EVGA nForce 750i SLI FTW Review

Thanks to memory manufacturers overestimating demand for Windows Vista, and the cutthroat competition between AMD, Intel, and NVIDIA going on right now, end users are enjoying bargain basement pricing on several system components: quad-core CPUs from Intel are currently starting right around $220, while 2GB DDR2 RAM kits are going for less than $50, and potent mainstream GPUs like the GeForce 9600 GT selling for under $150. With such low prices, gamers and hardware enthusiasts on a budget can now build a pretty powerful gaming system without having to spend a lot of money.

But one component that really hasn’t gone down in price the last 12 months is the motherboard. In fact, if anything motherboard prices may be slightly higher than they were a year ago. A quick glance at Newegg reveals nForce 780i SLI motherboards currently sell between $240-$300, while nForce 790i Ultra SLI motherboards start around $330 and quickly go up from there!

With motherboard prices this high, what’s an enthusiast on a budget looking for an inexpensive SLI motherboard supposed to do?

This is where NVIDIA’s nForce 750i SLI chipset comes in. The nForce 750i SLI chipset is NVIDIA’s budget alternative to the nForce 780i SLI. The nForce 750i SLI chipset supports DDR2 memory, just like the nForce 780i SLI, as well as PCIe 2.0, and 1333MHz FSB operation. The key difference between the 750i SLI versus nForce 780i SLI is the lack of 3-Way SLI support, with just 26 PCIe lanes total the nForce 750i SLI chipset is limited to two x8 PCIe graphics slots when running a pair of GeForce cards in SLI mode. In addition, the nForce 750i SLI chipset is limited to max memory speed of 800MHz, 4 SATA ports with 8 USB 2.0, and one Gigabit Ethernet connection. In comparison the nForce 780i SLI supports DDR2 speeds of up to 1200MHz with NVIDIA’s EPP, 6 SATA ports and 10 USB 2.0 ports.


The following chart summarizes the feature set of NVIDIA’s nForce 7-series chipset lineup:

nForce 7 Features Comparison
	nForce 790i Ultra SLI	nForce 790i SLI	nForce 780i SLI	nForce 750i SLI
Socket	LGA-775	LGA-775	LGA-775	LGA-775
CPU Support	Penryn (Yorkfield and Wolfdale) Core 2 Extreme, Core 2 Duo, Core 2 Quad, Pentium	Penryn (Yorkfield and Wolfdale) Core 2 Extreme, Core 2 Duo, Core 2 Quad, Pentium	Penryn (Yorkfield and Wolfdale) Core 2 Extreme, Core 2 Duo, Core 2 Quad, Pentium	Penryn (Yorkfield and Wolfdale) Core 2 Extreme, Core 2 Duo, Core 2 Quad, Pentium
FSB	1600MHz	1600MHz	1333MHz	1333MHz
ESA-Certified?	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
NVIDIA SLI Technology	Yes, 3-Way (3x16)	Yes, 3-Way (3x16)	Yes, 3-Way (3x16)	Yes, 2-Way (2x8)
Memory Type	DDR3	DDR3	DDR2	DDR2
Max Memory Speed	2000MHz (EPP 2.0)	1333MHz	1200MHz (EPP 1.0)	800MHz
# of PCIe Lanes	60 lanes	60 lanes	62 lanes	26 lanes
# of PCIe Links	10 links	10 links	12 links	6 links
PCIe Configuration	3x16 or 4x8, 1x16, 1x8, 4x1	3x16 or 4x8, 1x16, 1x8, 4x1	3x16 or 4x8, 1x16, 1x8, 6x1	1x16, 1x8, 2x1
PCIe 2.0	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
SATA/PATA Drives	6/2	6/2	6/2	4/4
SATA Speed	3Gbps	3Gbps	3Gbps	3Gbps
RAID	0,1, 0+1, 5	0,1, 0+1, 5	0,1, 0+1, 5	0,1, 0+1, 5
NVIDIA MediaShield Storage Technology	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Native Gigabit Ethernet Connections	2	2	2	1
NVIDIA FirstPacket Technology	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
NVIDIA DualNet Technology	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
NVIDIA Control Panel Utility	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
NVIDIA System Monitor	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
USB Ports	10	10	10	8
PCI Slots	5	5	5	5
Audio	High Definition Audio (Azalia)	High Definition Audio (Azalia)	High Definition Audio (Azalia)	High Definition Audio (Azalia)

EVGA was one of the first manufacturers to release a motherboard based on the nForce 750i SLI chipset, their nForce 750i SLI FTW has been on the market for a little over a month now and has already proven highly popular among enthusiasts on a budget. EVGA claims the board is “engineered for the win”, today we’re going to take a closer look at the board. Does it live up to the hype? Let’s find out!