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Technology
Ok, anyone who hasn't been living under a rock will by now know that currently the nVidia nForce2 chipset is regarded as THE motherboard chipset to have for an Athlon setup. Until now there were 2 flavours of this chipset, the basic model with SPP northbridge and the IGP version that included integrated GeForce 4 MX graphics onboard. Now with the success of those 2 platforms as well as the move to 400FSB Barton's appearing, nVidia have updated there line-up with 2 new versions dubbed the nForce2 400 and nForce2 Ultra 400.
MSI's K7N2 Delta-ILSR is based on the latter of these 2 new breeds and brings with it official support for 400MHz FSB's. The Ultra 400 revision is more of an evolution to accommodate the latest features rather than a revolution. Apart from that, as the Ultra name would suggest, the nForce2 Ultra 400 chipset is mainly an optimization when compared with the original nForce2. MSI would seem to understand this and have chosen to go with the Delta tag rather than Ultra which I think is a good idea personally, although it could cause a little confusion in the marketplace when viewed with competitors who decide to use the Ultra tag. The 400 tag is obviously the bit indicating the faster FSB speed. The MSI K7N2 Delta-ILSR also uses the MCP-T which provides support for nVidia's Soundstorm audio certification (although this motherboard doesn't actually have that certification), dual LAN, Firewire, up to 6 ports of USB 2.0 as well as ATA133 IDE.
The Board
As Hubert has done in the K7N2G-ILSR review, I'm going to breakdown the naming convention here which should hopefully give you an idea of what you're getting upfront. The K7N2 indicates it's an Athlon nForce 2 motherboard. The Delta indicates this is from the nForce2 400 line-up, in the this case the 400 Ultra. The "I" is for IEEE1394 (FireWire), "L" for LAN, and the "SR" is Serial ATA RAID.
Once again we see a fire engine red PCB which will look very attractive in any case window. You can also see from the overview picture that MSI have coloured the 3 memory slots green and purple which serves to indicate Dual Channel memory configurations as we shall see a bit later.
Ok, let's start our tour of the board with the CPU area. Enthusiasts will immediately note the lack of the 4 mounting holes around the CPU socket, and whilst this doesn't affect me personally, it will be something that is going to be of concern to others, especially those with Swiftech heatsinks or watercooling systems that utilize those four holes. This is however in-line with AMD's specifications which removes this form of mounting. It's placed nicely at the top of the motherboard, which is personally my favourite place, but coupled with the power socket locations (read below) could mean that you will find yourself cramping the wiring between the HSF and PSU. Another down-point is the location of the power connectors for the motherboard. Sitting just left of the CPU socket we find a standard 20 pin ATX connector as well as a 4 pin AUX connector as usually found on P4 motherboards. Going back to the specifications you can see that there are a lot of integrated features which makes the extra power connection less of a surprise. However the location for both of these is not ideal in that chances are you are going to be draping your power cables across your HSF setup. The orientation of the ATX connector means that you will need to get your fingers in between it and the back I/O panel when removing the ATX connector which for someone with larger hands could be an issue. Conversely the 4 Pin P4 AUX connecter unclips in the reverse of the ATX connecter, meaning you need to get fingers between the connector and capacitors around the CPU area. Whilst not a problem per say since not everyone is going to be removing these connectors repeatedly, I thought it worth a mention.
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The 'northbridge' features a rather fetching active cooling solution of a heatsink with clear bladed fan, with the impeller attached to a housing that drops the blades into the 'sink. The clear blades and aluminium look is quite appealing and matches well with the mosfet 'sinks just above it.
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As with the K7N2G-ILSR the 8x AGP slot has been coloured red, and whilst it doesn't serve any functional purpose it is a nice colour. Considering the fact that the AGP slot, memory slots and ACR riser slot are coloured it would make sense for the PCI slots to be coloured as well, but this isn't the case. One thing that is a big bonus from my point of view as a reviewer is that the AGP slot clip which holds AGP cards in place is clear of the memory slots, which even in the case of a Ti4600 means that you shouldn't need to remove the card to get the memory out. The blue slot indicates the ACR slot, and whilst it won't be relevant to many who buy this motherboard retail, it will provide an extra connection possibility that would probably appeal in the OEM market.
Previous Page - Introduction
Next Page - The Board (cont'd)
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MSI K7N2 Delta-ILSR: Whilst the original nForce2 supports DDR400, it doesn't officially support 400 FSB and as we have come to learn, the best performance can be found when running your FSB and memory synchronously. This is where the nForce 2 Ultra 400 steps in.
