| DriverHeaven.net @ COMDEX | ||||
Recently DriverHeaven was invited to meet with Abit at the Venetian in Las Vegas. Several motherboard manufacturers were holding a meeting there to show off their new products and meet with customers. This event coincided with Comdex, so through some last minute maneuvering, we secured interviews with ATi and ASUS as well as an entrance pass to Comdex courtesy of ATi. One plane ticket and a short flight later, I touched down in Las Vegas. After my morning coffee and a few hours of wandering around the Venetian (I got there a little early), Harry Yen of Abit was kind enough to meet with me and show me around Abit's exhibit. As can be expected, quite a large portion of the display was dedicated to Abit's line of overclocking boards. Most notable of these was Abit's display of their flagship IC7-MAX3 built into a PC in the shape of an airplane. The IC7-MAX3 features Abit's OTES (Outside Thermal Exhaust System) technology --a ducting system of sorts that diverts hot air outside of the case— as well as SecureIDE, an innovative feature that encrypts the hard drive and can only be decrypted using a physical key.
The high-end IS7 and IC7 lines have been an incredible success for Abit. Mr. Yen attributes this to Abit's exceptional R&D team, the abundance of overclocking options, and the willingness to cater to the needs and wants of the overclocking community. When asked what to expect from future motherboards, Harry confidently asserted that Abit (the pioneers of such improvements such as SoftMenu, dual processing for desktops, OTES, and most recently µGuru) has already implemented everything it could be expected to and is now waiting on newer features such as socket 939, Prescott support, and PCI Express to be implemented into chipsets. When asked if Abit would pursue expansion beyond motherboards (such as the coolly received Abit sound cards of the past), Mr. Yen maintained that this is not expected to happen any time soon. I also learned that Abit has no plans to implement ATi-based video cards any time soon. As far as the present is concerned, however, Abit has two very exciting technologies to show off. Firstly, I was treated to a live demonstration of µGuru. µGuru is a dedicated processor built to streamline the overclocking process. The µGuru allows for real-time hardware monitoring with zero resource consumption, gives the user full control over FSB and voltage settings from within Windows, and includes software that helps Abit diagnose problems should they arise. As a testament to Abit's overclocking expertise, they also had on display what must be the fastest PC in existence. Powered by an IC7-MAX3, the system was a P4 3.2GHz Extreme Edition overclocked to 4.5GHz. Unfortunately, I didn't manage to take a picture of it. Needless to say, though, the IC7-MAX3 is awesome.
Secondly, Harry Yen seemed particularly excited to show me the DigiDice, Abit's new line of small-form-factor (SFF) PCs. DigiDice is very unlike virtually any other SFF PC. It is larger than most and will accommodate a standard mATX motherboard as well as two 5.25” drives. This makes the DigiDice a much more expandable SFF than many others. At the time of writing, the DigiDice only supports the P4 processor, but Abit has plans to introduce an AMD-based one as well.
After the interview and tour, I was presented with a gift bag and sent on my way to Comdex to meet with ATi, who graciously provided me with a pass to the event.
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