Before I buy<>MSI K7N2-L

[iloveamd]

I know what some will say, "Why buy MSI in the first place!?!" I don't care about your southbridge that blew up. I have a perfect record with them. So now on to the questions...

1. Does the K7N2-L Delta have "twin bios?"
2. Does it have problems with regular Kingston DDR333 256MB, or just the HyperX?
3. How many fan plugs does it have? If only one...
4. How can I slap more than one fan in without a control panel in a drive bay.

Thanks for the help!

5. Should a worry about compatability with my Western Digital 60 GB drive?

Thanks again!

 

[yodayoda]

all questions answered here: http://www.msicomputer.com/product/detail_spec/product_detail.asp?model=K7N2_Delta-L. i built an ILSR system for my brother. i liked it because it had a friggin' grocery list of features, but i am less than impressed with the overall quality of the board compared to the abit/asus/epox/shuttle systems i have built.

1) no twin bios (unlike gigabyte)
2) i had no problems with Crucial PC2100 ram running at PC2700 speeds at aggressive timings. i think any memory problems are going to be attributed to the nForce chipset, not specifically to MSI.
3) it only has a total of 3 fan headers, and that includes one for the northbridge. so there is one for the CPU and only one for a case fan. i used a bunch of 4-pin to 3-pin converters for the case fans inside. you could also use 4-pin fans to cool your case.
4) see above.
5) i used a 120GB maxtor hard drive on the RAID controller with no problems.

let me sound off about the most grating thing: no 3 phase power regulation. while top tier mobo makers are going to 3 or even 4 phase power regulation, MSI is floundering with the other also-ran mobo makers like Soyo and ECS with their 2 phase MOSFETs. if you are serious about overclocking, have lots of components in your system, or just want rock-solid stability, you will steer clear of 2 phase boards and join the ranks of Abit/Asus/Epox users.

 

[Doh!]

Sorry to say the non-ILSR version has only 2 fan headers. One's already occupied by the NB heatsink fan so that leave you with only one for CPU. No more fan headers.

 

[CraigRT]

Originally posted by: iloveamd

Does it have problems with regular Kingston DDR333 256MB, or just the HyperX?

I could have sworn I read right on their site that it recommended Kingston memory...

I do commend you on defending MSI.. I have had not a single problem with their products either, I rather like them. but I am a die-hard Soltek lover. 😉

 

[NesuD]

1, no twin bios
2, Depends on the bios version. the most recent bios for my non delta K7N2-L fixed issues with that ram. On the other hand the new bios screwed the pooch for anyone using a 9700 pro. takes several boot attempts to get it to boot with video with 3.4 bios I think the 5.1 delta bios is the same.
3, 2 fan headers 1 for cpu fan and 1 for the northbridge fan.
4, Plug them into a 4ping connector from the power supply.
5, depends on your individual drive. some wds have an issue with the board and several other nforce2 boards that will lock them up when detecting the drives. I had one of the problem drives. there is a dirty fix for it if you have the issue. The problem has to do with a timing issue when the drive gets a reset from the controller. The fix is to disconnect the reset pin(pin1) by clipping the first 2 strands on your ata100/133 cable. if you call WD they will actually send you a modified cable that will work. all they do is you guessed it! clip the first 2 wires on the cable to disconnect pin 1. It has no effect on the other drives operation that i could tell. still annoying though. The issue is with the wd drive moreso than the board though. Don't know if MSI has corrected it in the bios or not. stopped using the drive in this system. moved it to a new home in my kids box. Just built a box for a friend witha soltek nforce2 board. My first impressions are very positive heads aboce the msi boards.

 

[iloveamd]

How does this board do with Micron 256 MB DDR 266?
:beer:

By the way...
Can you download ALL of Windows XP Service Pack 1a at one time.
For example can a go to a computer with broadband and Win 98. download the pack to a CD and install it somewhere else?

 

[NesuD]

Seems like the 256meg modules are ok with this board check crucials website to be certain. Yes you can download SP1 in one large exe and update you winxp with it. Not sure on a link you may have to find that yourself. Before you order that msi let me suggest the soltek board. I just built a system yesterday for a neighbor using the soltek igp nforce2 board and i have to say I like it far better than this msi. Liked it so much infact that i just ordered one for myself from newegg a couple of hrs ago. the msi is out of my box next week.

 

[iloveamd]

What are the suggested BIOS and driver versions on this board? I remember reading somewhere to turn off some part of the driver install. Does this carry weight?
Thanks.

 

[Doh!]

Some users were experiencing problems burning cd's or playing DVDs and solved the problem by installing MS' default IDE drivers. But using MS' IDE drivers resulted in high cpu usage during a large file transfer or any heavy disk activity. MS subsequently issued a patch to solve this problem.

I'm using nVidia IDE drivers & have had no issues so far. Try both as it seems to be a hit & miss w/ diff. hardware setup.

 

[TheCorm]

Having an initial think about an upgrade I will probably do next week, at the moment looking at this board of the Asus A7N8X, any thoughts?

Is there much difference featurewise?

Jamie