The Package
The FIC KT-748 comes in a very basic box packaging that includes an ATA-133 IDE cable, floppy cable, back panel, USB bracket, Firewire bracket, manual and a driver CD. This is pretty much a no frills motherboard for the budget and system builder market, with the exception of the firewire headers.
The Motherboard
Although it is not a fancy board, it does not mean FIC did not pack the motherboard with extra features.
- 3 memory slots, supporting up to 3 gigabytes of DDR400 memory
- 4 USB 2.0 ports at the back, with 2 more as headers for case front USB or using provided bracket
- 2 Firewire headers (through provided bracket or case front)
- 5.1 AC’97 audio
- 10/100 SiS LAN NIC
- AGP 8x support
- 5x PCI slots
Here's a pic of the back panel:
and here's one of the motherboard:
The motherboard has an extra square 12v 4-pin plug, a spec that is required by Pentium 4 motherboards but are optional on the AMD XP side. This extra plug is (supposedly) not necessary if your power supply is old and does not have one, but by plugging it in, you gain more system and overclocking stability. However, in the case of the KT748, the motherboard would refuse to post without the 12v plugged in. Although most powersupplies within the last couple years have the additional 12v plug, be aware that if you have an older powersupply chances are it will not include this plug and again, this board will not boot. This would be a good idea if the motherboard in question was a high-end tweaker's board, but as you will see later, this overclocking-friendly feature is somewhat redundant and may be an irritant if the budget minded upgrader did not account for a new powersupply.
The CPU socket does not have the extra 4 heatsink mounting holes, so the larger heatsinks such as the Swiftech line cannot be installed onto this motherboard. There are a few capacitors near the socket, so some larger heatsinks may not fit either, though we did manage to get on a Silent Boost, and stock coolers were no problem of course.
