I think it is not necessary to give information about MSI (Micro-Star International) anymore. They have been in the top five list for a long time. While the ranking in the top five is always changing, MSI continues to aim high. The feature sets on their motherboards are the most complete. You name the feature; they have it on their top motherboards. Even the pickiest guys like us, who point out even little flaws with editorial sarcasm, are watching MSI motherboards with amazement.
On the other side, the motherboard we tested was carrying out a heavy role: introducing Intel's long waited 845D chipset. The only difference with the older 845 chipset, is the replacement of the old dog SDRAM. We are not going to kill our old dog, but it is obvious that he cannot play around with our young kids P4 and Athlon XP anymore. What about RAMBUS? Why would I want to pay more for the exactly the same car, which can just speed 3 Mph more? 160 miles per hour is enough for everyone!
We know that Intel waited for RAMBUS agreement, but AMD gained ground at the same time. Why don't we use VIA or other chipset? Sorry folks but I don't give a crap what anybody says, excluding the 820 MTH catastrophe, Intel chipsets are more robust and reliable than those from other manufacturers. We test and use all kind of chipsets but I get less configuration and system crash problems with Intel chipsets in tests and daily use.
For this motherboard review I added one 845 SDRAM and one 850 RAMBUS motherboard performance results for you and me to compare with the new chipset.
