The Basics (continued):
The rear I/O panel provides you with the following connections... On the far left we have the standard PS/2 ports for a keyboard and mouse, immediately to the right of those we have a serial port, and the 15-pin connection for the integrated video. Next we have two pairs of USB 2.0 ports, with the second pair located just below the Gigabit LAN port. With the four external connections and four internal headers providing a possibility of eight USB 2.0 connections, we could have a total of twelve USB 2.0 devices, which is the maximum number supported by this chipset. Finally, we have the 8-channel audio connections. Considering there is an SPDIF header on the motherboard, I was disappointed to see that there is no integrated connector or expansion bracket provided in order to use it.
There are not many expansion slots available on this motherboard. First, this board is not designed for SLI or CrossFire usage, so there is only one PCI-Express x16 slot, with a PCI-Express x1 slot next to it.
Next we have two PCI expansion slots. While many components are integrated into the motherboard, you may want to add different expansion cards (perhaps a wireless NIC, sound card, or TV tuner), and you may wind up picking which cards are most important since you will quickly run out of slots.
Since the review sample was a pre-release, the standard accessories might not have been included. But what was included was a single SATA cable, rear I/O panel cover (not pictured), detailed user installation manual, and a driver CD (also not pictured). The collection of accessories is rather sparse, and I would have liked a few more SATA cables to be included, at the least. Since there are no PATA channels, you are probably going to use a SATA optical and a SATA hard drive, which means you will require at least two SATA cables to get up and running.
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