Abit this week officially introduced its AW9D and AW9D-MAX motherboards aimed at Core 2 Duo processors. The maker also claims the two models are quad-core (Kentsfield) ready. Both boards are based on Intel’s 975X chipset, but the MAX version features additional Serial ATA ports, dual Gigabit Ethernet and Silent OTES 2 cooling technology in place of the older Silent OTES used by the standard AW9D. Specifications are the following:

• 1,066 MHz FSB
• DDR2-800 memory
• 4x DIMM sockets (8 GB max.)
• 1x Ultra DMA 100 port
• 4x Serial ATA 3 Gb/s ports
• 7x Serial ATA 3 Gb/s ports (MAX)
• 1x e-SATA (MAX only)
• 2x PCI-E x16 slots
• 2x PCI-E x1 slots
• 1x PCI slot
• Gigabit LAN (dual on MAX model)
• 8-channel audio (AudioMAX)
• 8x USB 2.0 ports
• 2x FireWire ports
• ATX form factor