Just thought I'd drop in to say what my final choice was. Got an AMD cpu, namely an athlont 64 3000+ after all. Combined that with an MSI K8T-Neo2 F which hasn't got a fan on the chipset. The result with 5 harddrives (4 in the bottom compartment) is that the cpu never goes beyond 45 degrees celcius ...

Every picture I've seen of an 865PE-NEO2 has a chipset HSF. So, did you replace that with a passive heatsink? Your probably thinking of the Neo2-fis2r boards. They have an active one. I'm planning on getting the Neo2-PFS or Neo2-V which are both passive. I have also been considering going with an A...

I am planning on getting a P180 shortly and was wondering, whether there might be a problem with the passive cooled chipset getting too warm on an MSI 865PE Neo2 when combined with a 2,93GHz celeron cooled by a Scythe Ninja without a fan. I am not jet sure whether I will be using both, or only one o...