ABIT BP6 i440BX Dual Socket-370 ATX

The second major difference the BP6 holds over competing boards, including older models from ABIT, is the inclusion of the HighPoint HPT366 Ultra ATA 66 controller. This controller operates in addition to the Intel 82371EB PIIX4 Ultra ATA 33 controller that already provides for support for up to 4 Ultra ATA 33 compliant or compatible devices. The HPT366 doubles the number of EIDE devices supported by the board as it provides support for four additional devices, all of which may be Ultra ATA 66 compliant. All eight of the supported EIDE devices can be Ultra ATA 33 compliant, with the four on the HPT366 controller able to be Ultra ATA 66 compliant. While Ultra ATA 66 compliant devices can be installed on the first two IDE channels (driven by the PIIX4 SouthBridge) you won't be able to run them in Ultra ATA 66 mode and they will default to Ultra ATA 33 transfer modes. ABIT bundles a single 40-pin, 80-conductor Ultra ATA 66 cable with the BP6 to take advantage of the Ultra ATA 66 support the HPT366 provides, for more information about the Ultra ATA 66 standard read AnandTech's own Ultra ATA 66 Review.

The HPT366 controller features its own BIOS so devices attached to the two HPT366 channels are initialized after the power on self test (POST). The HPT366's BIOS is not user configurable by default, so all devices attached to it are autodetected every time the system is powered on. This adds a few seconds to the boot time of your system, but it's essentially the equivalent of adding a SCSI controller in terms of the length of increase of the boot time.

As you might be able to guess, the HPT366 throws off the normal boot sequence parameters in the Award BIOS setup as there is no option to have an external HPT366 controller your primarily boot device by default. ABIT made two small modifications to the BIOS features setup of the Award 4.51PG BIOS setup (interestingly enough, the BP6 did not make sure of the newer 4.60PG BIOS setup which most newer motherboards seem to use), the first was the addition of the 'EXT' device to the boot sequence selection option and the second was the configurable option 'EXT Means' with SCSI and UDMA66 as the two options for that setting. Just as you'd select the SCSI boot device option if you wished to have your boot drive be one attached to an external SCSI controller, you do the same with the 'EXT' device on the BP6, you just need to let the BIOS know whether boot from EXT means boot from a SCSI controller or the HPT366 controller.

The HPT366 controller does require driver support which is provided for by a supplied drivers disk that includes both 9x and NT drivers for the controller. When installing NT on a device attached to the HPT366 you'll need to install the drivers for the controller first by hitting F6 as soon as the text based NT install begins and using the appropriate drivers from the supplied disk.

The rest of the board, including the features of the Award BIOS are pretty much identical to that of the BX6R2. As with the BX6R2, an option in the BIOS allows for the IRQ of any specific PCI slot to be statically assigned, not only eliminating many problems with unfriendly PCI devices that simply refuse to work in certain configurations, but also making transferring hard drives from one system to another quite a bit easier as you can assign the IRQ's for all devices to specifically reflect a previous configuration.  The static IRQ assignment of the BP6/BX6R2 was a feature highly demanded by many owners of the BH6 and the original BX6 and is a feature that is quickly appearing in the BIOS setup utilities of most other motherboards. 

ABIT's highly regarded User's Manual makes its presence felt in the box of the BP6, giving users a step-by-step installation and a configuration guide for their system.  The ABIT manual includes a fairly easy to read and useful explanation of the BIOS and CPU setup, and makes the overall experience with the BP6 (especially for first time system builders) a pleasant one. The BP6's manual in particular includes helpful tips on how to install the device drivers for the HPT366 controller as well as more background information on the various features of the motherboard.

Hardware monitoring is provided courtesy of the Winbond 83782D hardware monitor chip. The board features two thermistors (one for each CPU) placed in the center of the PPGA 370 socket however there is no external thermistor header for monitoring of any other temperatures. The board features three fan connectors, two of which are monitored (both CPU fans) and included is a copy of the Winbond Hardware Doctor monitoring utility.

The performance of the BP6 is on par with what you can expect from a dual Celeron system. Keep in mind that dual Celerons aren't as effective in multiprocessor mode as dual Pentium II/IIIs due to the difference in L2 cache size. For high end applications such as 3D Studio Max, dual Celerons (of an equal clock speed) won't be as fast as dual Pentium II/IIIs however what the BP6 can be considered is a cheap way to get a performance boost. Dual Celerons are still faster than a single Celeron, and with most Celerons running below the $100 mark, Dual Celerons on a $140 BP6 (a very affordable price for this class of motherboard) will probably give you the most bang for you buck of any Pentium II class system you can put together.