Update 1/26/99

I just had the opportunity to speak with Abit tech support, and they were kind enough to provide me with some excellent information, which makes the BM6 an even more incredible board! Here's the skinny on everything new:

PCI Bus Support

The BM6 is equipped with the same Winbond BIOS enhancements as the BX6 2.0 (reviewed here), and so will support all of the amenities enjoyed by that board - including PCI clock dividers for overclocking, hardware monitoring for CPU and chassis temperature, fan speed, overheating alarms, keyboard and mouse power-on, and more.

FSB Frequency Settings

Here's the big one. In our original review, I mentioned that it was unfortunate that the BM6 only supported the standard 112/133Mhz multipliers for FSB, which makes it hard to attempt to overclock 300As past 450Mhz, or 366/400Mhz CPUs. The release BIOS (which is included with the currently shipping versions of the BM6)for the board will allow for FSB settings for the following speeds:

66Mhz
68Mhz
75Mhz
83Mhz
100Mhz
103Mhz
105Mhz
110Mhz
112Mhz
115Mhz
120Mhz
124Mhz
133Mhz

These intermediate settings are a sick overclocker's dream - The chances of your 300A running at 4.5 x 112 (504Mhz) is fairly slim, but having the option of setting it at 103, 105, or 110 can allow you to overclock to the very brink (whether this is good or bad is up to you). In my opinion, these settings are far more favorable than even those available on the BX6 2.0, which runs up to 153Mhz.

Price

We originally reported that the BM6 would initially ship in the $130 range. According to Abit, this should not be true. The BM6 is priced "just a few dollars higher" than the BH6, which you can find for around $98-100 if you look around the net. This should place BM6 pricing at roughly $100, far more competitive than our original estimate.

Scoring Changes

In light of these events, we've felt that the scores in the Ballistics Report and Final Verdict should be adjusted to reflect the changes. If you've gone through the review before, take into account the new information, and reread our final thoughts on the BM6!