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A
Closer Look The metallic effect box features MSI's
now trademark futuristic transport scene on the front though in all fairness it's
been toned down a bit and isn't nearly as cheesy as in the past. In fact the purple
colour scheme looks quite classy and as you'd expect all the necessary information
on features is right there on display. 
General
Layout The
layout of the K7N2 Delta is identical to its nForce 2 predecessors the K7N2G's
and in fact the same active north bridge cooling has been used too, not a surprise
as it was reasonably effective and so there was no real reason to go to the expense
and trouble of replacing it with anything else. I'm
not sure if this is the first board to feature this or just the first I've noticed
it on but the K7N2 Delta now features a new colour coded connection scheme. As
those of you not afflicted by colour blindness can see, the now have a unified
colour scheme with orange SATA connectors, yellow PATA connectors, red AGP 8X
slot, dark green IEEE1394 connectors, blue USB2.0 connector and so on and I understand
MSI is to standardise this colour scheme across their product range. 
Click For a Larger
Image
The
problems we saw with IDE connector alignment on the K7N2G persists on this
board too. There may well be design constraints that stop MSI from positioning
the IDE connectors so their position corresponds with the gaps between the PCI
slots, and although their actual positioning doesn't stop you using full length
cards in slots three and four in most cases it does mean the IDE cables have to
be folded flat to accomodate them.
The
Bundle I'm
beginning to wonder if MSI invented the word "bundle", though to be
fair thay don't quite go as far with their motherboard bundles as they do with
their graphics cards. The picture below shows the bundle that comes with the ILSR
including 2 SATA cables, S-Bracket, D-Bracket, IEEE1394-Bracket and TV-Out bracket.
Also there a round IDE ribbon cable (red of course!), I/O plate and instruction
manual. Why there's a TV out bracket included I'm not sure. 
The
board comes equipped with 5 PCI slots alongside an OEM friendly ACR slot (blue).
Because the board is equipped with five rather than six PCI slots the problem
of AGP graphics cards blocking access to the memory slots is avoided. 
Socket
clearance proved to be reasonably good though because the Delta shares its design
with the K7N2Gs we once again see it rotated 90 degrees to the usual orientation
which can be a pain with some cases that locate the power supply or structural
case cross-bracing close to the motherboard's edge. Missing again are the four
mounting holes around the socket which may be a cause of concern for those with
cooling solutions that require them. I should really point out that the removal
of these holes is actually in accordance with AMD's current Thermal, Mechanical,
and Chassis Cooling Design Guide which you can read HERE
should you so desire. I think it's time for AMD to do what they should have done
a long time ago and design a standard and much easier to use method for attaching
heat sinks to their CPUs.
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Our
Thermalright SLK-800 went on with bags of room to spare, thanks partly to its
design, but even so the SLK-800 is no petite cooler. The corner of the
rotated north bridge cooler and the two caps beside it might make it a bit tight
or use with some coolers though soo keep this in mind before you buy. Passive
heat sinks are used to control temperatures on the power circuit. We know from
experience that the nForce2's power train can get pretty toasty so anything that
helps is a welcome addition. The location of the the ATX
and auxilliary power connector is certain to upset the pursists but on a personal
level if this improves stability I for one am quite happy to tug my power cables
clear of the CPU fan with a cable tie.
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 P4
users will feel at home but the addition of a 4 pin auxiliary power connector
will come as a rude awakening to Socket A veterans. The board will operate perfectly
well with this connector removed but stability may be compromised. I'd still like
to see the inclusion of an adaptor so that users of power supplies which don't
have the 4 pin auxilliary connector can still use it from a regular 4 pin Molex. |
In
terms of hardwired connectors you get the usual assortment of audio jacks, that's
speaker out, line in and mic. There are also four USB 2.0 ports, 1 parallel port,
one serial port, PS/2 keyboard and mouse port and finally LAN. The blank space
to the right of the serial port is where the VGA connector is placed on the integrated
graphics version of the board.
 The
K7N2 Delta features the MCP-T which NVIDIA refers to as their "Digital Media
Gateway". This impressive chip features support six USB2.0 ports, IEEE1394
support, 2, 4, or 6-channel Audio and a whole lot
more.
As
I mentioned earlier the Delta features what looks like a pretty effective actively
cooled sink on the IGP. This
however ties up one of only two available fan headers on the board.  The
Promise PDC20376 offers dual Serial ATA-150 channels plus it also allows for an
additional ATA-133 IDE channel too. You are able to add two SATA devices as single
and separate drives are to create a RAID array of levels 0 or 1. I haven't been
able to test this but I understand that even under absolutely perfect conditions
the architecture of this particular Promise controller means it will never peak
beyond 133 MB/sec, not that we're likely to see that happen anyway!
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Extra
sound outputs are supplied by the included "S Bracket" which adds rear
left/right and centre/sub analogue outputs along with optical and coaxial SPDIF...... ......Also
you get the "IEEE1394" Firewire bracket, without which the added Firewire
functionality wouldn't be a lot of use really. I can't decide if the decision
to put a 4 pin (or i.link) connector on the bracket with a conventional 6 pin
connector is a good idea or not. I've seen plenty of four pin connectors at the
peripheral end but not at the PC end so I wonder if it would have been better
to opt for dual 6 pin connectors as seems to be the norm. And
a relative rarity is the TV out bracket. Rare it may be but welcomed it certainly
is and more motherboards featuring onboard graphics should come with one of these.
Unfortunately this board doesn't feature onboard graphics so I can only guess
this was included by mistake? | |
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MSI™ 1394 Cable
TV Out Bracket
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I
remember buying an MSI board that was one of the first ever to feature diagnostic
debug LED's and I have almost come to think of MSI as the pioneers of this technology.
The Delta comes with MSI's 4 light diagnostic bracket as standard. |
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