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THE BIOS:
If you take a look at
these shots, you'll see the very common Award BIOS...
The Iwill KK266Plus' BIOS is very
complete. There are many options for tweaking
memory timings, AGP settings and a good array of
overclocking options. From within the BIOS,
users can manipulate the CPU multiplier (as long as
you've "unlocked" your CPU), adjust the VCore voltage
and increase their FSB in 1MHz. increments.
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Layout and Quality |
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Good Stuff... |
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| THE LAYOUT:
Anytime we
have a new product in the lab, we like to give it a
thorough physical inspection...
The first thing we noticed when we
initially
removed the KK266Plus from it's packaging was the warning
sticker covering the socket. This is a very minor
thing, but the information on this sticker could help some
first time system builders to avoid some problems. With the sticker
removed, a thermal probe is clearly visible right in the
center of the socket. Also worth mentioning is that
there is plenty of room surrounding the socket.
Overclockers looking to install an oversized heatsink
should have no problems whatsoever.
The Iwill KK266Plus has an almost perfect
slot configuration...1 AGP slot, 6 PCI slots and one ISA
slot. Equipping the board with an AGP Pro slot would
have been ideal though. The IDE and floppy drive
connectors are well placed, making it easy to route cables
neatly in your case, especially if it's a mid-tower.
Then we see the internal case connectors, that are well
laid out and clearly labeled.
The Iwill KK266Plus has a very good
on-board audio solution. The C-Media CMI8738 chip is
capable of 6 channel (5.1) audio output and supports the
most common "3D sound" standards, EAX, DirectSound 3D and
A3D. There is small ribbon cable that connects the
audio plate to the extra audio outputs. There is also
an optional "Superport" connector available that adds SPDIF
and optical connectors as well. The on-board audio
worked very well, in our opinion comparable to a SoundBlaster Live! or
Vortex 2, but not quite on the level of cards like the
Game Theater XP or Audigy.
There is also a very nice active cooler
mounted to the Northbridge, but we were a bit disappointed
to see that there was no Thermal Interface Material used.
We would have been much happier if we found some thermal
paste applied to the Northbridge before the cooler was
installed. Another small gripe, which is very common
on many current motherboards, is the lack of space between
the RAM clips and video card. Should a user want to
swap out a DIMM, they will have to remove their video
card. To end the inspection on a positive note,
we'll highlight the cleanly laid out 3-Phase power array,
and point out that the KK266Plus is equipped with 4 fan
headers, but only 3 are "free"...one of them is used by
the Northbridge cooler.
There is also a KK266Plus-R available that
adds an on-board R.A.I.D. controller. In some of the
above pictures you can see the locations where the
controller chip and drive connectors would be located...
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Overclocking and Some Numbers...
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