MSI K8N Neo Platinum Bios 1.6

The MSI K8N Neo Platinum motherboard layout follows the design of our earlier review of the AOpen AK89 Max which gives plenty of room around the motherboard including around the AMD Athlon 64 socket to fit any heatsink.
The power connectors are spread out around this MSI K8N Neo Platinum motherboard for even power distribution with the 4-pin connector is placed next to the power regulators close to the AMD Athlon 64 socket which have their own heatsinks and the main power connector at the bottom of the motherboard.
If you are using a full-tower case you may have to watch the length of your floppy cable if you use one as it is situated at the bottom left of the K8N Neo Platinum motherboard.
Two of the Serial ATA connectors (orange) just above the socket and close to the AGP slot you will need to exercise some care connecting these up as they are not the most rubust connectors in the world.
Good to see again that the AGP slot is not hampered while the Orange coloured PCI slot is an MSI dedicated communications slot but you can use any normal PCI card in it.
The MSI K8N Neo Platinum motherboard back panel packs all the ports you need in a neat layout and the basic motherboard connectors are colour coded as standard.
The nForce3 250GB chipset has a rather small passive heatsink fitted to it.
Fitting a fan assisted heatsink using the standard pin fittings would be very worthwhile if you are planning overclocking this MSI K8N Neo Platinum motherboard as the heatsink gets rather hot. With four fan headers you can spare one.