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Rumor: Abit Bows out of Brand Business

Paul Lilly — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 10:13:15 -0500

Citing un-named "sources in the channel," DigiTimes reports that second-tier motherboard maker Abit has decided to quit the consumer electronics branding business. Among the products affected are digital photo frames and digital speakers, neither of which have been prominent sellers in the U.S. market, if at all.

Still, the news comes as another reminder of Abit's fall from grace as a premier motherboard maker who once catered to overclockers. At one time on the level of the likes of Asus, questionable management decisions proved fatal for the Abit of old, who hit hard times financially and sold its brand name to Universal Scientific Industrial (USI) in 2006. Since then, the company has shifted its focus to becoming a second-tier mobo maker, with its latest Abit-brand motherboard being the Intel X48-based IX48 GT3.

Image Credit: Actorsforautism.com

Rumor: End of an Era, Abit to Bid Adieu Next Week

Paul Lilly — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 09:11:22 -0600

Most seasoned enthusiasts have at least one fond memory of an Abit motherboard that overclocked like nobody's business, a trait which propelled the company into legendary status. But just as Abit had risen to the top, the company fell even quicker following questionable management decisions, and the Abit brand name was sold to Universal Scientific Industrial (USI) two years ago. Abit's presence has never been the same, and after December 31st, it will no longer exist, says TweakTown.

News and review site TweakTown appears to have intimate knowledge that USI will shut down Abit after next week. The decision follows failed expectations of USI for Abit's business, which reportedly sold between two to three million motherboards last year. This year, sales are even lower.

Old school enthusiasts hoping for a last minute stay of execution may want to keep crossing their fingers. According to Abit's website, the company's "US branch will be shutdown during the Christmas holidays, [and] normal operation will resume on Jan. 5, 2009."

Abit IN9 32X-MAX

Gordon Mah Ung — Tue, 10 Jul 2007 13:09:10 -0500

If you’ve seen one Nvidia 680i reference board, you’ve seen them all. Not so with Abit’s IN9 32X-MAX board, which thumbs its nose at the me-too crowd. The IN9 32X-MAX features Nvidia’s top 680i chipset, which gets you two x16 PCI-E slots for SLI, a third full-length x8 PCI-E slot for graphics, and support for unannounced, unofficial 1,333MHz FSB processors.

We’ve nagged Abit about funky slot configurations before, but the IN9 makes no such mistakes. With dual 8800s installed, you have access to one PCI, one x8 PCI-E, and one x1 PCI-E slot. The layout of the IN9 is nearly flawless; our only complaint is that our unit didn’t come with an auxiliary fan to cool the voltage regulators. It’s supposed to be included, but ours was apparently lost.

To make the board worthy of the “MAX” moniker, Abit bundles in Wi-Fi, surface-mounted buttons, an HDMI header for audio, and a rear-mounted CMOS reset switch, should your overclocking project go sideways.

Overclocking is one area in which the IN9 has a big advantage over the MSI board (reviewed next). We ran the IN9 with a 1.86GHz Core 2 Duo E6300 with the FSB pushed up to 1,333MHz and even did a few runs at over 1,400MHz with no issues.
With performance a nonissue, we think the choice comes down to features. The enthusiast-oriented features of the IN9 push it beyond the budget MSI board. Still this isn’t the best 680i board we’ve seen. That honor goes to Asus’s awesome Striker Extreme.

Abit AW9D-MAX

Gordon Mah Ung — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 17:07:07 -0500

When Abit hit the financial skids and outsourced its motherboard production, enthusiasts turned their mirrors around, broke out the whiskey, and prepared to mourn.

Well, mourn no more. Abit is still kicking and pumping out products for enthusiasts. Based on the older Intel 975X chipset, the AW9D-MAX is an interesting blend of future-looking features. The parallel and serial ports were nixed and Abit relocated the PS/2 ports to make room for a fat heatsink mounted to the voltage regulators. A heat pipe, black PCB, and blue LED perimeter lighting also scream enthusiast, as does a tweaker-friendly BIOS that’s probably the best we’ve seen in the 975X boards thus far. The BIOS isn’t perfect—we can’t stand the fact that if your rig fails to complete a POST, it won’t let you just reboot again and forget about the last problem. No, the Abit nags you with a “Hey dolt! You’ve probably screwed up an overclocking run, please go into the BIOS and fix it.” OK, those aren’t the exact words, but the Abit makes you feel like your spouse is telling you to clean out the garage.

The MAX also includes a two-digit POST LED and PCB-mounted switches. These aren’t new features, but they’re must-haves for this class of board. What mystifies us a little, however, is the slot configuration. If you’re running two double-width graphics cards, the MAX accommodates just a single PCI-E x1 expansion card. That effectively eliminates your chances of running a PCI soundcard, which is an essential, due to the board’s gimped Realtek chip. Not that Abit doesn’t try to do everything for PC audio. The actual codec is mounted on a riser board to get it up and away from the electrically noisy surface of the motherboard, but what’s the point if the codec is funkified? Bleh.

In performance tests, with the memory trimmed to the same latencies as the other two boards, the MAX gets squeezed by the Asus and MSI products. Although the race is close, this mobo generally gets beat by the other boards. That leaves it in a tough spot. With its funky slot configuration and premium pricing, there are better choices out there in 975X-land (Asus’s P5W DH gives you Wi-Fi and more usable slots for a little more cash). We are glad, however, that Abit is back in the hunt.