AOpen AK72 KX133 Slot-A ATX

The Bad

In spite of carrying the AOpen name, the AK72 wasn't as stable as most AOpen boards we've encountered in the past. The board itself was fairly stable but definitely not as stable as the ASUS K7V-RM and definitely not up to par with AOpen's award winning BX boards in terms of stability. When you're in a position like AOpen there are definitely very high expectations, and when those expectations aren't met the disappointment can be great.

The layout and incredible size of the board is pretty unusual for AOpen as well, the board may have problems in cramped cases but luckily the positioning of the DIMM slots makes it so that you shouldn't have any problem occupying all three DIMM slots, even in the smallest of ATX cases.

It's a bit disappointing to see AOpen sacrifice a potential sixth PCI slot for an AMR slot which, if positioned as a shared slot could have easily made room for a sixth PCI slot. It would have also been nice for AOpen to include a set of USB connectors for use with the USB header near the PCI slots that controls USB 3&4, unfortunately it seems as if you can't always get everything you hope for.

USB Compatibility

• Number of Front Universal Serial Bus Root Ports: 2

• Number of Rear Universal Serial Bus Root Ports: 2

• USB IRQ Enable/Disable in BIOS: Yes

• USB Keyboard Support in BIOS: Yes

Recommended SDRAM

Recommended SDRAM: 1 x 128MB Corsair PC133 SDRAM; 1 x 128MB Mushkin PC133 SDRAM

SDRAM Tested: 1 x 128MB Corsair PC133 SDRAM; 1 x 128MB Mushkin PC133 SDRAM

Manufacturer: Corsair
Purchase Website: http://www.corsairmicro.com

Manufacturer: Mushkin
Purchase Website: http://www.mushkin.com