Product Reviews

You can build a fairly quiet PC using desktop components, but if you want something small and quiet, mobile components are the way to go. Asus's N4L-VM DH motherboard is a good starting point. The microATX motherboard is small enough to fit into a tiny case and it accepts Socket 479 mobile processors, including the Core Duo and the new mobile Core 2 Duo. The board is Viiv-compliant, so it's suitable to use with Windows XP Media Center, which can use advanced power management features, including a fast return from hibernation.

Most Socket 479 motherboards require the use of a screwdriver to release the socket in order to be able to insert the processor, but Asus has replaced this design with a standard lever-operated socket. This makes it a little easier to assemble. However, Asus has also used a proprietary fan mount, so you'll be stuck with the provided cooler. It's quiet, but the opportunity to upgrade would have been nice.

MicroATX boards have a lot less space than regular ATX boards. Even so, the N4L-VM DH has a fair number

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of expansion options. First, there are two PCI and one PCI-E x1 slots for expansion cards. If you don't fancy using the onboard graphics, there's a PCI-E x16 slot so you can install a dedicated graphics card. There are two DDR2 DIMM slots, which can take DDR2 667MHz memory. They don't leave a lot of room for expansion, so make sure you buy a decent amount of memory. The slots operate in dual-channel mode, so it's best to buy two sticks of memory and populate both slots.

Otherwise, the N4L-VM DH is well stocked. The rear panel has Gigabit Lan, FireWire, four USB2 and 7.1 channel audio ports. There are two SATA2 ports, which can be used to create a RAID array. This is considerably fewer ports than you'd expect on ATX motherboards but, as the N4L-VM DH is designed to fit into a small case, it should be enough.

We tested the motherboard using a 1.83GHz Intel Core Duo T2400 processor and 1GB of DDR2 667MHz Crucial memory. The 2D performance was impressive and slightly better than we'd expect from a similarly specified notebook, mostly due to using a desktop hard disk. The onboard Intel graphics weren't as impressive; they're not suitable for playing games, although they're fine for standard Windows use. We got better performance using the PCI-E x16 slot, so you can use this board for games if you're willing to buy a dedicated graphics card.

If you want to build a quiet Media Center PC, the N4L-VM DH is a good starting point, but it's expensive and you'll have to buy a mobile processor to use with it. A cheaper option is ECS's 945G-M3 motherboard, which costs less and supports the more common LGA775 processors.