Slots and connectors are placed very conveniently, so it will be easy to assemble a system based on this mainboard. Moreover, all three PCI Express x16 slots can accommodate graphics cards with dual-slot cooling systems.

ASUS took good care of those enthusiasts who will be willing to use this board for their numerous overclocking experiments: there are Power On and Reset buttons on the board and a Clear CMOS button on the back panel.

You may be a little surprised to see no POST code indicator anywhere on the board, although it is an important diagnostic tool and it is available on the reference nForce 790i SLI based mainboards. However, remember that there is an LCD Poster panel among the bundled accessories. It displays the POST status in real time and uses not the codes but words for it.

ASUS Striker II NSE processor voltage regulator circuitry is made of contemporary components. It uses Japanese solid-state capacitors with organic polymer electrolyte, ferrite core chokes and high-frequency MOSFET. The circuitry has eight phases, however, the number of active phases may drop down to two in idle mode thanks to a special EPU controller (Energy Processing Unit).

There are six USB 2.0 ports, PS/2 keyboard connector, an optical and coaxial SPDIF connector, two eSATA ports, IEEE1394 connector, two Gigabit network ports and a Clear CMOS button on the mainboard connector panel.

Six analog audio jacks and an eight-channel ADI AD1988B codec with the entire analog part of the sound tract have been moved to a separate daughter card called SupremeFX II. It should be installed into one of the PCI Express x1 slots.

One of the unique features of ASUS Striker II NSE mainboard typical of the entire Republic of Gamers series is the back panel highlighting that should make it easier to find the right connectors in low-light conditions.

I have to say that it is far not the only glowing component on ASUS Striker II NSE. The mainboard is covered with all sorts of diagnostic LEDs for FSB frequency and different system voltages. And the colors of these LEDs have been selected in such a way but a quick look at the mainboard is enough to determine the "general condition" of the system. Of course, we are not talking about any exact diagnostics here, but it is more than enough to check if the parameters have been set correctly.