by Anton Shilov
09/15/2003 | 11:30 AM
We are getting closer and closer to the 23rd of September and massive AMD Athlon 64 availability and continue our brief exploration of mainboards for AMD 64-bit desktop microprocessors. AOpen, the company known for its mainboards with vacuum tubes for better audio quality – started to advertise its Socket 754 mainboards in
What is very interesting about AOpen mainboards is that one of them – the MK-89L – uses the micro-ATX form-factor. This is the first mainboard for AMD Athlon 64 microprocessors described here that is intended for relatively small cases, not huge Full-ATX mainboards.
All mainboards designed for the 64-bit Athlon CPUs boast a number of features typically found on advanced mainboards. This is not a big surprise since the Athlon 64 chips this year will, in general, be acquired by enthusiasts, who require feature-rich products. For this matter AOpen’s micro-ATX MK-89L based on nForce3 150 is a bit unique because of its form-factor and also because it lacks a certain important options, such as Serial ATA-150. This one, obviously, seems to be targeted on “ordinary” end-users, not hardware maniacs.
Take a look on the list of features and capabilities of AOpen MK-89L and AK-86L:
Brand Name: | MK-89L | AK-86L |
Core-Logic: | NVIDIA nForce3 150 | VIA K8T800 |
PSB: | HyperTransport link | HyperTransport link |
Memory: | Up to 2GB of PC3200 | Up to 3GB of PC3200 |
Expansion Slots: | 1 AGP 8x, 3 PCI | 1 AGP 8x, 5 PCI |
Integrated Graphics: | No | No |
Parallel ATA: | 2 channel ATA-33/66/100/133 | 2 channel ATA-33/66/100/133 |
Serial ATA-150: | No | 2 ports with RAID support |
USB 2.0: | 6 or 8 ports | 8 ports |
FireWire (IEEE1394): | No information | No information |
LAN: | Probably 10/100Mb/s | 10/100/1000Mb/s |
Audio: | 6-channel AC'97 | 6-channel AC'97 |
Additional Features: | No information | No information |
Form Factor: | Micro-ATX | ATX |
Notes: | - | - |
As you see, the AK-86L provides the "must be" functions of a relatively expensive mainboard for the Fall 2003 period, whereas the MK-89L seems to be a cost-effective solution that offers us only the capabilities supported by NVIDIA nForce3 150 logic, a not very long list, to tell you the truth.
Akiba PC Hotline Japanese web-site was first to publish some technical information as well as some pictures of AOpen Socket 754 mainboards here.