Abit KD7A with VIA KT400A:
Pros:
1. Auxiliary power connector present – it can work with any modern PSU
2. rubycon capacitors: there was not a single time when the system froze!
3. Any RAM will work, I simply put the first modules I laid my eyes on and it worked!
4. I do not know if this is a plus but it will take any PATA hard drive – from 60 GB to 500 GB!
Cons:
1. board is smaller than standard ATX so everything is a bit cramped!

PD2JK wrote on 2023-05-31, 10:30:

Are those Rubycon caps original? I used to own a MAX2 with leaking caps, they even had a 'solid' look / package.

Yes, they are original; I acquired AT7 & AT7-MAX 2 with the full package - box, cables,... - the seller said they were used in the showroom before being put in storage.

Now they we got all the result is time to analyze them. For ease of use I made a single table with all the data; the system with AT7 – VIA KT333 is considered the baseline: 100% and the other 2 systems results will be compared to it!

The results of the tests without sound show us how little difference is between all 3 chipsets: less than 1%! Basically we are talking about the same performance. It also shows us that even a Geforce 7800gs is not bottlenecked by the AGP 4X on the VIA KT333 chipset. The so called improved and upgraded memory controller is nowhere to be seen! All reviews of the era showed incremental gains of 3-4% from KT333 to KT400 and around 5% from KT400 to KT400A. Today using the most powerful CPU compatible with all 3 chipsets and an ultra powerful AGP video card we see that AGP 8X, DDR 400 and successive chipsets do not bring more performance!
The results of the tests with sound show us there is practically no difference between AT7 equipped with VIA KT333 and AT7 – MAX 2 equipped with VIA KT400 because both are using Realtek ALC 650 codec. So despite using a different Southbridge – VT8233A versus VT8235 – and a V-link connection to the Northbridge that is double in speed AT7 – MAX 2 only advantage is the USB 2.0 controller integrated in the Southbridge. However we should not discount that advantage: it is compatible with every USB keyboard so no more chasing a keyboard that works with USB 1.1! That alone is a very important from the point of view of compatibility despite not providing any performance advantage whatsoever.
The situation is very different with the KD7A based on VIA KT400A chipset: here there is a big advantage of 8.96% when testing with sound. The explication is very simple: the board uses a VIA VT1616 codec and not a Realtek one. Maybe VIA should have continued on and improved step by step but, unfortunately, it is Realtek that continued on this path and VIA exited the audio and chipset business altogether. Today all we got is a Realtek monopoly but back in the day many others released audio codecs that proved that competition is the key to progress. Nvidia with sound storm, Via with VT1612, VT1616, Realtek with numerous version of its codec and so on. This also begs the question: what performance should we get with a KT600 motherboard such as Abit KV7 equipped with VIA VT1616 audio codec and how it would compare to nforce2 with sound storm?

KT333 wins because Universal AGP.

And now for the final conclusion: what is the highest performance chipset supporting Athlon XP with a 333 MHz FSB? Answer is: there is no winner, they are equal! If all you got is a VIA KT333 motherboard than that is fine, you will not loose any performance compared to a VIA KT400 one.
How about the particular boards I tested on? Both Abit AT7 & AT7 – MAX 2 are collector’s items so the chance of finding one is really slim. They are very good, most likely the best performing KT333/KT400 boards however that does not mean an Asus or Epox motherboard for example should be overlooked! Because as time goes by socket 462 boards are becoming rarer and rarer any functioning motherboard should be taken into account! Unlike the nforce2 versus KT880 fight this time there is no clear cut victory of a particular chipset!

appiah4 wrote on 2023-06-01, 09:10:

KT333 wins because Universal AGP.

That may be another point of view, very valid when taking into account Voodoo cards!

Do you plan on doing the 266 chipsets? KT266, KT266A, AMD 760, ALI Mag1k and some SiS ones?

Yes I am. In fact right now Abit NV7-133R is under testing. However I do not have motherboards supporting all available chipsets simply because Abit did not manufacture them. So I wil use KT7A-RAID, KR7A-RAID, KG7-RAID and NV7-133R representing VIA KT133A, KT266A, AMD 760, NFORCE1

First testing done with the NV7-133R. The board boots up fine with the Athlon XP 2000 Palomino CPU. However that is not the fastest CPU supported by the board because there are Thoroughbred models with 266 MHz FSB that are quite a bit faster. So I installed the Athlon XP 2600 AXDA2600DKV3C which is the fastest Thoroughbred model with a 266 MHz FSB. And nothing! No beep, no screen , nothing! Put the 2600 in Abit AN7 board and it started right away; booted up, recognized the CPU and XP booted up normally. Maybe this NV7-133R is damaged, capacitors are old and not up to specs anymore. Pulled up the reserve NV7-133R and again nothing with the 2600. Installed the 2000 Palomino and the system greeted me with the happy BEEP! Switched PSU to a Corsair RM1000i and still nothing!
Several days passed and managed to find an Athlon XP 2400 which is the second most powerful Thoroughbred with 266 MHz FSB. Tested first in AN7 where it was recognized on the spot and XP started normally. Put the CPU in the NV7-133R and still nothing! Replaced with the second NV7-133R and again nothing! This is fishy! That can't be right! Maybe after so many years BIOS rot set in so I flashed again the latest BIOS which is version DW and still nothing! Both NV7-133R refused to start with XP 2600&2400.
I remembered the problems with the AT7-MAX 1 so I thought maybe the boards do not like CPU's with multipliers of 13 and greater or maybe NV7-133R is not actually compatible with Thoroughbreds models so I found an Athlon XP 1600 - the very fist Thoroughbred model. Installed it and lo and behold: the system started up, greeted me with the happy BEEP and I could enter BIOS! So Thoroughbred works with NV7-133R!
Now the suspicion remains that the board does not accept any CPU with multiplier of 13 and over: ordered an Athlon XP 2200 which has a 13.5 multiplier and is due do arrived next week. If that one still does not work I must find an Athlon XP 2000 that has a 12.5 multiplier however none is available in my country so Ebay remains the only choice.

