Socket 775 Micro-ATX MSI motherboards review

Page 3 - Detailed overview

First few detailed pictures of the products:

The motherboard is in the standard MSI red colour. Very well placed components. memory slots are a tad apart, allowing better memory cooling. FDD connector is hidden below the PCI slots, where it isn't in the way (since it's rarely used anymore). A plus is the fact that the ATX power connector and the one for the IDE devices are close together, i.e. cables will not create a tangled mess in a smaller case (for which this motherboard is intended and suited). Another plus (for the modders at least) is the availability of a LPT port (it still being the easiest way to connect an LCD panel). COM port, despite its quite limited use nowadays is present too, again from modders standpoint it could be used for attaching a IR receiver for a remote control, still it we would have liked if it was just a header on the motherboard (for easier attaching and cable sorting). The physical dimensions of the motherboard are 244 mm length and 190 mm width, which is a tad less than the actual micro ATX format, this however we acknowledge as a benefit should a miniature case mod is concerned.

Again the standard MSI red. Yet due to the more complex Nvidia architecture, we witness a less favorable component placement. Memory slots are too close, and that could be a problem with using extreme clocking memory modules with big coolers. We also didn't like the placement of the FDD and IDE connectors. IDE connector is right behind the ATX power connector and that definitely obstructs the cable paths. Then again, this motherboard is based on rather recent chipset, and nowadays disk/optical drives ride the SATA, so whether the IDE will be used is questionable. But the motherboard has no LPT either, so you can forget about parallel attached LCD. All there is is a single COM port, implemented as header on the motherboard. As a plus we must point out the availability of HDMI port on the back panel. This is the place to point out that MSI do offer the P6NGM2, which is about the same motherboard but with LPT and COM ports on the back panel instead of HDMI (no HDMI is available at all). The physical foot print of P6NGM is a bit bigger – 244 mm length and 220 mm width.

And at the end of this section a few comparison shots: