Background:
Thanks to the input of several posters in this thread (and info from other sites as well), this thread has become a nice general resource of information on the MSI P6N 650i-based boards, so I've removed my original post to make more room. I've also annexed the second post in this thread and moved the heatsink and overclocking info down there.
MSI Product page:
Links to the latest 'release' BIOS, drivers and utilities can be found on these pages...
MSI P6N SLI-FI
MSI P6N SLI Platinum*
* Platinum board is basically same as FI board, plus the following:
- 100% solid caps (some interesting info from Gigabyte on Solid caps)
- heat-pipe setup across NB, SB and MOSFET areas
- fan included for NB
- S/PDIF coaxial out (in addition to the optical out that they both have)
- eSATAII port on rear, provided by separate Sil3531 ic (supports RAID 0) making 5 SATAII ports total vs 4 on FI
- packaging differences... round floppy and IDE cables and a handfull of other additional cables
- ~$50 - $55 higher price at NewEgg (it varies, depending on sales/rebates in affect)
P6N Diamond - top end 680i based board, with lots of bells and whistles (including 4 x16 PCI-E slots and onboard X-Fi audio)
P6N SLI V2 - a cost-reduced 650i based board (no firewire, a 2nd x1 PCI-E slot instead of 3rd PCI slot, CMOS jumper instead of button, different LAN controller, etc).
P6N Ultra - similar to P6N SLI V2, but uses 650i Ultra chipset, which has no SLI support (second x16 PCI-E slot is non-functional).
Official component compatibility pages:
For P6N SLI-FI
For P6N SLI Platinum
usama_ah reported the following:
...Aside from the new [Platinum] motherboards shipping with bios v1.1, they also come with a Vista drivers CD and a sticker that says "Vista Premium certified." Actually you don't need the Vista drivers CD because almost everything installed without a problem, except for one thing... which Vista found a driver for online automatically.
End-user reported successful memory pairing:
Your Mileage May Vary - some memory reported as working here may need some particular settings and some memory reported as not working might actually work, with some particular settings... The timings and voltages listed below are taken form the product pages, not what users are running them at.
Having cleared that up, memory compatibility in general on these boards has been extremely good. There have been very few reports (that didn't turn out to be something else) of some particular memory not working - even memory 'rated' to run at higher than 1.8v usually has some SPD settings to allow it to run at more reasonable voltage so you can get to the BIOS to set things up. If you have some extreme or odd-ball memory that you suspect is keeping you from booting, my first suggestion would be to try just 1 stick of it (in various slots, if needed) until you can get to the BIOS to configure it.
One last note before the list... unlike pretty much every other manufacture of modern motherboards, MSI colors thier DIMM slots 1&2 (for correct Dual Channel operation) different colors...
...so for proper Dual Channel operation, you should use DIMMs 1&2 (green slot closest to cpu and orange slot closest to cpu). The problem is, most people 'refer' to these by thier 'position' on the board, and end up calling them "slot 1&3" or even "DIMM 1&3", so just be aware of this when you read or post about DIMM slots on these boards - please be specific to avoid confusion.
[Editor's note: I'm trying to expand this list as I get new reports, so if you are successfully using some memory not listed here, please post the model number or link to the exact memory being used if possible.. thanks.]
A-DATA 1GB (2 x 512MB) DDR2 800 5-5-5-18 @1.8v ADQVE1908K (NOTE: there are some reports of both of these A-DATA memory kits listed here as...
A-DATA 2GB (2 x 1024MB) DDR2 800 5-5-5-18 @1.8v ADQVE1A16K ...working fine in DIMM3&4 (dual channel), but not in DIMM1&2 (dual channel) )
BUFFALO Firestix DDR2 800 5-5-5-?? @2.1v FSX800D2C-K2G
Corsair XMS2 DDR2 800 4-4-4-12 @2.1v Twin2X2048-6400C4
Corsair XMS2 Dominator DDR2 800 4-4-4-12 @2.1v Twin2X2048-6400C4D
Corsair XMS2 Dominator DDR2 1066 5-5-5-15 @?.?v Twin2X2048-8500C5D (no voltage listed, but I assume it's relatively high)
Corsair XMS2 Dominator DDR2 1142 5-5-5-15 @?.?v Twin2x2048-9136C5D (" ")
Crucial Ballistix 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2 1000 5-5-5-15 @2.2v BL2KIT12864AL1005 (Micron D9's)
G.Skill 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2 800 4-4-3-5 @2.0v - 2.1v F2-6400CL4D-2GBHK
G.Skill 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2 800 4-4-4-12 @2.0v - 2.1v F2-6400CL4D-2GBPK
G.Skill 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2 800 4-4-4-12 @2.0v - 2.1v F2-6400PHU2-2GBHZ
G.Skill 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2 800 5-5-5-15 @1.8 - 2.0v F2-6400CL5D-2GBNQ - At least one Newegg reviewer says it works, but it is listed here (in yellow) because multiple people in the forums have claimed problems with this specific memory on these motherboards - You have been warned . Having said that, if you jump to page #10 of this thread, CarbonBased is reporting that this memory works - and is even using 4 sticks/GBs of it (see "4GB Memory Issue" below).
