MSI K7T Turbo Socket-A KT133A ATX

Name: MSI K7T Turbo Socket-A KT133A ATX
Item: MSI K7T Turbo Socket-A KT133A ATX
Author: Mike Andrawes

by Mike Andrawes on January 30, 2001 1:49 AM EST

Posted in
Motherboards

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Final Words

So here you have it, the coveted MSI K7T Turbo. As a pre-production sample, it has already met our performance and stability expectations. Performance is on par with the other two candidates we’ve seen so far, although there is still some room for improvement.

In terms of stability, the K7T Turbo proves itself as the most stable KT133A motherboard so far. Even under extreme overclocking conditions, the K7T Turbo remained rock solid in our stress tests. This makes the board a very good choice for server applications, where stability is the biggest concern. The addition of the Promise ATA 100 RAID controller makes this board even more attractive.

On the other hand, there are some downsides for the K7T Turbo. Its FSB tweaking is not as flexible as ABIT, where users can choose FSB speed freely without any jumpers, and voltage tweaking is not as good as what EPoX offers, which offers more settings and even AGP voltage tweakings. These complaints are relatively minor, however, and the excellent stability alone is enough to make the K7T Turbo a winner in many people’s books. Throw in all the features MSI has included and the K7T Turbo is a clear winner.

Once again, we’d like to mention that this is just a pre-production board from MSI. We have encountered occasions where the retail product is quite different from the pre-production one send to us, and most of the time the changes only make it better. While the K7T Turbo we have tested has met the performance and stability expectations, MSI could put in some interesting features to make the retail version that much more attractive.

How it Rates

AnandTech Motherboard Rating
	Rating (x/10)
Performance As expected, performance of the K7T Turbo is similar to that from ABIT or EPoX. ABIT still holds a slight edge, but MSI and EPoX are not far off.	7.5
Price The board is expected to be between $145-155 US, which is very attractive considering the fact that it has an on-board Promise RAID controller. Also for a board with this kind of stability, it’s definitely worth it.	6.5
Stability Once again, just like the K7T Pro2, the K7T Turbo did not crash once in our standard 24-hour stress tests. We pushed it even harder and the K7T Turbo still didn’t crash once even after 48 hours of stress tests. Do we need to say more?	9.5
Quality MSI always has some of the highest quality products and the K7T Turbo is no exception. The components are very high quality, although not the best we have had, but still better than most motherboards.	8.0
Features MSI added in a lot of necessary features for overclockers, including multiplier ratio settings, FSB speed tweaking, and CPU core voltage settings. The addition of the Promise ATA 100 RAID controller undoubtedly makes this board even more attractive.	7.5
Layout The layout of the board is a bit above average. The design around the CPU socket is excellent, where there will be no obstacles blocking the airflow around the socket. However, the placement of the IDE connectors supported by the Promise controller might block the use of some longer PCI devices.	5.5
Availability MSI’s products are not as widely available as ASUS or ABIT, but their popularity is growing rapidly. You should be able to find them easily on on-line stores, and sometimes with local computer stores, due to their recent growth.	6.0
Documentation & Software Bundle MSI’s manual is merely average. It lacks some of the details for beginners, but does provide some details on BIOS and software installation. The CD does provide all the drivers and utilities though, but little else	5.0
Overall Rating - not an average Click here to find out why	8.5

MSI K7T Turbo Socket-A KT133A ATX

Final Words

How it Rates

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