ECS KN1 SLI Extreme Motherboard Review

Introduction & Specs

Hot on the heels of ECS’ Editor Day, they hit us back with the SLI model of the KN1 Extreme motherboard. They tell us that overclocking has improved, but is it really? More importantly does ECS manage to score with features and price again?

Not long ago we reviewed the ECS KN1 Extreme motherboard here on PC Perspective. While I really approved of the board’s package and price, the tweaks and overclocking features were a bit lacking. In fact, with a HT multiplier of 3x, I was only able to get a 230MHz bus speed. I’ve been in contact with ECS since then and they have informed me that the KN1 SLI is much better at overclocking, of course we’re going to find out. But the biggest concern for me is whether or not ECS manages to pull off a value champion as they did with the KN1. Is the price / performance / packge still there?

Specifications

ECS KN1 Extreme
Chipset	NVIDIA nForce 4 SLI
Socket Type	AMD Socket 939
Memory	4x DDR400 DIMMs, 4GB max., Dual-channel
Drive Connectivity	2x ATA133 IDE 4x SATA II (RAID 0, 1, 0+1, JBOD)
Auxiliary Drive Connectivity	2x SATA II (RAID 0, 1, JBOD)
Audio	Realtek ALC850 5.1 channel audio
Analog Audio Connectivity	6x jacks (front, rear, surround, center/bass, mic)
Digital Audio Connectivity	Coax and Optical SPDIF output
Network	Marvell 88E1111 10/100/1000 MB Realtek RTL8100C 10/100 MB
USB 2.0	4 ports on rear panel 3 headers onboard (includes 2-port bracket)
Firewire IEEE1394	2 headers onboard (includes 2-port bracket)

Comparing the specifications above with the KN1 we reviewed a few weeks back, the only differences are the audio and auxiliary drive connectivity. While the KN1 only had 3 audio jacks and a Realteck ALC650, it did have an extra ATA133 channel. But the KN1 SLI has two extra SATA-II (v2.3) instead of two plain SATA (v1.0).