Conclusions
Starting at about $130 online, the KA1 MVP is reasonably affordable for a CrossFire mobo. ECS also bundles interesting extras like the Top Hat Flash and 3.5" expansion bay insert, both of which add a little extra value to the package. Application performance is competitive, as well, although that's probably more attributable to the Athlon 64 processor and its on-die memory controller than anything else.

For most people, a motherboard with a decent price, competitive application performance, and a couple of bundled extras is good enough. Enthusiasts demand more, though, and in too many areas, the KA1 MVP just doesn't measure up. Some of the board's problems can be traced to its use of ATI's SB450 south bridge, which has consistently delivered poor PCI and USB performance. ATI isn't to blame for all the KA1 MVP's woes, though. ECS could have just as easily used a ULi south bridge chip instead of the SB450, and they should have replaced the board's 10/100 secondary Ethernet option with a GigE chip.

The KA1 MVP also suffers from a couple of layout problems that should have been caught before the board made it to market. The Serial ATA port placement needs to be fixed to ensure that cables don't interfere with longer or double-wide graphics cards, and ECS should probably add some heat sinks to the VRMs instead of relying on a tiny chipset fan for cooling. While we're griping, the KA1 MVP also needs a BIOS update that adds temperature-based fan speed control for at least the CPU fan, and preferably for all on-board fan headers. A BIOS update might also remedy some of the performance issues we encountered with the board's PCI Express peripherals.

Extreme moniker or not, the KA1 MVP doesn't have all the little things that enthusiasts have come to expect from a motherboard. ECS needs to improve in a number of areas if it wants to be taken seriously against the likes of Abit, Asus, DFI, and other enthusiast favorites, making it hard to recommend the KA1 MVP over existing SLI and CrossFire motherboards already available on the market.