MSI P7N Diamond vs. MSI P7N SLI Platinum
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Date: 17.03.2008 |
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Layout and Features
Despite the different PCB design, the boards are rather similar mainly due to the three-chip layout and almost identical cooling system.
The only thing that immediately catches the eye is the different number of PCI Express x16 slots.
By the way, because of the great number of these slots, the DIMM slots rest against the first video card, which makes installation/replacement of memory modules difficult. No other issues will come up for the assembly operator. In particular, the main connector is on the bottom edge of the boards, with the additional 8-pin in the upper right-hand corner (it allows plugging in a 4-wire cable).
The system for cooling the chipsets is the same: radiators are installed on the north and south bridges, on the nForce 200 chip, and on the power components of the power components of the power converter. At the same time, all the radiators are interlinked with heat pipes.
The motherboards have four 240-pin DIMM slots each for DDR2 memory modules, with the overall supported memory capacity being 8 GB.
Now a few words on the connectors to plug in fans. On each of the boards, there is a mandatory 4-pin connector to plug in the CPU cooler.
Besides that, there are three 3-pin connectors on the Platinum board, with four 3-pin connectors on the Diamond board.
We already mentioned the configuration of PCI Express x16 slots in the introduction (there are four on the Diamond model, and three on the Platinum model).
Besides these, P7N SLI Platinum uses two PCI, with two PCI Express x1 and one PCI on the PCIP7N Diamond.
Let's now examine the expansion capabilities. The Diamond model uses the south bridge nForce 570i SLI. In the end, the board supports 6 SerialATA II links with the option of setting up a RAID array. On the Platinum model, it is nForce 430i: four SerialATA II links + support for RAID. Besides, nForce 430i supports two ParallelATA links (whereas nForce 570i SLI only one), but the Platinum board implements only one link; the second link is supported by the additional JMB363 controller made by JMicron. Support for PATA is implemented in the same way on P7N Diamond.
The same chip provides support for two more SerialATA II links which are brought over to the rear panel of the boards.
In the end, you can plug in 10 hard disks to the Platinum model (six SATA + four PATA), and twelve to the Diamond board (eight SATA + four PATA).
Then, the south bridge nForce 570i SLI supports ten USB 2.0 ports. On the Diamond model, six ports are positioned on the rear panel, with four more plugged in with brackets (there is one bracket for two ports in the bundle). The Platinum board is of the following ports configuration: four - on the rear panel with four additional (there is also one bracket for two ports). So, there are eight ports, which is precisely the number supported by the south bridge nForce 430i.
The boards support the Firewire bus. To that end, the Diamond model uses the additional JMB 381 controller made by JMicron. On the Platinum board, similar features are implemented by the VT6308P chip made by VIA.
The configuration of ports is identical: one mounted on the rear panel, with one more connected with a bracket (available in the package bundle of both the boards).
A few words on the audio subsystem. On the Platinum model, there is the ALC888 codec. As we already stated, the Diamond board comes bundled with a separate sound card based on the X-Fi chip.
Both the motherboards offer support for a high-speed network connection. They use the same Realtek RTL 8211BL Gigabit LAN controller: two on the Diamond model, and one on the Platinum.
The board's rear panel is of the following configuration:
Engineers at MSI have given up LPT and COM ports. Nevertheless, both the motherboards support only one COM port with brackets (missing in the bundle). On the panel of each motherboard, there is one Firewire port, two SerialATA, and a CMOS Reset button. Also, the Diamond board lacks audio outputs implemented on the sound card.
The boards' components layout diagram:
Now on to the BIOS settings.
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