ABIT SE6 Socket-370 i815E ATX

AnandTech Motherboard Rating

Performance

ABIT focuses on high performance, and it is shown in the SE6.  It performs very well and is above average compared to other i815/i815E motherboards.

Price

ABIT definitely loses some points here.  Their products are usually associated with a higher price compared to other companies.  The SE6 is a bit more expensive than other i815/i815E motherboards.

Stability

With the CAS latency set to 2 and the FSB at 133MHz, the SE6 was not stable at all in our tests, despite the use of PC133 CAS 2 rated memory.  Backing off to CAS 3, the SE6 was rock solid. 

Quality

ABIT doesn’t have the best history with product quality, but they are improving.  The SE6 is not bad, about average with our metric.

Features

SoftMenu II provides a lot of FSB and CPU core voltage settings for users.  There are not as many as what SoftMenu III has, but it can still give users a lot of choices.  Beside that, the SE6 has all the main features of i815/i815E boards.

Layout

The layout of the SE6 is not very good.  The power supply connector should be best placed on the right edge of the PCB, and the second serial port should be placed on the left side of the board.  Also the AGP slot is too close to the DIMM slots.

Availability

It is never hard to find ABIT motherboards.  Most online stores and local computer stores always have them in stock.  Even some large retail stores like Microcenter, Fry’s Electronics, and CompUSA have begun to carry them.

Documentation & Software Bundle

The manual bundled with the SE6 is very well written.  It contains most information users would need for their motherboard.  The CD that comes with the motherboard contains all the drivers and utilities users would need.