FIRST LOOK: Abit Fatal1ty AA8XE
by Wesley Fink on November 9, 2004 8:30 AM EST- Posted in
- Motherboards
Introduction
Abit has just unleashed their first "Fatal1ty" motherboard. For those who don't know, Fatal1ty is the name used by 19-year old Jonathan Wendel, one of the most respected gamers in the world.
Early in his gaming career, Fatal1ty became the number 1 ranked Quake 3 player in the world. This was followed by wins 3 years in a row at CPL competing in Quake 3, Alien vs. Predator 2, and Unreal Tournament 2003. Fatal1ty also won Quakecon 2002 and became the world's first Doom 3 champion at Quakecon 2004.
Abit has partnered with Fatal1ty "to develop PC gaming hardware with no equal". The Fatal1ty boards and graphics cards are "Built to Kill" according to Abit - they are designed to be the "best of the best" for gaming. There is no doubt that Abit knows enthusiasts, gaming, and overclocking as they are the brand most mentioned when computer users are asked to name a good board for overclocking. Over their years of catering to the Enthusiast, Abit has also been an innovator in overclocking, introducing features like Soft Menu that became the standard for the industry. Abit understands this market, so the launch of the Fatal1ty series seems an ideal fit with Abit strengths.
The Fatal1ty AA8XE is built with the just released Intel 925XE chipset, which sports a 1066FSB, DDR2 memory, and a PCI Express x16 slot for a graphics card. There is no doubt - in the look of Fatal1ty or in the specifications - that Abit has thrown all their best Enthusiast features at Fatality. The list of Abit Engineered features include:
- ABIT uGuruTM Technology (ABIT OC Guru/ABIT EQ/ABIT Flash Menu/ABIT Black Box)
- ABIT ThermalGuardTM Technology
- ABIT TweakGuardTM Technology
- ABIT Dual OTESTM cooling Technology (Enhanced Version)
- ABIT OC strip Technology
- ABIT PWM cooling Technology
- ABIT Aero OTES Technology
- ABIT Audio Purification Technology for Dolby Digital Live
- ABIT MB LED back-light
- ABIT MB color management system for easy installation
Our own recent tests of the 925XE/3.46EE have shown the AMD Athlon 64 to be a much better gaming platform than Intel at the present time. However, there is no doubt that Fatal1ty and Abit have the gaming credentials to put together the best gaming platform available. We will reserve judgment until we have had a chance to compare the Fatal1ty AA8XE benchmarks to other gaming rigs.
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Badash7 - Monday, November 22, 2004 - link
Does it have or will it have through a bios update support for ddr2 667mhz or faster memory like the asus 925xe p5ad2-e does?jonmcc33 - Saturday, November 13, 2004 - link
The "real" Jonathan Wendel is uncovered!http://www.eeob.iastate.edu/faculty/WendelJ/jonath...
jonmcc33 - Saturday, November 13, 2004 - link
Number 1 in talentless games like Quake 3 and Unreal Tournament and that makes him respected? A 5 year old could play those games.Maybe if he played Call of Duty or something else that requires skill then I'd think he deserves a motherboard named after him.
knitecrow - Friday, November 12, 2004 - link
those numbers don't matter for this boardthis board is targeted towards hard core gammers... who are slightly smarter than the average dell buyer.
the break down between AMD and Intel is very different for the performance gamming market. My guess is 60-40 (amd:intel)
Even Intel fanboyz are being persuaded by hard facts... for gamming Athlon64 is king.
OzMowerman - Friday, November 12, 2004 - link
AMDx86: 14.9%
notebook: 8.4%
server: 4.8%
Intel
x86: 83.6%
notebook: 90.1%
server: 96.9%
"a flea in the crack of an elephants arse" is the only thing that springs to mind
Its not hard to see why the amd fanboys get upset....LOL
when it comes to the end of the day, they make crap products and are untrustworthy.
Isnt it funny that its always the tight arse low income that sprulk amd the hardest.
If Intel made a chipset for amd processors, i would seriously consider buying one, but while our only choice is the backyarders via, and the incompetant nvidia, no thanks.
cryptonomicon - Thursday, November 11, 2004 - link
sorry, hard to resist flaming this board for some reason.cryptonomicon - Thursday, November 11, 2004 - link
so this board is really killer at.. uh.. what? media encoding and workstation performance? drool!Concillian - Wednesday, November 10, 2004 - link
#36:If those gamers are only overclocking the video card and do not overclock the CPU, they are potentially doing the right thing. What game fully utilizes an FX55 at the resolutions people actually use?
Games in general are not CPU bound at this point, so why fret over 5% here and there if the video card is going to limit your frame rates anyway? Get what's cheap for CPU and pimp out on the graphics card.
It would be nice to eventually see a review that exhibits just how GPU limited most games are even with the highest end GPUs. We always see CPU articls with the highest end GPUs to try to remove that side fo the equation and vice versa. But for a consumer they often have to take their budget and decide what gets spent where between CPU, RAM, and video cards. Probably the single most common decisions among gamers focus on these types of decisions, yet there are surprisingly few articles that focus on how to approch realistic purchasing decisions for these three critical components.
vailr - Wednesday, November 10, 2004 - link
#25: A serial port can be added to any USB port, using a USB-to-serial port adapter.$14.99 here: http://www.svc.com/usbsead.html
Wesley Fink - Wednesday, November 10, 2004 - link
#35 - My experience has been that ENTHUSIASTS know about water and phase-change cooling, but gamers usually don't know much about overclocking systems. If they overclock anything it's the video card. There are exceptions to every rule, but this is a GAMING system and I think our comments are apropos.If you believe the FX55 (2.6GHz) are not overclockable, you are not reading many articles. Most are reaching 2.9Ghz to 3.OGhz at stock voltage with air cooling. Those using water and phase-change are getting much higher results. The 90nm die-shrink will likely open the high-end even more for A64.