MSI 925X Neo

While motherboards using Intel's new 915 mainstream chipset are becoming commonplace, products based on the high-end 925 chipset are rarer. MSI's 925X NEO Platinum is the first retail board we've seen.

Unlike the 915, the 925 only supports 800MHz FSB processors and DDR2 memory and features Intel's Extended Memory 64 Technology (Intel EM64T0), allowing 64bit addressing on the latest and future Pentium 4s.

The Neo is well laid out and built on a black PCB around the 775pin Socket T, with both the northbridge and ICH6R southbridge cooled passively by two aluminium heatsinks.

The specification of the new 925 calls for a single ATA port, so if you want two optical drives and another ATA drive you're a bit stuck. But the Neo provides two extra ATA ports controlled by a Via Raid controller. Four Serial ATA (Sata) ports also allow for Raid 0 and Raid 1 arrays.

The board has an 16x PCI Express (PCX) graphics slot - with a locking mechanism that has an awkward short release lever - two 1x PCI Express slots and three standard 32bit PCI slots, the last of which is orange as it supports two masters, so it can be used with comms cards such as MSI's own wireless cards, as well as standard PCI adapters.

You get 10/100 and Gigabit Ethernet, integrated Firewire, 7.1 audio and support for up to eight USB2 ports. All you need is bundled in the box, including rounded ATA and floppy cables.

Contact: MSI
msicomputer.co.uk

Specifications:

• Socket 775
• Pentium 4, Prescott and Extreme
• Intel 925X Intel ICH6R
• 4 memory slots (DDR2 400/533)
• 16 PCX graphics slots
• 2 PCX slots
• 3 32bit PCI slots
• 10/100/1000 Gigabit Ethernet
• 10/100 Ethernet
• 3 parallel slots
• 4 Sata
• 4 USB2
• 2 PS/2
• 1 serial port
• 1 parallel port
• 2 Ethernet
• 1 Firewire
• 6 audio
• 1 coaxial S/PDIF out
• 1 optical S/PDIF out