Hardware Report

Abit NF7-S 2.0 Motherboard / AthlonXp 2500+ Bartron / 1gig Ram / x1600 Pro AGP

In : Mepis Linux 7 RC2

by : je.saist


This is one of my favorite custom systems. It's got one of the best motherboards Abit ever produced, coupled with one of the best AMD AthlonXP processors. It can, and has, reached a 3ghz clock rate on water cooling. It's currently nestled in one of Thermaltakes Bach Media Cases, and the two 60mm fans have been replaced with ones from Antec.

It also... is up for sale.

On a more technical note, the system was running in 1024*768 on the drive swap, so the pictures have been shrunk in the GIMP to 800*600. Clicking on each picture should net the full sized picture on photobucket.


The system in use is Mepis Linux RC2. 




Motherboard: The motherboard from Abit, the legendary NF7-S 2.0




Back when this motherboard was new, there was nothing else like it, period. The 2.0 revision was taking Barton processors up to unheard of speeds, easily reaching 2.5 and 2.6ghz clock rates on air cooling, and topping 3ghz with water cooling. The motherboard could quite simply take anything you threw at it... and make it faster.

The NF7-S 2.0 also set itself apart by hosting an optical output for the onboard Nvidia SoundStorm, one of Nvidia's best technologies ever. At the time, and even today, it still is one of the best sounding integrated sound solutions you can find.

In all truth, the only problem that the motherboard had is that extra long AGP cards could lock the lower tabs of the memory in. And you would be buying an extra long AGP card because you'd be looking at the top end Radeon 9700's or the worst graphics card ever created by Nvidia, the Geforce FX.

Of course, mine isn't exactly stock. The old Abit provided fan wore off some time ago, so now it's got a Vantec copper fan for the northbridge. Not that you'd ever see it inside the Bach case.



Processor: Yes, the processor says AthlonXp 3200+... but it isn't.

One of the features of the Abit NF7-S 2.0 is it would register a AthlonXp 2500+ Barton as AthlonXp 3200+ with no additional modification. So as far as this system is concerned... that's what it has.

The processor itself is topped by a Thermaltake Silent K7 heatsink, which means that it can clock higher.





KPowersave: Unfortunantly, this system doesn't exactly support power saving.





Network: Okay, so the motherboard only has a 10/100 network card. It works though.




Memory: Corsair XMS dual channel kit, 512mb each.



While this is Corsair kitted memory, it's not exactly as fast as it should be. The main problem is that the Abit NF7-S 2.0 refuses to run this memory at 2.2.2.5 timings with the processor in an overclocked state. So, the memory is run at a timing of 3,3,3,8. It's not exactly slow, but there is a bit more performance that could be unlocked with the right memory modules.


I have no idea why the disk cache is so high on RC2...



 

Storage: The system is currently coupled with an 80gig SATA Hitachi.





USB: no problems with the USB support.





Sound: One of the few motherboards I've ever had where I didn't need to add in a sound card.
Nvidia's Soundstorm was a fantastic audio solution, no other way to put it. Whoever decided to drop Soundstorm in Nforce3 and onwards needs to be taken out and shot. Or made to play Halo or World of Warcraft. Either would be appropriate punishment. 





X.org: the stock X.org screen. 




Of course, what we really want to know is what the graphics card actually is.

It's an x1600 Pro AGP.  As I found in my own testings under Microsoft Windows, this card could hang in with the Geforce 6600 GT, but neither were really outpacing the 9800 Pro.




Um... and unfortantly... under RC2... the 8.43 drivers have gone Nvidia on us.

We are working on a fix for the ATi drivers, so eventually that Red Failure should be a bad memory.





Take me back to the guides.