Jetway NC92-330-LF dual-core Atom mini-ITX

Jetway NC92-330-LF dual core Atom mini-ITX motherboard

Manufacturer: Jetway
EU Price (as reviewed): €110.00 (MSRP)
US Price (as reviewed): $124.00 (ex. Tax)

There's been no shortage of small form factor motherboard coverage on bit-tech in the last few weeks, but this Jetway is a little different to the last few boards we've looked at. The uniqueness of this board is that it's not only got the usual PCI slot, but it's also got space for an add-in board, which can throw in extra hardware while keeping it low profile. Has Jetway made a great mini-ITX product and is Intel's dual-core Atom N330 up to the task? Let's find out!

Inside the Box

Jetway offers the idea of an eco-box with this low power motherboard, although the box contents don't exactly afford much either. An IDE ribbon cable, a single SATA cable, a metal rear I/O plate, a basic manual and a driver disc are all the extras stuffed into the box. We're missing an extra SATA cable perhaps but there's not much more on offer from the motherboard itself, as things like PCI brackets are not commonly supported on all mini-ITX cases.

Board Features and Layout

• Intel Atom 330 dual core CPU at 1.6GHz with HyperThreading and a 533MHz bus.
  
• Intel 945GC Express Chipset and ICH7 Southbridge
  
• One 1.8V DDR2 DIMM socket supporting up to 2 GB of system memory up to 533MHz.
  
• Intel GMA950 Integrated Graphics Engine
  
• Realtek ALC662 5.1 Channel High-Definition audio codec
  
• Realtek RTL8111C chip PCI-Express Gigabit Ethernet
  
• One PCI slot
  
• Two SATA ports
  
• One IDE port
  
• Eight USB 2.0 ports

Jetway's green and yellow motherboard is strangely quiet nice, although it does seem quite heavily weighted on the darker features. The heatsink is just 29mm high, 5mm shorter than the Gigabyte Atom mini-ITX motherboard. While not stated anywhere on either board this could be crucial to some extremely low profile cases (like the Akasa Enigma).

The fan is remarkably quiet, despite being a little 40mm one and like single-core Atom mini-ITX motherboards, the NC92-330-LF needs no more airflow. However, unlike single-core Atom boards, but the CPU heatsink on Jetway's dual-core Atom N330 board is significantly taller and held down with push-pins.


We recommend plugging in the SATA ports first since they're a little difficult to get to behind the PCI slot and memory. That single memory slot is a bit limiting too, but a 2GB module doesn't cost much on its own and it's not like you'll need 4GB of RAM with an Atom anyway, otherwise you're probably expecting it to do far too much.