Not trying to be rude but walls of text are difficult to read, some paragraphs would help immensely with readability.

Point taken, I will try to be more concise and precise!

nd22 wrote on 2023-06-20, 03:59:

First testing done with the NV7-133R. The board boots up fine with the Athlon XP 2000 Palomino CPU. However that is not the fast […]
Show full quote

First testing done with the NV7-133R. The board boots up fine with the Athlon XP 2000 Palomino CPU. However that is not the fastest CPU supported by the board because there are Thoroughbred models with 266 MHz FSB that are quite a bit faster. So I installed the Athlon XP 2600 AXDA2600DKV3C which is the fastest Thoroughbred model with a 266 MHz FSB. And nothing! No beep, no screen , nothing! Put the 2600 in Abit AN7 board and it started right away; booted up, recognized the CPU and XP booted up normally. Maybe this NV7-133R is damaged, capacitors are old and not up to specs anymore. Pulled up the reserve NV7-133R and again nothing with the 2600. Installed the 2000 Palomino and the system greeted me with the happy BEEP! Switched PSU to a Corsair RM1000i and still nothing!
Several days passed and managed to find an Athlon XP 2400 which is the second most powerful Thoroughbred with 266 MHz FSB. Tested first in AN7 where it was recognized on the spot and XP started normally. Put the CPU in the NV7-133R and still nothing! Replaced with the second NV7-133R and again nothing! This is fishy! That can't be right! Maybe after so many years BIOS rot set in so I flashed again the latest BIOS which is version DW and still nothing! Both NV7-133R refused to start with XP 2600&2400.
I remembered the problems with the AT7-MAX 1 so I thought maybe the boards do not like CPU's with multipliers of 13 and greater or maybe NV7-133R is not actually compatible with Thoroughbreds models so I found an Athlon XP 1600 - the very fist Thoroughbred model. Installed it and lo and behold: the system started up, greeted me with the happy BEEP and I could enter BIOS! So Thoroughbred works with NV7-133R!
Now the suspicion remains that the board does not accept any CPU with multiplier of 13 and over: ordered an Athlon XP 2200 which has a 13.5 multiplier and is due do arrived next week. If that one still does not work I must find an Athlon XP 2000 that has a 12.5 multiplier however none is available in my country so Ebay remains the only choice.

If you look here http://abit.ws/page/en/motherboard/motherboar … &pPRODINFO=BIOS then you'll see that support for those processors is there in the BIOS. They should definitely work. Even Thorton is supported.

I know that it is supposed to accept any 266mhz socket cpu but in practice it does not. Maybe someone else has this board and can share some info?
Does any other nforce1 boards have the same quirks? I am fully aware that nforce1 is quite rare and not many people build systems based on it!
As I said I found that only about 75% of info available regarding this early socket 462 chipsets to be actually correct ; for example wikipedia and the manual of NV7-133r state that only 1.5gb of RAM is supported by nforce1- well, this is wrong!!

Athlon XP 2200 arrived and tested: the results are the same - it will not boot on NV7-133R.
However I also installed the CPU in the KG7-Raid which specifically states that the maximum supported CPU is Thoroughbred up to 2000! It booted right up and XP started normally! I was puzzled so I installed the 2400 in KG7-Raid and again the system started up and the CPU was recognized on the spot with the correct name in the BIOS and not unknown processor! I also tried the 2600 Thoroughbred but the system refused to post with that one so I think I discovered the limit of this board and probably AMD 760 chipset using stock - not overclocked - settings!
KR7A with KT266A is next on the bench test - which also clearly has a 2000 Thoroughbred limit as the maximum supported CPU - to see how far it would go!
Up until now the nforce1 has not made a good impression!

Today I ordered on Ebay from a German store an Athlon XP 2000 Thoroughbred part number AXDA2000DUT3C. It will arrive in 1-2 months which means that testing 266 MHz platforms will have to wait.
Abit KR7A-133R will remain in storage for now until I have the CPU so I will test processor compatibility when I have all the parts.
In the meantime I have decided that VIA KT600 deserves a complete run through all tests to see if VT1616 audio codec helps VIA against nforce2 with Sound storm or not! I will build a complete system with Abit KV7 using KT600 chipset and come back with the results!

Can't you use the pencil trick to convert one of your XPs to a 2000?

Majority of Thoroughbreds were unlocked from the box.

Am386DX-40 wrote on 2023-07-05, 18:54:

Can't you use the pencil trick to convert one of your XPs to a 2000?

I know about that trick but I never tried it! I watched a few videos and read some forum posts and I concluded it is possible to damage the motherboard if it is not done right and I do not want that to happen to an Abit 😀. Besides it only costed 5 euro to get an Athlon 2000 so I do not think is so expensive as to risk one my boards!

The Serpent Rider wrote on 2023-07-06, 19:31:

Majority of Thoroughbreds were unlocked from the box.

Very good suggestion Sir! I thought why not try it so I took the 2600 and installed in the AN7. Entered the BIOS and manually selected 12.5 multiplier and restarted. I was greeted code error 18 and continuous beeps! Si i tried the other way: entered BIOS and selected 2000 from the list in the soft menu. Again beeps and no go! I think my processors are locked and it is not possible to change multiplier manually! The things I can change are FSB, voltages, FSB/DRAM ratio!