Written: 10/27/2000
Written by: MotoŽ
Manufactured by: ABIT

The KT7-RAID is Abit's top of the line Socket A motherboard based on VIA KT133 chipset. Built in an ATX form factor for the latest support in AMD Thunderbird and Duron CPU from 550MHz to 1.2GHz processors, with 3 DIMM, 1 AGP, 1 ISA, and 6 PCI slots. The KT7-RAID has everything you could want in a top of the line motherboard. If that isn't enough, add in Ultra DMA 100 support, RAID support, 200 MHz FSB processor support and ABIT's SoftMenu III and you have the makings of what could be the best Socket A motherboard on the market today.

The VIA KT133 architecture is based on an innovative and scalable architecture with proven reliability and performance. It's a two-chip set solution consisting of VT8363 North Bridge and VT82C686A South Bridge controllers. The chipset takes advantage of PC-133 SDRAM by allowing you to run your RAM at 133Mhz while your Front Side Bus speed stays at 100Mhz.

The Abit KT7-RAID is one of the very few Socket A motherboards that lets you adjust the CPU multiplier settings. Having the ability to adjust the multiplier is important if you plan to overclock your CPU because the KT133 chipset is not very stable beyond 110Mhz (even though it has FSB way beyond 110Mhz). Unlike Intel CPUs, AMD T Birds and Durons can have their multipliers unlocked. Once unlocked you're free to leave the bus speed at the stock speed and crank up the multiplier setting all the way to 12.5X if the CPU can handle it.

The RAID controller allows you to hook up to four drives in striped, mirrored, or a combination of both. For maximum hard drive performance you would stripe your drives in a RAID 0 setup. The performance gain is really amazing. Striping two IBM 7200 RPM ATA100 drives gives higher performance than a 15,000 RPM SCSI drive. For those people who have no interest in RAID, the KT7 is available in a non RAID version for about $20 less.

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