KingMax Mars 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2-800 5-5-5-18 @?.??v KLDD48F-A8KI5 (or maybe KLDD48F-A8KB5 on that page - wasn't specified)
Kingston HyperX 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2-800 4-4-4-12 @1.95v KHX6400D2LLK2/2G (it's possible that they were using this KHX6400D2LLK2/2GN instead)
Patriot eXtreme Performance 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2-800 4-4-4-12 @2.2v PDC22G6400LLK
pqi TURBO 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2 667 4-4-4-12 @2.0v PQI25400-2GDB
PNY 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2 667 5-5-5-15 @1.8v D22GX53OPT (also reported to run fine at 800MHz 1.95v 4-4-4-12 and higher)
Mushkin w/EPP Profile 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2-800 4-5-4-11 @2.1v - 2.2v 996533
Mushkin eXtreme Performance 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2-800 4-4-3-10 @1.9v - 2.1v 996523 (Micron D-9, EPP)
Mushkin eXtreme Performance 2GB (2 x 1GB) DDR2-1066 5-5-4-12 @2.2v - 2.35v 996535 (Micron D-9, EPP)
OCZ Value Pro Series (2x512MB) DDR2 667 5-5-5-15 @1.8v OCZ2667512VP Also runs fine at DDR2 750Mhz 3-4-3-6-10-1T @ 2.25v And also fine at DDR2 830Mhz 4-5-4-6-3-1T @ 2.1v
OCZ S.O.E. (2x1GB) DDR2 667 4-4-4-12 @1.9v OCZ2SOE6672GK (ProMOS chips) - I'm using this in my system... also runs fine at 4-5-5-12 DDR2 800 @1.9v
OCZ S.O.E. (2x1GB) DDR2 800 5-5-5-12 @2.1v OCZ2SOE8002GK
OCZ Platinum Rev 2 DDR2 800 4-4-4-15 @1.9v - 2.1v OCZ2P800R22GK reported: "The maximum OC stable was ddr2 950mhz 5-4-4-16 @ 2.25v, on Memset was 5-4-4-16-2T 20-40-6-8-6-7.8us"
OCZ FlexXLC Edition DDR2 800 4-4-4-15 @2.0v OCZ2FX800C42GK (Micron chips - actually, these may be ProMOS now)
OCZ SLI-Ready 2GB DDR2 1066 5-5-5-15 @2.1v OCZ2N1066SR2GK (Micron D-9, EPP, 2.35v EVP)
OCZ FlexXLC Edition DDR2 1150 5-5-5-18 @2.35v OCZ2FX11502GK "We managed to successfully get the memory to an extremely fast and stable 3-3-3-9-18-1T at 2.3V with OCZ FlexXLC PC2 9200. The board not only managed the whole test bench at these timings, but sat through the stress test with them also. "
A few non-specific reports (for whatever it's worth):
2x 1gb Patriot DDR2-667 4-4-4-12-1T
512x2 Buffalo Firestix
1GB Samsung PC2-5300 5-5-5-15 @1.9v
Mixed (G.Skill/Kingston) 2x1GB DDR2-800 @ 889, 5-5-5-15-2T
4GB Memory Issue*:
This problem is apparently not limited to the MSI 650i-based boards (various boards from others including ASUS are having the same issues), but I did want to put a link here so you know about it...
P6N SLI Platinum 4Gb Slowdown
*Update: If you get to the bottom of that thread, apparently there is a BIOS update that resolves the problem:
SLI-FI - v2.13 beta BIOS or later (including the latest "2.1" released BIOS)
Platinum - v1.22 beta BIOS or later (including the latest "1.2" released BIOS)
Some Site Reviews:
P6N SLI Platinum review here at [H]ard|OCPP6N SLI Platinum review at hardwarezone
P6N FI review in MSI german forum translated to english via google here.
MSI P6N SLI Platinum: NVIDIA's 650i Part Two (AnandTech review)
MSI P6N SLI Platinum nForce 650i Motherboard Review (PCStats review)
EVGA 680i LT SLI: NVIDIA's 680i Cost Reduced - oh wait... that's not a review of the MSI P6N Platinum board... or is it?
MSI P6N SLI Platinum (bit-tech.net review)
MSI P6N SLI Platinum Motherboard Review (nV News review)
Abit and MSI take on the nForce 650i - Comparing the Fatal1ty FP-IN9 SLI and P6N SLI Platinum (techreport.com shoot-out/review/comparison)
MSI P6N SLI Platinum (viperlair.com review)
A few reviews in Spanish can be found here.
Other:
Thread here at [H]ard|Forum with some initial over-clocking info
680i overclocking thread at XS - should have similar results on 650i based boards
another thread at XS forums - P6N-Fi overclocking
Some Coolaler forum (Taiwan?) threads (some nice close up images, various testing)...
[Edit: looks like my links below didn't work out too well, so just click one of them and then go to the Hardware->New Intel Main Board and related test forum and look around .]
Initial testing thread
SLI video setup + zalman cpu cooler testing
more nice pics in this thread
NOTE: Continued in next post, below...