AOpen AK79G Max nForce2 Motherboard

AOpen has been creating high performance and high quality products for quite a long time. That makes it no surprise then to see them releasing no less than nine different nForce2 motherboards, especially considering that the nForce2 platform is the current AMD platform of choice and has made plenty of enthusiasts happy. This line up includes the AK79G Max, which has a plethora of innovative and handy features that you won't find anywhere else, such as WinBIOS, EzClock and Vivid BIOS. It's definitely a unique and powerful nForce2 solution.

With integrated LAN, graphics and rich audio capabilities, the AK79G Max will make its owner smile about not needing to hassle with installing PCI cards. Of course, many users will want a more robust AGP video card for better graphics performance, but for less hard core gaming fans and those who don't care to game, this board by itself is a great and simple way to build a system. Just add RAM, case, power supply, processor and hard drive, and you're set. I find this quite appealing, and any of you who have built a system for your girlfriend, parents or friends probably feel me on that one. Anyway, let's open the box and see what's crackin'.

Specifications:

Here are the AK79G Max's specs taken from AOpen's web site, followed by features also from AOpen.com.

Features:

There are definitely some cool and innovative features on this board. Here are several that I find intriguing and worth noting. Click the logo in the left hand column to learn more about that feature.

	"To provide a user-friendlier working environment, AOpen developed a new useful WinBIOS utility, which is a Windows-based utility and can be executed exclusively on AOpen motherboards that is compatible with the Windows 2000/XP operating systems. Starting now, you may configure your BIOS parameters whenever you like while found yourself under the Windows environment. The user-friendly traditional BIOS interface designed allows you to adjust/set BIOS parameters with assistance from clear description for each item."
	"This tailor-made EzClock allows you to set the voltage and frequency values of CPU, AGP, PCI and memory on a “Windows environment” utility as well as on BIOS page; even better, those settings will be displayed on your booting screen. Having this handy EzClock, you are able to take well advantage of your motherboard and have it perform as best it can. More than that, it also helps monitor the system when you over-clock, providing you detailed and necessary information."
	"Today, AOpen Motherboard is honored to bring you a new overall solution, SilentTek, to make your system quiet. To collocate with hardware circuit, BIOS and the utility under Windows, SilentTek combined “Hardware-Status Monitoring”, “Overheat Warning” and “Fan Speed Control” with user-friendly interfaces to provide you a perfect balance among noises, system performance and stability."
	"Unlike earlier graphic POST screen which could occupy the whole screen and mask text information during POST, AOpen Vivid BIOS deals with graphics and texts separately, and makes them running simultaneously during POST. With this innovative design, Vivid BIOS now brings you a beautiful and sleek 256 colors screen without missing any important information shown on POST screen."
	"Here we are pleased to provide you a brand-new powerful interface—JukeBox. Without any cost you can have your PC turn into a fashionable CD player! This latest JukeBox motherboard aims at helping you directly operate your CD player on the PC without any hassle of entering Windows operation system."

Other great features on this board include onboard sound powered by SoundStorm (considered the best onboard sound solution on the market by many), onboard graphics (GeForce4 MX - also probably the best onboard solution around), onboard Ethernet MAC, IEEE1394 (FireWire) and USB 2.0 support.

Package Contents:

• Easy Installation Guide x 1
• Enhanced Full Pictured Manual x 1
• EzRestore Guide x 1
• Bonus Pack CD disc x 1
• Norton Anti-Virus CD disc x 1
• Floppy Disk cable x 1
• 40-wire IDE cable x 1
• 80-wire ATA133 cable x 1
• Serial ATA cable x 1
• IEEE 1394 cable/bracket x 1
• TV-OUT cable/bracket x 1
• Two ports USB2.0 cable/bracket x 1
• S/PDIF cable/bracket x 1
• Back Panel I/O Shield x 1

My compliments to AOpen for the nice package. I was impressed with how well it was all packed into the relatively small box. The box is not quite as tall as other mobo boxes I've seen, but AOpen still managed to stuff everything in it and still shut the lid. I still can't quite get it all packed in there correctly in order to close it! ;-) So you get quite a complete package in the box and on the board. Very few users will need a PCI card with this setup, unless of course they want more powerful graphics. The full color easy install manual is a nice touch in this package that I wish more companies would do. Most of what you need to know can be found on the poster-sized guide. I think the black IDE cables is a cool little extra as well.