Chaintech Launches nForce2 Mainboards

[First]

Well I'm here in the Netherlands covering a very interesting series of motherboards based on NVIDIA's nForce2 chipset. Without beating around the bush too much, here are the specs:

Chaintech Zenith Board:

Name: 7NJS
Chipset: nForce2 SPP + MCP-T
Specs: FireWire, Promise Serial ATA RAID (2 SATA connectors and 1 IDE RAID connector), CMI8738 sound, USB 2.0, DualNet (NV and 3Com LAN). Accessories are very interesting; for example, this board includes 3 60mm long rounded IDE cables. This is a nice (and unique among bundled motherboard accessories) feature to have before the space-saving SATA cables (and drives) arrive. SPDIF, FireWire/USB brackets, and everything else you'd expect to be included with a high-end motherboard is included with the 7NJS.

The 7NJS's suggested USD retail price is $188. While this might seem a bit high, Chaintech was good enough to develop a low-cost version that could become very very popular around here, dubbed the 7NJL1. This is part of Chaintech's Apogee series, which is basically Chaintech's price/performance motherboards. The 7NJL1's suggested USD retail price is $120-130 and is based on the nForce2 SPP + MCP-T. Some of the other features that are included with the 7NJL1 aren't clear at the moment, but I'll have confirmation about its features when I receive it for testing tomorrow morning.

Anyway, thought you guys would like to know about this particular product. Hum, I guess there was a reason for me to fly for 10 hours to see a motherboard launch.

 

[DanStp]

I am a little confused here. I thought one of the great advantages of the NForce boards was their built in audio? Why are they using a CMI chip for the sound?

 

[dilmonen]

Originally posted by: DanStp
I am a little confused here. I thought one of the great advantages of the NForce boards was their built in audio? Why are they using a CMI chip for the sound?

The CMI chip is just the "interface" to nVidia's SoundStorm chip. Some use RealTek some use C-Media...

 

[randomlinh]

wth are you talking about "interface?" why do some manufactures list realtek, and soundstorm on different versions of their board.. ie, asus. on my roommates he has it specifically listed as nforce sound (this is from an nforce1).

For $188 w/ all the goodies, i'm disappointed they didn't use the soundstorm.

 

[RanDum72]

The CMI chip is just the "interface" to nVidia's SoundStorm chip. Some use RealTek some use C-Media

No, the CMI 8738 is not just the 'interface', its the actual sound processing chip. Chaintech used the south bridge without the APU, the basic MCP. The version with the APU is called the MCP-T. Some manufacturers such as Epox has MCP-T southbridges but uses Realtek chips for the output stages (but the sound processing is still done by the nvidia APU).

The Chaintech is similar to Asus' A7N266 nforce1 board, which has the CMI 8738 as its sound chip.