Although the Athlon XP is already surfacing in some stores worldwide, its official release date is not until October the 9th.

The Athlon MPs have been kicking around for some time and work with KT7As (and KT7s), but have performance identical to normal Thunderbirds due to their new features not being recognised by the bios.

I can understand Abit not adding support for the MPs with it not being an official desktop cpu, but now the XPs are surfacing I'm praying for a new bios.

Abit out of every motherboard brand have always been about adding support for o/c and options for enthusiasts, so I hope they stick to this trend by being one of the first to add true Athlon XP support.

In a press conference held in July, they claimed that the KT7A (and KT7) was "capable of identifying the palamino core" as it contained the required circuitry.

I realise that lack of DDR on the KT7A will hold the new XPs back a little, but other options recognised by a new bios (More SSE, Improved Hardware Pre-fetch, etc) will certainly boost performance.

So come on Abit, keep us in the dark no longer - we need to know!

I've sent the above to all the abit tech e-nail links on the forum main page. Show your support by doing the same!

Thanks for reading!

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Also the current bios will only recognise the XP as a normal thunderbird. ASUS have released an XP bios for their KT133A boards, so I'm sure Abit will follow suit soon.

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The Abit-Tech-Email (Netherlands) told me, the new Duron is NOT supported by the KT7s.

I'm trying to find the answer to that right noiw in other forums and by e-mailing Abit.

Doni and others, check this page out:

Palomino core support

Looks like the core works fine with the KT7 and KT7A, but this XP issue mentioned above needs sorting out. Abit e-mailed me and said all you have to do is re-install the operating system to use the SSE instructions - the KT7A works fine with the XP.

Confused? so am I..................

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This board isn't very old and should be able to support the XP - other KT133A motherboards have already released support!

[ October 11, 2001: Message edited by: spirits247 ]

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An Abit senior engineer has contacted me, writing this crap:

<<"KT7A/KT7A-Raid rev 1.3and KG7/KG7-Raid/KG7-lite will support new Athlon XP CPU. However, a BIOS upgrade is required. The BIOS will appear in ftp://ftp.abit.com.tw/pub/beta first for trial. After the trial period, it will be formally release and put it on www.abit.com.tw.
Before the BIOS released, we do not have the CPU support range.

Without BIOS upgrade, the boards may able to boot up and run. But the SSE function will not activate. Also if the system is upgrading from T'Bird Athlon to XP Athlon, you are requested to re-install Windows. Otherwise, the SSE function will not work. For details of SSE, please visit AMD web site.

KT7/KT7-Raid and KT7A/KT7A-Raid revision less than 1.3 will not/can not support XP Athlon. Although, they may share same BIOS. The revision is printed on a sticker and sticks on the top of mainboard with a code number and V.*.* at the end. This V *.* is the revision. Usu">>

Considering like 99% of people have V1.2 or below, I'd say the majority of us KT7A users are done for.

I bought my motherboard less than 7 months ago, 5 of which were spent getting bios updates to sort out stability and sblive! issues. I had to send a Thunderbird back because Abit has only recently brought out a bios allowing those above 1.1Ghz to work! And how about the infamous Geforce problems with the AGP slot? Then, when the thing is running like a dream with Bios 3R, I now hear this - NO XP FOR YOU MY LAD. Great.

How about replacing my board with a V1.3 then Abit? Fat chance I'm sure!

Oh well, guess it's the KT266A. But not from Abit....................

For those poor souls wanting to find out the inevitable (you haven't got a V1.3), here is how to do it.

Two places where you can see your revision:

1) Bar code bottom left hand corner of the board, next to the ISA slot. Mine says V1.0

2) Sticker on the bottom of the ISA slot (yeah I know, great place to put it huh?). Use a CDROM or mirror to read the version number without removing the board.

[ October 12, 2001: Message edited by: spirits247 ]

[ October 12, 2001: Message edited by: spirits247 ]

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I'm so confused!

I love Abit me, fantastic manufacturer. New bios for my KT7A and XP. New they'd come through

Hydrasun, you may be ok! Let us know!

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I wrote Abit in the netherlands this mail:

Hello,
I use a Abit KT7A Raid Motherboard. My Question is: Will it work with the
new Athlon XP? Need I for this combination a new BIOS?

and got this answer:

That is not possible at the moment and i don't know if a biosupdate will
solve this because those updates are made in Taiwan

Please reply with former messages included
Biosflashing is at your own risk

Met Vriendelijke Groet,
Mit Freundlichen Grüßen,
Best Regards,

Jos Mommersteeg
ABIT Technical Support

This whole thing is really confusing.

