ASUS M2NPV-VM Motherboard Review :: ASUS M2NPV-VM Features

ASUS M2NPV-VM Spec Sheet
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Part Number	M2NPV-VM
Manufacturer	ASUS
Price Check	Find Best Price
Downloads	BIOS Drivers Manuals
Chipset	Nvidia Geforce 6150 nForce 430
North Bridge	Nvidia 6150
Socket	Socket AM2 (940)
Processor Types	Athlon 64X2, Athlon 64FX, Athlon 64
Number of CPUs	1
Front Side Bus	1GHz HyperTransport Bus Link
Memory Type	DDR2
Memory Channels	Dual
Maximum Memory	8GB
External Graphics	PCI Express x16
IGP	Nvidia Geforce 6150
South Bridge	Nvidia nForce 430
Audio	6-channel
IDE	133/100/66/33
SCSI	None
SATA	3.0 GB/s
RAID	0, 1, 0+1, 5
LAN	10/100/1000
Firewire	IEEE 1394a
USB	USB 2.0
Expansion Slots
BIOS	AWARD
Form Factor	microATX

The Southbridge chipset on the ASUS M2NPV-VM is the nForce 430. This chipset was first introduced to support Socket 939 CPUs up to and including the FX-57 and 4800+ Dual Core CPUs that were the latest CPUs supported by that platform. NVIDIA has also certified this chipset to support the AMD AM2 platform CPUs including the 5000+, the FX-62 and others available on the market today. The CPU Socket on the M2NPV-VM is the Socket AM2.

The nForce 430 supports PCI Express (up to 18 lanes) and PCI slots. The ASUS board has a PCI Express x1 slot, a PCI Express x16 slot and two PCI slots for expansion. Other features that the nForce 430 supports include up to 8 USB 2.0 ports, High Definition Audio (H.D.A.), two Parallel ATA ports, and Serial ATA 3.0Gigabit/s with Native Command Queuing.

The M2NPV-VM sports four SATA ports. One issue with the ASUS board is the positioning of the SATA ports directly under the PCI slot #1. If a 8800GTX card is installed in the PCI Express slot, the first two SATA ports will be blocked off, meaning you'll have to use SATA cables with a short connector, or two of the ports will be unusable.

Onboard sound is provided by a Analog Devices Incorporated ADI1988 SoundMAX CODEC. This CODEC fully supports the High Definition Audio standard started by Intel in 2004 with the release of the LGA-775 platform. Though the HDA standard supports 7.1 Surround Sound, the ASUS M2NPV-VM supports 5.1 SS only. The board also supports the SoundMAX SuperBeam directional microphone. HDA supports multiple simultaneous audio streams. I like the ADI sound better than the normal Realtek sound found on most motherboards.

The rear panel IO offers a RJ-45 jack for the onboard Gigabit LAN. There is a Marvell PHY to go along with the nForce 430 Southbridge controlling the LAN. Four USB ports are present, allowing the user plenty of expansion on that front. If you need more, there are two PCI slots available on the board to add brackets on two USB headers, allowing 8 total ports. A DVI-I adapter is included to allow the usage of a Digital LCD monitor as well as a D-Sub connector to attach monitors.

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