BH7, the latest offering from ABIT features the Intel 845PE chipset. As we know that 845PE is not the fastest chipset available right now, it does have important value that no other chipset has right now. This important value is the possible official support of the 800Mhz CPUs that will be launched later. That is probably why ABIT chose to release such a board after the successful IT7 Max 2.

In our tests, we find that the performance of the board on the average. In terms of Content Creation and Business WS, the performance is exceptionally good among the 845PE/GE boards. In terms of 3D performance, it looks like it has room for improvement.

This board has pretty good features. It supports Hyper-Threading Technology, 6-channel sound and S/PDIF IN/OUT as a standard feature for improved audio performance, USB 2.0, AGP4X and onboard LAN, Serial ATA150 onboard. 800Mhz CPU support, SOFTMENU III overclocking features like vcore, vdimm, vagp, fsb adjustments.

Overclocking wise, this board has 1Mhz stepping but the range is only from 100~250 at 1mhz intervals and various FSB:RAM ratios for Async operation. PCI/AGP can also be fixed to 33/66 for better overclocking. IN our tests, we overclock our P4 1.8Ghz to 2.9Ghz at 18 x 160Mhz at CAS 2.5, 3-3-6. This is definitely a surprise for me as this CPU of mine never make it above 150 on other boards I have tested before. Priced at USD 92, it is one of the cheaper i845PE boards available which supports future CPUs.

Suggested Retail ~ USD 92.

Discuss

Pros 好处:

• 6 Channel audio
• USB 2.0 
• 1394
• SATA
• SoftMenuIII for overclocking - PCI/AGP fix, ratios, fsb up to 250Mhz
• 4 phase power
• 800Mhz support

Cons 坏处:

• No 1394
• No RAID
• AGP performance a bit low

Ratings

Here are my ratings out of 10 stars.

Highly Recommended