Written By:
Date Posted: July 15, 2002

In my previous review I only had two relatively small issues with the board. The K7D Master-L solves these issues and several that didn't affect me. I knocked the original K7D Master for not being based on a red printed circuit board, like other MSI products. This time around MSI got it right and released the board on a red Six-Layer PCB. Which would you rather own, an ugly green board or an awesome looking red board? That is what I thought.

MSI includes their D-Bracket in the package. The D-Bracket is a USB/LED device that occupies a PCI slot cover. It helps you troubleshoot problems by providing a using a combination of 4 LED's to tell you what the board is doing. The D-Bracket also has two USB 2.0 ports, which makes it even more practical.

Also in the package are an 80-pin IDE cable, a floppy drive cable, a driver CD, MSI sticker and manual. Maybe one day, before I die, a mainboard manufacturer will actually include two IDE cables with their product. It just doesn't make any sense to me why they wouldn't include an extra $.50 cable with such an expensive product. Oh, well. The driver CD included the latest chipset and audio drivers from AMD. While the manual was very basic, it did provide useful information such as BIOS setting definitions.

Also included was the MSI branded trial version of WinDVD. The program was a bit out of date, and there is far better software out there, such as Cyberlink PowerDVD.

Overall MSI put together a very basic, yet functional package for the K7D Master-L. The sticker was pretty nice, and it is on the front of my case now. MSI, I asked you nicely once, now would you please listen? Put two IDE cables in the box!

The K7D Master-L is very expansion friendly. An AGP Pro slot and 5 PCI slots are present. Two of the PCI slots are of the 64-bit, 66/33 MHz variety, which are indeed backward compatible with not 64-bit PCI devices. The PCI device simply has to be keyed for use in these particular slots and most PCI cards are.

While the early revision of the AMD 768 Southbridge had issues with onboard USB, the latest Southbridge release from AMD fixes the issue. MSI has decided to include a USB 2.0 card still, even though the onboard USB is functional and including the card is no longer necessary.

Like other 760MPX-based mainboards, the K7D Master-L only allows for Buffered DDR Memory in all four slots. Unbuffered DDR will only work in the first two slots. Several users of the K7D Master have reported issues when using certain memory with the board. A BIOS revision from MSI helps eliminate memory compatibility issues. I haven't had any memory compatibility issues with the K7D Master or the K7D Master-L so the BIOS' claim of improved memory compatibility remains untested.

Not willing to gamble with stability, MSI has covered the 762 Northbridge with an active heatsink. This should help keep things stable if you decide to overclock with the board. If you are not overclocking you may be able to unplug the fan in order to make your PC a little quieter. While the fan was not extremely loud, it did produce a noticeable humming sound. The humming sound may or may not disturb you, but be aware of its presence.

Another upgrade from the original K7D Master is the onboard 10/100 Mbps Ethernet courtesy of the Intel 82559ER chip. The onboard Ethernet worked quite well, and never dropped from my local network or DSL connection.

Interestingly enough, an Intel chip powers the Ethernet, meaning your AMD-powered machine will have at least one Intel part in it.

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