Motherboards based on nVidia's nForce4 for the Pentium have been showing up steadily and we've already looked at solutions from ASUS, MSI and Gigabyte. Today, we take a look at another one and this time, its from Epox. Generally, Epox has a reputation of producing boards that are good in performance and overclocking while low on price Lets find out if their 5NVA+ SLi falls into this category or not.

Packaging

The 5NVA+ SLi comes in a nice black box with Epox's symbol for “Gold” in front and the model number. This creates a very nice effect and is sure to catch the attention of a buyer. The back side mentions some of the specifications and features but doesn’t go into much detail. We would’ve liked to see a picture of the board on the back so the buyer can quickly can get an idea of what the actual product looks like without opening the package. A carrying handle is provided which makes it easy to move the box.

Inside the box, Epox provides their power pack which contains a screw driver, some heat sinks that can be placed on MOSFETs or your RAM modules as well as the temperature measuring wire that connects to a jumper onboard and allows you to measure the temperature of any part of the board. White Serial-ATA and rounded IDE cables are included which look nice. Epox also bundles separate back plates for USB and Firewire connectors and since this is an SLI board, an SLI bridge is included. A reasonable user manual along with the drivers CD is also included in the package

Layout

Epox uses black, red and yellow colors for their onboard slots and connectors and we think they would look much better on a black PCB instead of the green that the 5NVA+ SLi uses. Continuing with the colored look, Epox places a fan on the Northbridge with rotating lights and while that may appeal to some people, we think its going a bit overboard- especially with different colored lights. In our opinion, Epox should use a single color instead of random colors as that adds a bit of sophistication.

One thing that we mention in every single Epox review and yet Epox continues to disappoint us is with the placement of the power connectors. As with most Epox boards, the 5NVA+ SLi places the main and 12v power connectors in the area between the first PCI-E slot and the CPU socket and this ends us creating cable clutter with thick cables going over your CPU and possibly Northbridge- areas which need open space to allow heat dissipating.

The CPU socket itself has reasonable room around it and you should be able to install your HSF unit easily and Epox places the memory slots next to the CPU socket. One of the IDE connectors is placed next to the memory sockets while the other is placed next to the PCI slots and we’re not sure why Epox has does this. The floppy connector is placed at the bottom edge which is also not recommended by us, however the additional USB and Firewire headers along with bottom edge look good.