ASRock 775XFire-eSATA2 Motherboard Review :: ASRock 775XFire-eSATA2 Layout

The first thing about this board that stuck out to me as to the layout of it was the location of the 24-pin ATX connector. The location of the 24-pin ATX power connector is on the top part of the board. This is not the most optimum placement for the 24-pin connector, as a far better placement would be closer to the edges of the board. The 4-pin power connector is in a great position on the upper right hand side of the board.

24-pin power

4-pin power

CPU area

North Bridge

South Bridge

USB Header

The CPU area is clear of obstacles nearly all the way around the Socket, allowing for easy installation of after-market cooling solutions on the board. The North and South bridges are each covered by a heatsink, keeping them cool in operation. The board has two USB headers bringing the total supported by the chipset to 8. A Realtek RTL8101L chip provides the PHY for the onboard LAN.

Front Panel IO

Molex Connector

eSATA2

The memory DIMMs are blocked when a long video card like the 8800GTX is installed on the motherboard. A regular 7900GT fit fine without blocking the memory slots from opening, but with the ever-increasing size of video cards it should be taken into consideration. The Front Panel IO is labeled but not color-coded. You can't mix up the connections unless you can't read.