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Part 2 - Layout
The
placement of the ATX connector is something that I will definitely have to
highlight; once installed, it’s almost touching the CPU heat sink. This placement
issue will generally require disconnecting the ATX connector every time you
would like to remove the heat sink.
The I/O back panel features the mouse, keyboard connectors (PS/2), four USB
2.0 connectors, one parallel printer port, one serial port, the standard AC97
audio connectors and the Gigabit Ethernet port.
![](S2.jpe)
Audio support on the FISR Max2 is provided by the C-Media 8738MX featuring
a 6 Channel audio with the help of a MSI sound bracket. The bracket offers
2 SPDIF jacks for digital audio, one for optical and another one for a coaxial
connection and 2 analog line out jacks for a standard 4 channel output. The
C-Media solutions provides decent audio quality under standard 4 channel mode
and quite a pleasant experience under the full 6 channel setup with the use
of a digital connection. Having this solution on the Max2, I wouldn’t have
a problem using this option as my main sound source.
Serial ATA support is available thanks to the Promise PDC20376 chip. Two
high speed Serial ATA ports (SER1 & SER2) are present on the board supporting
1st generation serial ATA data rates of up to 150MB/s. Each connector
can connect one hard disk. The board features 3 IDE RAID connectors controlled
by the Promise 20376 chip. IDE3 located horizontally around PCI slots 4 and
5 is a enhanced PCI IDE and Ultra DMA 66/100/133 controller providing PIO
mode 0~5, and a Ultra DMA 66/100/133 function.
IEEE 1394 support is present on the board thanks to the VIA VT6306 chip. The
chip is a complete single IEEE 1394 solution providing high speed plug and
play connection to enabled IEEE 1394 products such as HDD’s and video cameras.
A bracket is present in the package offering three 1394 pin headers.
![](C1.jpe)
An
interesting feature on the 845PE Max2 is it’s on board Intel Gigabit Ethernet
controller. The Intel 82540EM chip located close to the PCI slot number 2
provides a standard IEEE 802.3 Ethernet interface for 1000Base-T, 100Base-TX
and 10Base-T application. The on board Ethernet adapter is capable of sending
and receiving data at 1000 Mb/s, 100Mb’s and 10Mb/s speeds in addition of
providing a direct peripheral component interconnect (PCI 2.2) compliant bus
speed up to 66MHz.
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That’s not the only bracket that our 845PE Max2 FISR sample had, featuring
already some interesting features listed in the paragraphs above, a third
bracket is in the bundle that has more than a single use. First you get an
extra USB 2.0 port, a LED system allowing the user to identify system problems
with the help of 4 LED lights capable of 16 different signals possible and
possible Bluetooth support for wireless connectivity.![](/graphics/next.gif)
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