Intel P35 / X38 Motherboards Roundup
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Date: 21.02.2008 |
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abit IX38 QuadGT (Intel X38; DDR2)
The package with abit IX38 QuadGT stands out for its very bright and colorful design. Besides, it has a handle to carry the box around.
However, the contents makes you feel anguish - there are only the most needed items, albeit not all. In particular, there aren't power supply adapters for SerialATA devices.
Package bundle
- Motherboard;
- User's Guide + Quick Setup Manual in English;
- uGuru Features Guide;
- 1x software & drivers CD;
- One ATA-133 cable, one FDD cable;
- 4x SerialATA cables;
- A bracket for 2 additional USB 2.0 and one Firewire ports;
- Sticker with a jumpers layout diagram;
- 1x cap for the rear panel of the housing;
There are a few interesting traits in the PCB design.
For instance, the CPU's power converter is fully digital, with the power components hidden under a massive radiator.
The power converter of memory modules also has a separate radiator connected to the radiator of the north bridge with a heat pipe.
By the way, the shape of the radiator on the NB is rather unusual and implies installation of an additional fan. But to all appearances, engineers at abit gave up the feature.
There are four DIMM slots for DDR-2 memory modules.
There are three PCI Express x16 slots on abit IX38 QuadGT. However, because of the chipset's limitations, the full-featured 16 bus lanes are allocated to the first and third (blue) slots only. For the second (black) slot, only 4 lanes are left. However, it can be used to install an additional video card or a physics accelerator.
On abit IX38 QuadGT, there are also two PCI and one PCI Express x1 slots. To plug in hard disks, there is one Parallel ATA connector and 8 Serial ATA II connectors (two of which are external). To support additional SATA links, the board uses the additional SATA/PATA/RAID JMB363 controller.
Besides, the board uses a Gigabit LAN RTL 8110SC controller, as well as a Firewire controller - TSB43AB22A by Texas Instruments (one integrated, and the other one additional). The board also supports 12 USB 2.0 ports (4 integrated, 8 additional), and the audio subsystem Intel High Definition Audio is implemented on the base of the ALC888 codec.
The rear panel is specific in that there is a small button meant to clear the CMOS settings.
Besides this button, there are power-on and reset buttons, as well as an additional uGuru chip, a 7-stage POST indicator, as well as a connector to plug in the uGuru-Panel.
The BIOS of abit IX38 QuadGT is based on the Award BIOS Phoenix version. The memory settings section is absolutely the same as that on P35-based motherboards made by abit:
In view of the top-end X38 chipset, we'd like to have some more freedom while tuning the memory than on P35-based chipsets.
The system monitoring section is one of the most powerful among the motherboards reviewed. It is located in the uGuru section and is partitioned into several screens. The first group is "Temperature Monitoring" that displays the current temperature values of the CPU, system, and the power supply module. Also, the user can activate the processor overheat signalization and enable the automatic system power-off feature upon attaining a certain temperature.
The second section displays the current voltage levels.
Regarding that, programmers at abit added a feature of warning and automatic system power-off if the power surges exceed the admissible limits. Then, look into the "Fan Speed Monitoring" section responsible for the system fans.
abit IX38 QuadGT keeps track of the rotational speed of all the fans (6) which can be plugged in to the system. Moreover, you can assign signals of deceleration or stoppage to every fan, as well as enable the function of system power-off in case the fan has stopped.
Finally, there is the "FanEQ Control" section where the user can set a dependence between the rotational speed of the fan and the temperature.
This feature is accessible for all the six fans. Each fan has its own collection of settings:
The user can define a range of operating temperatures, as well as the range of adjusting the cooler's rotational speed. The latter parameter varies either as percentage or as absolute voltage values. Besides, the user can set the dependence of the fan's rotational speed on any temperature sensor.
Users can also retain and load BIOS settings as profiles (the board supports 5 profiles).
Now on to the overclocking tools. The respective BIOS menu item is called "OC Guru" (formerly named "SoftMenu").
Hence, abit IX38 QuadGT allows the user to adjust the FSB speed within 133 to 750MHz, raise the CPU voltage to 1.9V (using two features),
on the memory - to 3.0V, on the north bridge - to 1.9V and on the FSB - to 1.6V. The overclocking is controllable from within Windows using the multifunctional uGuru utility:
As regards the practical overclocking, the motherboard showed middling results - 496 MHz (with a CPU E6550).
Interim conclusion - abit IX38 QuadGT is quite a well-made product based on the Intel X38 chipset. Most importantly, the board is priced affordably enough, lower than some top-end motherboards based on P35. Not only that does make up for the scarce package bundle, flaws in the software and overclocking issues, but also boost attraction of this board.
Pros:
- High stability and good performance level;
- Three PCI Express x16 slots;
- Support for SerialATA II/RAID ( 8 lines; ICH8R + JMB363);
- Support for one P-ATA link (JMB363);
- Integrated 8-channel audio and Gigabit Ethernet LAN controller;
- Support for USB2.0 (12 ports) and IEEE-1394 (Firewire, 2 ports);
- Additional uGuru chip + utilities (FanEQ, BIOS profiles, OC Guru, etc.);
- The most advanced system monitoring and support for the uGuru Panel;
- 7-stage POST indicator;
- Passive system for cooling the chipset and the power supply modules;
- Affordable price;
Cons:
The board's specific features:
- Middling results of overclocking the CPU (FSB = 496 MHz);
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