MSI 6667BB-004US Detailed Features

With the top removed it is easy to see that one third of the case is consumed by the hard drive. The mount is designed for a 3.5" drive and will probably fit anything smaller though this was not tested. For MSI it was important for this case to maintain a slim vertical profile. These features all strongly emphasize that this nettop is geared towards multimedia.

The CPU and GPU occupy the left middle portion of the board and are connected to a single small fan by a copper heat transfer tube. One mini PCIe slot can be seen at the upper right along with the wireless antenna connectors. Though this is a wireless device, the wireless card is not included. There is one small screw in the bottom right that holds the hard drive mount in place. After removing the screw the mount still does not slide out. It is blocked by the front panel which must first be removed by unlatching two plastic clips. With the hard drive removed it becomes apparent the CF and memory slots must be hiding on the back of the board. The only way to access the back of the motherboard is to remove all 7 screws that hold it in place. Since the memory is not supplied everyone will get to enjoy the fun.

Removing the motherboard is not impossible, but it is still a hassle. Here's a shot of the backside of the motherboard showing the SODIMM memory slot on the right and the CF slot on the left. As long as you're installing memory, why not add a CF card just in case. It may come in handy in the future. A CF card can contain an entire distribution of Linux or possibly a media center front end. The entire computer could be used this way without ever adding a hard drive, or by saving precious hard drive space for movies and recorded television.

With that painful ordeal over, the hard drive can be installed and the case sealed up...hopefully for a long, long time. Though the side cover was easy to remove, it was ten time more difficult to replace. The rail and clip system is similar to what is standard for desktops, but the odd shape of the case prevents the cover from easily sliding into place. It had to be readjusted, realigned, retried and coerced into place. After figuring out the alignment for the first time it became slightly easier to fit thereafter.

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