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| ABIT KV8 MAX3 Taking it to the streets | |
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(Review by MS, November 24, 2003) |
| KV8 MAX3 At: |
ABIT µGuru
The third manual refers to the general super-category of µGuru. Briefly, "ABIT µGuru is a fresh Microprocessor developed by ABIT engineers and used only on ABIT motherboards". After we peeled off the sticker from the chip, the laser-markings said Winbond WL38950D. This apparent "misnomer" does not really constitute any misleading, all it says is that the chip is fab'ed by Winbond rather than by ABIT. However, there are certain similarities to known Winbond Hardware monitor chips.
Left to right: Heart of the µGuru is the Winbond WL38950D ASIC, note the alphanumerical error code display and the placement of the floppy connector; the different programs under the umbrella of µGuru are ABIT EQ, Audio EQ, Blackbox, FanEQ, Flash Menu and OCGuru; the Blackbox uses an XML-feed to generate system hardware data, certain parameters need to be entered manually. Likewise, there is an empty field to enter the description of the problem. A valid email configuration is required on the computer in order to send email to ABIT Techsupport. Among the more conventional monitoring utilities is the so-called FanEQ which allows monitoring of temperatures and dynamic adjustment of the fan RPM according to thermal load.
What is µGuru really? Basically, µGuru is a hardware monitoring and configuration utility to provide a Windows based GUI along with tweak possibilities. µGuru in this case encompasses everything from voltage and frequency monitoring over fan regulation and audio configuration, with the latter basically being a new skin for the Realtek configuration utility.
The most touted aspect of µGuru, that is, the Overclocking-µGuru is supposed to provide similar functionality as what MSI markets as CoreCell, that is, an automatic overclocking utility. The version included on the CD was, unfortunately, missing the OC-guru altogether, however, downoloading the latest version from ABIT's website solve the "missing file" problem and the OC-guru could be run.
Trying to use the µGuru for overclocking purposes revealed the next problem, though, in form of missing granularity. That is, the external CPU clock can only be increased in steps of 20 MHz, that is, the only workable settings are 220, 240, 260 and so on MHz external CPU clock, starting from a 200 MHz clock setting. If the original external CPU clock was set to e.g. 205 MHz in the BIOS, the possibilities will be 205, 225, 245 etc. MHz. Not much value in those options.
Left to right: There are a number of different ways to monitor the system hardware, the least flashy is the one shown on the left. A more futuristic skin is shown in the next picture, in this case, the three "gauges" will constantly toggle between the devices they are monitoring. For a more static monitoring display, all that is necessary is to click the arrow at the bottom and ... er, the bottom falls out like a Leporello. The OCGuru in F1 mode has the sliders for increasing clock speed etc. Last not least, there is the audio EQ which is basically an ABIT skin for the Realtek audio configuration utility.
And then, there is the "Black Box", a hardware configuration monitor and crash reporting utility that can be used to send emails to ABIT in case the system has problems. The utility automatically polls most hardware devices present in the system, along with the driver versions and OS revision. Furthermore, some of the settings like the external CPU clock are being reported, however, some details such as power supply and memory need to be entered manually.
The same goes for the description of the problem, which is better than the kind of error reporting instigated by Microsoft, which analyzes the situation and sends an error report that the ATI display drivers caused the system to malfunction. If, for example, there is a bad memory module in the system, it will send a report that the ATI display drivers caused the system to malfunction. If the hard disk drive goes bad, it will send a report that the ATI display drivers caused the system to malfunction and the same holds for extreme overclocking and improper seating of the HSF, no matter what you do, it is the fault of the ATI drivers. To be fair, the above refers to Microsoft only and not to ABIT.
next page: => Hardware Bundle / OTES =>
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