiting for the prices to go down and performance to go up for the Core 2's after maybe 1 year to upgrade.rqle - Monday, July 3, 2006 - link
I prefer a next gen board without the floopy, am still waiting. Keep PATA, well, third party chipset now, but kill off the floopy.Calin - Tuesday, July 4, 2006 - link
I'm all for it too - as long as you can install Windows on any computer without needing a floppy disk driveMacGuffin - Monday, July 3, 2006 - link
Or atleast X4 physical connectors, if X16 slots make things cramped for capacitors and other parts on the board. And what's up with this trend of 5/6 expansion slots on high-end motherboards? There was a time when most boards had 7 expansion slots. I guess the elaborate heatpipe mechanisms for 2-chip core logic interfere (eg. M2N-SLI vs. M2N32-SLI) with more expandability.
This is going to be a good year for technology!