Well, at last the mainboards based on NVIDIA nForce started selling worldwide. The first product on this chipset, which managed to elbow its way into the market appeared MSI K7N420 Pro mainboard. At present, it is the only available solution based on nForce. However, there is not so much waiting left before ASUS offers us something cool as well.
On November 19 ASUS officially announced two new Socket A mainboards based on NVIDIA nForce 420 chipset. As it followed from the press-release, these mainboards called A7N266 and A7N266-E correspondingly, differed only by the audio implementation. It was true, A7N266 was equipped with an external 6-channel C-media CMI8738 sound controller, and A7N266-E used MCP-D Dolby Digital 5.1 APU integrated into the chipset South Bridge. This way, A7N266-E simply boasted enhanced audio features. All the other specs of the boards are as like as two peas. They are even built on one and the same PCB. However, as A7N266 doesn’t use the integrated APU it received a cheaper MCP South Bridge instead of MCP-D supporting Dolby Digital 5.1.
Let’s take a look at the details specs and pics of the two products:

	ASUS A7N266	ASUS A7N266-E
Supported CPUs	Socket A AMD Athlon XP, Athlon and Duron CPUs
Chipset	NVIDIA nForce 420	NVIDIA nForce 420-D
FSB Frequencies	200MHz/266MHz
Memory	Supports 64bit and 128bit memory bus (TwinBank architecture) Up to 1.5GB PC1600/PC2100 DDR SDRAM without ECC
Expansion Slots	1 AGP Prom 5 PCI, 1 ACR
VGA	1.5V AGP Pro/4x Integrated GeFirce2 MX graphics core
IDE	UltraDMA 100/66/33
Sound (optional)	C-media CMI8738 6-channel PCI audio controller	Integrated APU Integrated Dolby Digital encoder Daughter card with S/PDIF digital out included
LAN (optional)	Integrated Realtek RTL 8100 10/100Mbit LAN controller
Additional Features	SFS (Stepless Frequency Selection) Vcore and Vio adjustment ASUS COP (CPU Overheating Protection)
USB Ports	4 ports (bracket with 2 extra USB ports included)
BIOS	Award
Form-Factor	ATX (30.5cm x 24.5cm)
Extras	Three 3D games included into the package
Photos (click to enlarge)

Both mainboards should start selling in hardware stores in the first half of December. They are expected to cost:

• ASUS A7N266: $195;
• ASUS A7N266-E: $215.

We should also point out that these prices seem a bit too high to us, especially since nForce based solution from MSI with a similar set of features as A7N266-E except network support is now selling for $180-$185.