Abit
BE6-II review by Dean
It was already over a
year ago when Intel released it's Pentium II/III chipset called the
440BX. Immediately, big names such as Asus, MSI, Soyo and other
brands started putting out their BX boards.
Abit initially made a
huge success with their first BX boards namely the BX6 and the successor
to that, the BX6 rev 2.0. Abit made overclocking so much easy
for users with SoftMenu II in their motherboards. SoftMenu II
allows users to change parameters in the bios without touching the
jumpers on the motherboard so simply put, they're jumperless.
During the time of the
BX boards, the most common combination you'd see was the Celeron 300A
with an Abit BX6 and that combination performed at par with the Pentium
II 450 which was very expensive compared to the 300A. The successor
to the 300A's throne was the Celeron 366 which easily hit 550mhz right
out of the box. So the FSB's had by the early BX boards were
quite fine. FSB's such as 66, 75, 83, 100, 103, 105, 110, 112
and so on were the most common that time.
With the entry of higher
clocked celerons, the overclocking gain started to be less.
With the limited bus speeds of the early BX boards, a celeron 400
could only go so far as 6X83.333 or 500. New BX boards came
out then giving out FSB's 90, 95, and more above 100. Another
revolution in the motherboard industry was the addition of UDMA 66
which provides faster transfer of date from the hard drive.
So where does the BE6-II
find itself? Knowing the need for overclockable boards, Abit
revolutionized overclocking once again by providing the best board
for overclockers. Abit combined overclocking features as well
as support for UDMA 66 in their last BX motherboard the Abit BE6-II.
So what's the deal
with the BE6-II?
You know the features
of 440BX boards...I'll just list the new cool stuff in the BE6-II.
The Abit BE6-II is actually
the successor to the Abit BE6. So what makes it different?
SoftMenu III
The selling point of this
motherboard is SoftMenu III. SoftMenu II proved to very easy
to use but overclocking was made even easier with SoftMenu III.
In the bios, even a newbie could understand the things inside because
Abit simplified everything and made them very understandable.
The best thing about SoftMenu III is the added bus speeds. While
having 66, 75, 78, 81, 83, 90, 95, 100, 103, 105, 110, 112...proved
to be quite good, there're times when the bus speed you need lies
somewhere in-between.
Abit gave bus speeds of
66, 75, 83-200 in 1mhz incriments so that means you'll have more overclocking
options. Example, a Celeron 433 can easily hit 83mhz bus but
it's very hard to reach 90mhz bus. With the Abit BE6-II, you
can choose the most stable FSB and it maxes out your Celeron.
Same goes with Pentium II/III users since you have so many FSB's to
choose from...maybe you're stable at 124mhz but but not 133 so you
might try 125, 125, 127 and many more.
4 IDE connectors Support
for UDMA 66
Standard transfer rates
for HDD's were just 33.33 MB/sec but with UDMA 66, you double your
transfer rate therefore making things better. I won't go too
deep into this but Abit has a built-in mass storage controler on the
board. the HPT366 thingy....
Standard motherboard only
have 2 IDE connectors and 1 FDD connectors. Abit was nice enough
to put 2 more IDE connectors so that gives you a grand total of 4
IDE connectors. That's great!
PC 99 compliant
Color-coding things make
them easier to remember and identify. Abit's BE6-II is PC 99
compliant so that means the connectors at the back of the boards are
pastel colored. They look very cute compared to the traditional
black colored connectors and it also makes identification and remembering
easier. Green is for the mouse while the other PS/2 connector
is for the keyboard...
What else it has...
Well, the BE6-II has 1
AGP slot, 5 PCI slots and 1 ISA slot(not shared)...there's a cutout
for the 6th PCI slot.
Abit also put dip switches
on the motherboard which can let you set your processor speed manually
but using the dip switches disables SoftMenu III so you'd rather leave
them as is.
Abit also included a thermal
diode with the motherboard which allows you to monitor something else
aside from your system temperature and cpu temperature. So that
gives you system 1 temperature, system 2 temperature and cpu temperature...maybe
you'd like to stick it you your vid card and see how hot you're running...
Voltage tweaking is necessary
for overclocking but most motherboards limit you to 2.2 volts.
Abit gives you another option...2.3 volts. While this may seem
a bit high from the default 2.0 volts, it's quite good for overclockers.
You'd get an Abit board if you're an overclocker...
Stability
Abit is not known to be
the most stable motherboard maker but for me, it is very stable.
No problems...very nice job on the board.
Layout
I had an Abit BE6 but
I sold it to Louie and got myself a BE6-II. I have 2 complaints 'bout
the BE6-II...
1) The motherboard
power supply connector is located at the back of the processor slot
and that makes connecting it more difficult for some ATX cases(like
mine....)
2) The 3 DIMM slots
are located quite close to the cpu slot making alpha coolers difficult
to use with them.
Thoughts...
This truly is a very good
motherboard and I'm so impressed by it. Even if I went Spitfire
and all, I wouldn't sell off this motherboard since it's a price catch.
It's not as expensive as the Asus P3B-F but it's got very great features.
Bios updates give you everything you need...PC133 SDRAM compliance...support
for CopperMine CPU's, support for the new Celeron CPU's...
The Manual is very well
done though it is still inferior to an MSI manual...but the manual
is clear enough to understand and it was well documented.
3 DIMM slots only?
That's quite fine to me since I only use 1 stick of 128MB PC100 SDRAM
but I'm not too sure 'bout others....
This truly is the king
of all overclockers...it gives you the features of new motherboards
and combines it with overclockability. While the BX chipset
isn't too up-to-date anymore, it still is the fastest chipset when
running at 133mhz FSB. Although the motherboard doesn't really
support this bus speed, It's really fun to see your Pentium III 550E@733
on a BX platform slaughter an i820 with RDRAM with the 550E@733 as
well....
I recommend this motherboard
to those who're willing to buy the new Celerons since you can easily
overclock your Celeron II with no problem at all. All you need
is to update your bios to support these new processors. While
the official multiplier is only until 8, the new celerons are multiplier-locked
so changing it in the bios won't do anything. For Pentium III
CopperMine people....this will give you very great performance however,
you have to remember that this motherboard only has a 2/3 AGP divider
so if you run at 133mhz, you'll have an 88 or 89 mhz FSB for your
AGP card which some cards can't handle...but what the heck...the GeForce
can take that bus speed!
>> Take
me home!
anything you wanna
talk about this review? mail
me...
