Gigabyte GA-7DXR vs Abit KG7-RAID

[Max Kamenetsky <maxk@chinook.stanford.edu>]

Hi all!
    I'll be upgrading my machine fairly soon and I'm torn between
these two motherboards

Gigabyte GA-7DXR
Abit KG7-RAID

On one hand, I've used Abit boards before and they are very good.  On
the other hand, the Gigabyte board has a built-in audio, so that will
save me some money in not having to buy a sound card.

Here are my questions:

1.  I need to be able to use the RAID chipset on the board.  That is,
    I want to use hardware RAID, not the software RAID that comes with
    the kernel.  The Abit board uses the Highpoint HPT370 chip, the
    Gigabyte board uses the Promise 100 chip.  Does anyone know if
    Linux will be able to use either one (or both) in hardware RAID
    mode?  From the latest info I could find, Linux cannot use the
    HPT370 in RAID mode.  Is the same true for the Promise chip?

2.  Is it possible to use the Creative CT-5880 sound chipset under
    Linux?  That is, will the ES1371 driver work for it?

3.  If anyone has used either one of these 2 boards, do you have any
    other comments on one vs the other?

Thanks for any help!

Max