Test: Kontron KT780/ATX UK

Introduction

Let me first mention it is a liberating experience, to test a motherboard that is not made by Asus, Gigabyte or MSI, who are dominating on the market, and therefore also Hwt in general. We have not seen alot to Kontron on Hwt until now, and that is mainly because Kontron usually develop motherboards in the sizes ATX, Micro-ATX, Flex and Mini-ITX, but not Full-Size ATX in socalled embedded editions for industry. actually KT780/ATX is the first motherboard from Kontron in Full Size ATX, eventho the company has existed since 1962! And yes, we do mean 1962! - So we have to move all the way forward to the year 2008, before the first motherboard this size, rolled out from the storage in Germany. It is therefore not a copy/paste error, when the name of the board ends with /ATX. Kontron has decided to build the board around the 780G chipset with onboard HD3200 graphics, and personally I think that is a brilliant choice. It supports the newest AM2+ CPUs and DDR2 RAM, with the possibility of plugging in more powerful graphics, through the boards PCI Express 2.0 connection.

We are in a completely different world, then the usual consumer jungle, where most motherboards only exist on the market for 6 to 12 month, only to disappear into oblivion. It would be a disaster for the industries equipment, if you had to scratch a large machine, because a cleap Taiwan motherboard died in the computer that runs the process, and then not being able to aquire the part needed, to replace the old one. Or hospitals having to close down the MRI scanner, while technicians with panic in their eyes, scroll through the buy/sell section of Hwt.dk, in order to find a used motherboard that could breathe life into the machine again. Therefore it is normal with a 5-7 year warranty, where the motherboard is replacable. This motherboard however belong to a new category called the basic series, where they have cut down the warranty and support by a couple of years, in order to offer it at a price, where mr. and mrs. Denmark can afford it, and we are happy about that, because Kontron can brag about a RMA rate of 1-2% tops - Neither Gigabyte, MSI nor Asus can compete here.

Kontron leads the world market, when it comes to integrated computer technology and rock solid mobile solutions, and delivers products for a wide variety of customers, like OEMs (Original Equipment Manufacturer), system intrgration companies and program developers within business areas such as communication, automation, test and readings, transport, games and entertainment, medicine, military, air travel and energy. The company helps its clients reduce their time-to-market by alot, and reach competative edges with products, such as high performance computer platforms and -systems, single board computers, HMI and strong mobile computers. Kontron has over 2300 employees around the world, and productions in Europe, North America and South Asia. The company is noted on the German stockmarket TecDAX 30 with the symbol *KBC*. Kontron is a premium member in the Intel® Communications Alliance, and with that, have access to the leading Intel technologies and priviledged Engineering Support.

The Scandinavian sales team is located in Denmark, 20 kilometers north of Copenhagen, and are responsible for sales and marketing in all of Kontrons product assortment. The address is shared with Kontron Technology A/S, which is a product center for embedded motherboards.

For further information, visit www-kontron.com

The 780G chipset is described on the next page.