Introduction

The motherboard industry is all about innovation. Due to the fact that most boards that are based on the same chipset perform virtually identically, it is up to the manufacturer to include something that makes their board stand out from the rest. This can come in the form of a large software bundle, low price or even a coloured PCB. These things, however, are sometimes not good enough and true innovation is needed to grab a decent chunk of the market share.

Abit's recent announcement of their MAX series of motherboards has stirred up much discussion amongst hardware enthusiasts. The main reason for this is that it is virtually legacy free, which means there are no PS2 ports, no serial parts and no parallel ports. Abit are hoping to lead the motherboard industry into the future by removing these ageing ports, and instead have added many new features such as firewire, USB 2.0, 6 channel sound and a 10/100 LAN controller.

The first motherboard Abit has introduced in the MAX series is the AT7, which is based on the KT333 chipset for the SocketA platform. Can Abit live up to the hype that has surrounded this board? Read on to find out!