It seems that old KT7/KT7A won't support AthlonXP.
http://fae.abit.com.tw/eng/faq/qa/2001/2001101201.htm

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Looks like I AM gonna have to get a KR7-RAID after all. THX ABIT

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AMD Duron 800
Abit KT7-RAID BIOS 4A
256meg PC133 Micron memory
Creative GeForce Annihilator (21.81)
SBLive! Player 1024
GlobalWin FOP38
Edimax Realtek 10/100 PCI NIC
Maxtor 33073U4 30.7GB UDMA 100 drive

IDE 2 Master - Ricoh MP9060A CDRW/DVD combo drive
Ide3 master - Maxtor ATA100 drive

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T-Bird 1000@1333(133x10)
KT7A with bios version 64
ASUS GeForce 2 GTS Pure
SB Live! 5.1

asus a7v133 (KT133A) = compatible
aopen ak73 (KT133A) = compatible
MSI's K7T-Turbo (Kt133A) = compatible
ADD MORE KT133A BOARDS HERE

Abit Kt7A (Kt133A, 99% of boards)-> up yours hahahaha buy our next board!

[ October 12, 2001: Message edited by: spirits247 ]

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Like I said above, 99% of KT7A boards will not work with the XP.

[ October 12, 2001: Message edited by: spirits247 ]

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T-Bird 1000@1333(133x10)
KT7A with bios version 64
ASUS GeForce 2 GTS Pure
SB Live! 5.1

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OHH AND I WANT TO KNOW FIRST WHAT CAN HAPPEND, IF MOBO CAN DIE WHEN YOU FLASH WITH OTHER BIOS THEN I WILL NOT GONNA DO THAT, IF IT WILL NOT JUST BOT THEN I AM GONNA TRY

[ October 13, 2001: Message edited by: Z ]

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T-Bird 1000@1333(133x10)
KT7A with bios version 64
ASUS GeForce 2 GTS Pure
SB Live! 5.1

Even without official support, I still wouldn't mind buying a 1.33 XP for my KT7A as long as the thing worked - even without SSE.

I mean in the UK they are the same price as the normal TB's but run cooler, won't require a new PSU or HSF and I can eventually use it in my next m/b.

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quote:

---

Originally posted by spirits247:
Hydrasun has just bought an XP and has the older KT7A. Can't wait for him to report back and let us know how he got on!

Even without official support, I still wouldn't mind buying a 1.33 XP for my KT7A as long as the thing worked - even without SSE.

I mean in the UK they are the same price as the normal TB's but run cooler, won't require a new PSU or HSF and I can eventually use it in my next m/b.

---

ok, cool, how long we have to w8

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T-Bird 1000@1333(133x10)
KT7A with bios version 64
ASUS GeForce 2 GTS Pure
SB Live! 5.1

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AMD Duron 800
Abit KT7-RAID BIOS 4A
256meg PC133 Micron memory
Creative GeForce Annihilator (21.81)
SBLive! Player 1024
GlobalWin FOP38
Edimax Realtek 10/100 PCI NIC
Maxtor 33073U4 30.7GB UDMA 100 drive

IDE 2 Master - Ricoh MP9060A CDRW/DVD combo drive
Ide3 master - Maxtor ATA100 drive

Also did you set your bios to 133*10 when trying to run it?

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The KT7 is manufactured by a great company called ABIT.It is one of they flagship model for the AMD Socket A line of CPUs, the KT7A.
I bought this mobo 3 months ago, I decided to buy ABIT again (I had a BH6 before) becouse I was satisfied with the quality and the support they offered.Everything went right till the day AMD has announced they new CPU the Athlon XP and on that day I decided to upgrade to a 1.8GHz PR XP when it will be available.Sadly this ABIT company was made a big mistake, they "flagship" product does not supports this new type of AMD CPU, but they latest super flagship product the KG7 (or the KT7A rev1.3) does.
I can't understand why simply all the other company's (I bet even ACORP, sorry...) mainboards based on the same chipset are able to handle this problem with a BIOS update.I can't belive that they want to force us (KT7 users) to buy they new product this way...
If this is the situation then .... %$@#!@$$^ for them. <- 10 minute long beep here.

Now,
What about the quality ? -> simply lost somewhere.
What about the support ? -> support? soory not available now.
What about the close work with CPU manufacturers ? -> seems it's gone too.

WHAT ABOUT US?

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AMD Duron 800
Abit KT7-RAID BIOS 4A
256meg PC133 Micron memory
Creative GeForce Annihilator (21.81)
SBLive! Player 1024
GlobalWin FOP38
Edimax Realtek 10/100 PCI NIC
Maxtor 33073U4 30.7GB UDMA 100 drive

IDE 2 Master - Ricoh MP9060A CDRW/DVD combo drive
Ide3 master - Maxtor ATA100 drive

I'm currently selling this obsolete junk and getting an Epox 8KHA+ using the new KT266A chipset. I lose a bit of cash that could have gone towards an XP, but I'm so sick of this situation now I just want out.

The reviews of this board are astounding, and the stability with the very first bios faultless (something Abit never achieved with the KT7A).

Best of all it has a new via southbridge that works fine with sblive cards!

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