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Specifications
The MSI K8N Diamond probably has the most imposing looks among all mainboards for the Socket 939 platform:
The number of various connectors this mainboard offers is even frightening at first. MSI stuffed this thing up the way enthusiasts like it. You can clearly see my point not only from the picture, but also from the detailed specification below:
MSI K8N Diamond | |
CPU | AMD Athlon 64 for Socket 939 |
Chipset | NVIDIA nForce4 SLI |
Hypertransport bus | 1 GHz |
Clock generator frequencies | 190, 200-400MHz (with 1MHz increment) |
Overclocking friendly functions | Adjustable Vcore, Vchipset and Vmem; |
Memory | 4 DDR DIMM slots for dual-channel DDR400 SDRAM |
PCI Express slots | 2 x PCI Express x16 |
PCI expansion slots | 3 |
USB 2.0 ports | 10 (4 – on the rear panel) |
IEEE1394 ports | 3 (2 – on the rear panel, by VIA VT6306 controller) |
ATA-100/133 | 2 ATA-133 channels |
Serial ATA | 4 Serial ATA-300 channels (with RAID support in the chipset) |
ATA RAID support | RAID 0, 1, 0+1 in the chipset |
Integrated sound | Creative Sound Blaster Live 24-bit |
Integrated LAN | Gigabit Ethernet (via chipset) |
Additional features | D-LED diagnostic system |
BIOS | Phoenix-AwardBIOS v6.00PG |
Form-factor | ATX, 304mm x 244mm |
The specification needs one comment: the additional Serial ATA RAID controller from Silicon Image is an optional component and is not present on all samples of the K8N Diamond mainboard.
MSI’s product range also includes an analogous mainboard called K8N SLI Platinum which is a little bit less expensive than the K8N Diamond, is based on the nForce4 Ultra and, accordingly, doesn’t support the SLI mode. So, one of the PCI Express x16 slots of the K8N SLI Platinum works as PCI Express x2 on the logical level. Otherwise the two mainboard models are identical.
The K8N Diamond amazes not only with its widest functionality, but also with an extremely rich set of accessories, including:
- A CD with drivers and utilities;
- One Serial ATA cable;
- One round 80-pin Parallel ATA cable and one round FDD cable;
- A bracket for the back panel of the system case with two FireWire ports;
- D-Bracket 2 for the back panel of the system case with two High-Speed USB ports and a system of diagnostics indicators D-LED;
- An I/O shield;
- A SLI kit including a SLI Switch Card and a SLI Bridge;
- A “wireless” PCI card that supports Bluetooth and 802.11g WLAN, with an antenna;
- User manual.
Of course you have to pay for every item on the list. Due to its complexity and its numerous additional controllers and accessories the MSI K8N Diamond is going to cost close to $300. We think the real adepts won’t be set aback by that, though.
