A Real Nail-Biter: Four Boards With ALi Magik 1

Iwill KA266-R: Stability Problems

BIOS: Award Rev. 32401A (15.12.2000)

Board revision: 1.1

What is noticeable at first sight with this package is the exemplary box design: The board from Iwill is anchored firmly in an additional, slip-proof, transparent plastic holder. Several sides of the contents can be seen from the outside through little transparent windows.

When tested, the Iwill KA266-R showed significant problems with system stability: Even a repeated BIOS update did not provide relief from this. Even worse: the performance got worse and stability could not be increased. Iwill offers the same board as the RAID variation (with an MG 80649 AMI controller) - the circuit paths have already been provided in the board layout.

The performance of the boards is good enough to place the Iwill in the midfield of this comparison. Overclocking is practically impossible: Although the frontside bus and the multiplier can be set at 100 MHz and 146 MHz in 1 MHz steps, there is no option to adjust the CPU core voltage. The placement of the AMR slot remains a mystery, as there are no components for this interface on the market.