Abit bounces back with nifty new lines

ABIT IS BACK and from the look of it, healthier than ever. If you were wondering whether or not they would be around in 2008, the answer is yes, and they have a bunch of new products to prove it.

The second biggest shock is that the outfit is going to do GPUs again. It had the first two on display at the show. Abit is starting on the low end and working its way up, probably due more to NV partner rules than anything else, so they were showing the N8500GT2 and the N8600GT2. Nothing that is going to re-write the computing landscape, but it is a good sign.

Abit X48 Max Tigerforce

On the motherboard side, the high end is capped with the IX48-Max Tigerforce board. It is an overclockers X48 with add-ons and more add-ons. You can see the large coolers on the north and south bridges, but they also didn't neglect the VRMs. On top, there are clip on RAM and video card coolers (not pictured).

This board also has two things that we have never seen anywhere else. Most important is the power, five-phase, has monitors so you can watch every phase individually. If you are overclocking, this could give you vital info as to what is going wrong when things aren't stable. The other one is the box, Abit has put in a really nice inner box that is heavy duty material with a hinged top and internal trays. Not necessary, but a nice touch for a high-end board.

Moving a little down the line, they have a limited edition X38 board called the IX38 GT3. This one is Europe only and has DDR3 instead of the DDR2 found on the normal Abit X38 boards. Down a few more steps, we have an the IP45 GT3, an enthusiast P45 board with lots of heatpipes all over the critical components.

Abit Emerald 1000

Another shock was the Abit Emerald, Sapphire and Amber machines. They are Point of Sale devices, and the specs won't stun any overclocker, but they are new for Abit. The Emerald has a Via Eden CPU, a 2.5-inch drive and a 15-inch touchscreen. The Amber is a lot thicker and less elegant, while the Sapphire is basically a micro ATX PC with a monitor beside it.

Abit makes MIDs

The biggest shock? Silverthorne based MIDs. Yup, Abit is getting into that market in short order, along with everyone else. It has all the goodies, 802.11, GPS, DTV and a 4.8-inch screen. They were smart enough to eschew Vista so it looks like it may be one of the first usable MIDs from a big name manufacturer.

If this is what one year brought to Abit, we can't wait to see what next year will have. The doom and gloom about the company seems to finally have been exorcised, and now it is focusing on the future. µ