Ureview by: carn3rd
Ureview points: 17
Ureviewer since: April 2007
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Reviewed On: Saturday April 28, 2007
Price paid: $175.00
| Rating: 9 | Recommends product: Yes
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To build a proper gaming pc, you need a proper gaming board, this was not my motto when I first build my pc. At first I ordered an Asus board which looked like something out of the future with a gigantic pipeline going down it like a vein. Alas, the motherboard was a dud from day one and I had to RMA it with newegg, instead of getting a direct replacement I opted for something better recommended by a friend. Enter the Nforce 680i LT SLI, the baord was barely a week old when I placed an order and had promising features. From the pictures though, it looked like a blast from the past with the numerous fans mounted onto it and the green color, whilst most new motherboards have more vibrant colors. This one is a keeper though regardless the color of it or how many fans it beholds. installation was idiot proof and it fired right up at the first click of the power button , unlike the asus. The only features that really had to be adjusted in the bios menu are the video mode to be set to PCI-E & the Evga startup menu to show when booting. Alot of the alteration or "tricking" to the board seems to be done through Nvidias Windows Based software instead of the traditional BIOS menu setup; alot of the clocking and other motherboard functions can be accessed through this software.
Here's a pic of the control panel menu:
and heres the Overclocking menu:
There are alot of unique features that come with the board software like Nvidia's NTune, which is supposed to tune the computer for optimal performance. There are 3 tune options as show in this picture comming up:
I have yet to use this tune feature so I can't really comment on it.
This model board is the lower version of the "family" of two board provided by Evga with the Nforce hardware present on it and I deemed that spending an extra 65$ for the the non-lt model was ridiculous, aside from it having a lcd panel on it to display error codes.
The on-board audio (Realtek HD Audio) is really swell too, along with the software included to run it, which is pretty unique, makes the uses of an after market card pretty dull.
Another plus for this board is the on board NIC port, which eliminates the need for any lan card to be plugged in. In essence there are 2 PCI-E ports for obvious SLI reasons and 3 regular psi slots, and I really do not see the need to use the regular pci slots since all the ports you need (usb,firewire etc.) are on the back of the motherboard or can be connected to the mother board for frontal chassis connection.
My real beef with this product though is the absence of a chassis speaker to the board via pins, it just isn't there. And, the nforce firewall software interferes with some programs, such as Azeurus, which have to be allowed to operate via accessing the Connection settings on the Nforce software as well, which doesn't always work as well. Another main gripe was not with how the motherboard performs but what it was packaged with. When you pop the box open, it looks like any other evga hardware, encased in heavy plastic for protection. An installation cd was included and a little pamphlet summarizing the installation of a motherboard, no hardcore booklet was included, hinting that only serious gamers need to apply when installing this. This booklet makes the connection of chassis plugs very tedious since its basically in black and white and the pictures are not clear on which plug goes where, the whole 170 page booklet though can be accessed through Evga's website and downloaded as a .Pdf file, which is pretty whack for anybody without a spare computer to do so, they could've just included the booklet instead of a pamphlet which is basically a small 4 layer harmonica which I've seen hotel pamphlets being larger than. Other than that, I would recommend this board to anyone, gamer or not.
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| Pros: Easy to navigate through bios menus. Fires up no problems. Various pin power locations for chassis/external fans. |
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| Cons: No chassis speaker pins. Nforce firewall software interferes with programs. No installation manual included. Price. |
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