NEW nForce2 chipset rev. on its way?

[InternetOwl]

I have been reading that a new rev. of the nForce2 chipset is coming to add 7.1 audio support, native Serial ATA RAID and Gigabite Ethernet to the Athlon XP platform. Anyone else know something about this?

 

[mechBgon]

Sounds like the MCP-S1000 southbridge they've been working on. The 7.1 audio is news to me but the native SATA RAID and gigabit Ethernet jive with what is known so far. I hope they've got the boards mainstream by July so we can build some killer systems at work when the fiscal year rolls over.

 

[Megatomic]

Well, with Abit and NV parting ways, I wonder who'll make an affordable high performance board using this new chipset if it ever sees the light of day? I need one with the holes around the CPU socket so I can continue to use my Alpha cooler.

 

[mechBgon]

Maybe Shuttle? They like to sit on the affordable price points...

For our work rigs I'd lean towards Asus for the three-year warranties, particularly if they'd kick out an IGP-equipped microATX version with the new southbridge. At first that sounds unlikely, but then you think about how HP/Compaq uses nForce and nForce2 in some of their business desktops, and onboard gigabit Ethernet plus onboard video would be a natural combo for a system like that.