A year ago DFI didn't have much of a presence in the motherboard market, and then along came Jacky Huang and the "Lan Party" concept. Fast forward to the present, and DFI have firmly staked a name for themselves by providing gamer-oriented motherboards with a little florescent flash. With Team DFI roaming around the states visiting local LanParty events, like the recent CyberXGames at CES, DFI are evolving into a motherboard company that aims to speak directly to its consumers.

A couple of friends of mine who like to try out new things gave the DFI LANParty motherboards a shot a while back, and all I heard was how great the boards were... from what a great accessory package they come with, to how fast they are at stock speeds, and how great an overclocker they are... Now that it's our time to test the DFI LANParty NF2 Ultra B, I can tell you my expectations are raised pretty high.

It is rare to find a manufacturer that bundles so many things in along with their motherboards, but after opening up the box we find more than half the space is taken up with accessories! If you are thinking just a few rounded cables and PCI brackets, think again.

DFI LANParty nForce2 Ultra B Motherboard Includes: Motherboard Manual, Quick Installation Guide, Driver CD, RAID Disk, FrontX Drive Bay, Rounded IDE Cable, Rounded Floppy Cable, Window Sticker, DFI Badge, Jumpers, WinDVD, PC Transpo Strap

DFI have bundled in everything from UV-sensitive IDE and floppy rounded cables to a FrontX drive panel (USB, IEEE 1394, Audio), and even a case carry strap called the "PC Transpo." The PC Transpo is great for those of you who go to LAN parties and are tired of lugging around your PC with both arms!

The DFI NF2 Ultra B board itself, is also very well equipped. The ATX sized motherboards includes Serial ATA/Serial ATA RAID, IEEE 1394, 5.1 audio, 10/100 nVIDIA LAN and a Realtek Gigabit Ethernet controller along with nVIDIA's Soundstorm audio controller. For the true techies out there, the board also has mini power and reset buttons right on the PCB, as well as a four diagnostics LED's.